5.

Liturgy and Eucharist in the Twentieth Century

Although the Catholic Church officially still recognizes the doctrines of the Council of Trent as its own, much
of Catholicism is quietly laying them aside. Most of its theologians no longer speak about the mass as a
sacrifice, few of its preachers and catechists urge special devotion to the Blessed Sacrament, and virtually no
congregations regularly attend the Latin mass that the Tridentine dogmas defended and explained. The term
"transubstantiation," once found in every Catholic catechism, is virtually unknown to younger Catholics, and
even the word "mass," though still in popular use, is disappearing from the professional vocabulary of Catholic
theologians and liturgists.
The immediate cause of this shift was the change in Catholic worship that resulted from the Second
Vatican Council, but the beginnings of the shift were already being felt decades before in the liturgical
movement (see pages 116-117). Initially this movement toward liturgical renewal was neither an organized
movement nor an attempt at genuine renewal. Rather it began as an attempt at "restoration," an effort to restore
to the Roman mass some of the things it seemed to have before the Council of Trent. And in the beginning it
affected only the monks in a few European monasteries.
During the 1950s certain reforms in the liturgy in fact began to occur, but they were extremely modest.
For example, some dioceses were given permission to celebrate evening masses on Sundays and holy days, the
liturgies of Holy Week were revised to be a little more like the Lenten practices of the patristic period, and the
long hours of compulsory fasting before communion were shortened to three and then to one hour. Then in
January 1959, John XXIII announced his intention to convoke an ecumenical council, and the world's Catholic
bishops responded to the pope's call to update the church by approving the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy
the first conciliar document of Vatican II. It was the end of an era, for the constitution called for changes in the
liturgy more thorough than any in over four centuries. It was even more than the liturgists had ever dreamed
possible in the period before the council, and yet it was the logical culmination of their years of research and
efforts to increase popular participation in the liturgy.
In the years following the Second Vatican Council, change replaced sameness as a liturgical norm in the
Catholic Church. In fact a series of changes in the mass were implemented in such quick succession in the
sixties and seventies that older Catholics sometimes began to yearn for the "good old days" when they knew
what to expect when they went to church on Sundays. First only parts of the Latin mass were translated into
modern languages, then the whole mass was translated, and finally the liturgy itself was simplified and made
more flexible. As a result, the Roman mass today (for it is still basically a single ritual with allowable variations,
all of which have been approved by Rome) is a more biblical and eucharistic form of worship that emphasizes
scripture readings and communion rather than the consecration. It can be celebrated by a single priest or
concelebrated by two or more priests, and it allows for the readings and other liturgical actions to be performed
by lay people as well. Almost all of the priest's prayers are said in a tone of voice that is audible to the
congregation, and the people are expected to respond to the prayers at certain points and to join in the recitation
of other prayers such as the creed and the Our Father.
Seen from the perspective of the people in the pews, then, the change in the Catholic mass could hardly
have been more complete. Instead of being a service that they were expected to watch from a distance, it has
become a form of worship in which they are expected to participate. Instead of being a silent ritual, it has
become one with very few moments of silence. Instead of being a "sacrifice of the mass" at which few people
communicated, it has become a "eucharistic liturgy" at which almost everyone communicates. And instead of
being a legalistic obligation that must be fulfilled on Sunday morning, it has become a religious requirement
that may be satisfied dry Saturday evening as well as on Sunday.
 These recent revisions have also altered the priest's role in and experience of the mass. He used to offer
the mass rather privately, up at the altar with his back to the congregation, but the altar has now been moved
away from the rear wall so that he faces the people and acts as a leader in public worship. His role as a preacher
used to be secondary to his function as a minister of the Blessed Sacrament, but now he is supposed to give
regular homilies explaining the scripture readings. His preparation for mass used to be rather cursory, since low
masses did not vary much from day to day, but now he must select from a variety of alternative prayers and
readings. and on weekends he often has to help design and coordinate a liturgy that expected to have some
ceremonial variety from week to week.
In many parishes, lay people have become increasingly involved in the preparation and celebration of
the weekly eucharist. Liturgy teams plan for what will happen at the service, selecting among optional prayers
and readings, composing prayers that reflect parishioners' personal needs and social awareness, choosing
appropriate music, designing floral and symbolic arrangements for the interior of the church, and coordinating
the efforts of a variety of people who work both behind the scenes and in public view. More affluent parishes
even employ full- or part-time liturgy directors and music directors to oversee this planning and coordinating
effort. The result is a liturgy that involves a great number of active participants: greeters who welcome
parishioners as they arrive; ushers who show them to their seats, take up the collection, and help direct the
people going to communion, an organist or other musicians, and a choir or a less formal singing ensemble, who
provide music and lead the singing of the parishioners, lectors who Introduce the liturgy, read the scriptures, and
make announcements, people chosen to carry the symbolic gifts of bread and wine to the altar, acolytes and
perhaps a deacon who assist the priest, eucharistic ministers who help In the distribution of communion,
especially when the cup is shared in addition to the consecrated hosts, and perhaps even a hospitality committee
that serves coffee and doughnuts to those who like to socialize before going home. In many ways, then,
Catholics' experience of eucharistic worship quite different from what it was before the council, and this is true
for lasty and clergy alike.
Initially it was thought that both the rate of change and the variety to which it gave rise would increase
in the future. The Second Vatican Council approved the notions of liturgical change and variety in principle, and
since the council itself sanctioned only certain changes and limited variety, some critics pointed out difficulties
in the revisions. The new rubrics allowed the mass to be adapted to special needs and occasions for weddings
and funerals, for teenagers and children, for formal church celebrations and for informal home gatherings. But
even this adaptability did not seem to be enough in a Catholic world that included a bewildering diversity of
national and regional, racial and cultural, economic and social groups. Could a single style of liturgy be the best
form of worship day after day and week after week for so many who are so different? This is the question that
liturgists and theologians began to ask, and some have even answered it in the negative. Bishops, too, especially
those in nonwestern countries, were aware that in the period before Trent their predecessors enjoyed greater
freedom in liturgical affairs, and in the 1970s some dared to suggest a return to regional autonomy in matters of
worship. During the 1980s and 1990s, however, expansive growth in variety was curtailed both through the
appointment of more conservative bishops and through Vatican directives that disallowed certain earlier
experimentation.

One of these directives was issued in 2001 regarding the proper implementation of the Constitution on
the Sacred Liturgy. Known by its Latin name, Liturgiam Authenticam (meaning authentic liturgy), it revised the
norms for translating liturgical texts from Latin into modern languages that had been in place since 1969. In
general, it said that the earlier practice of translating the words of the mass into modern phrases that captured
the sense of the original was no longer acceptable, and that scripture passages used in the mass should be guided
by what is said in the Latin translation of the Bible. In particular, it insisted that translators follow the word
order of the master Latin text, that they seek to preserve the dignity, beauty, and doctrinal precision of the Latin,
and that they avoid inclusive language when talking about human beings as well as gender-neutral language
when talking about God. It allowed that a very literal translation may at times sound odd, but it suggested that
any departure from ordinary language could be used as an opportunity for catechesis.
Around the same time, the International Commission on English in the Liturgy (ICEL) that had created
the first English translation of the mass was disbanded and replaced by one that was more attuned to the new
directives from Rome This commission produced a revised translation that was gradually approved by English-
speaking episcopal conferences around the world and that was adopted in the United States in 2011. Among
other things, the large Roman Missal replaced the thinner liturgical books that had been in use after the council,
and laity were instructed to reply "And with your spirit" instead of "And also with you" when the priest said
"The Lord be with you. Although the publication of the new missal aroused strong feelings in favor and against
the more traditional language, both sides in the liturgy debate were somewhat surprised by the fact that the
revised mass texts had neither the positive effects that conservatives had hoped for nor the deleterious effects
that liberals had anticipated.
Undaunted, conservative Catholics continue to press for what Benedict XVI called a "new liturgical
movement" that would bring mass translations more in line with the missals that had been in use before Vatican
II, and they applauded the pope's lifting of restrictions on the use of the 1962 Latin mass. They believe that
active participation in the liturgy, which the bishops at the council had called for, includes reverent silence and
inward appreciation of the eucharistic mystery, as well as greater use of Gregorian chant to foster deeply
worshipful attitudes. Above all, they deplore what they perceive as a secularist mentality and a fascination with
worldly fashions that detract from the authentic worship embodied in the traditional mass that was the same for
all Latin rite Catholics around the world.
Notwithstanding, great autonomy continues to be exercised in places where a shortage of priests raises
the need for deacons or lay people to lead Catholics in public prayer. Without the authority to preside at the
eucharist, these pastoral ministers must create new forms of worship such as communion services using already
consecrated hosts, or scripture services suggestive of what might be found in Protestant congregations. Critics
of this situation point out the irony of losing the eucharist as the central form of Catholic worship at a time
when the liturgy has been revised to make it more accessible to people, and they sometimes fault the Vatican for
not relaxing the rule of celibacy so that more priests might be ordained. On the other hand, there are those who
even prefer this type of situation, saying that it gives added significance to the eucharist when it is able to be
celebrated, and that in the meantime it provides for greater freedom and variety in worship. The initial impetus
for change and variety had not come from pastoral sensitivity or practical necessity, however, but from the
liturgical movement and from the historical facts it had uncovered about the eucharistic liturgy in earlier eras.
Before Vatican II those facts suggested that other forms of the mass were possible and that development could
occur again as it had in the past. They also suggested that other explanations of the eucharist were possible
besides the scholastic one, and the shift toward nonscholastic philosophies and biblical theology in the twentieth
century showed how that possibility might be realized. In the ten years prior to the council, this shift in Catholic
thinking about the eucharist was slight, but it was definite enough to justify the changes in eucharistic practice
that have already taken place In the years since the council, the shift has become more noticeable and it is
suggesting changes that are yet to come.
CHANGES IN EUCHARISTIC THEOLOGY
 The main direction in recent years has been toward a reunification of thinking about the Blessed
Sacrament, communion, and the mass. Today Catholic theologians prefer to speak of the mass as the eucharistic
liturgy, and there is a tendency to regard it as a single sacramental action so that eucharistic theology today is as
much a theology of the liturgy as it is of the consecrated elements. In the 1950s, however, the theology of the
eucharist was still primarily a theology of the Blessed Sacrament, and the first step toward a new eucharistic
theology was a reexamination of what happened during the consecration.
The Catholic explanation of the consecration since the Middle Ages had been given in terms of
transubstantiation: the appearances of the bread and wine remained while their substance or reality
changed into the body and blood of Christ. In 1955, however, F J. Leenhardt proposed that the consecration
could also be explained by another theory that came to be known as "transfinalization." The basic idea behind
it was that the "final reality" of any created thing is determined by its maker and not by what it is made of. A
carpenter who made a cabinet, for example, made something whose final reality was a cabinet even though he
made it out of wood. He had actually produced something new, since before only the wood existed but now
there was a new reality, brought into being through the intention of its creator. In an analogous way one could
understand the eucharist, Leenhardt suggested, since it started out as bread and wine but its final reality was
different. It was something new brought into being through the intention of its creator, for Jesus Christ, who
instituted the sacrament, had intended that the bread and wine should become his body and blood Of course
there was an important difference between the two cases since the artifact was made by a human action while
the sacrament was produced by the power of God, but the whole point of the analogy was that God could in fact
change the final reality of the bread and wine since he was the ultimate author of all creation.
Leenhardt was a Protestant theologian who presented his theory in an ecumenical spirit, hoping that it
might be an explanation that both Protestants and Catholics could agree on. For many Protestants, however, the
theory explained too much since it suggested a real change in the elements about which they could not agree.
And for most Catholic theologians the theory explained too little since it admitted that the elements were
changed without fully explaining how the change took place. But Leenhardt's theory did show that it might be
possible to explain the consecration in other ways besides transubstantiation, and in the following years
theologians continued to explore that possibility.

A theory that gained wider acceptance in Catholic theological circles was called "transignification." It
was developed in a number of ways by various authors using philosophical categories from existentialism and
phenomenology such as those discussed in chapter V. The basic philosophical idea behind it was that
significance or meaning is a constitutive element of reality as it is known to human beings, and this is especially
true of human realities like attitudes and relationships. Such human realities are embodied and expressed in
symbolic actions such as gestures and words, and they are known through the meaning that those actions have
for people. The words "I love you," for example, embody and express one human reality, while a slap on the
face embodies and expresses quite another. But sometimes symbolic actions can mean more than one thing, and
in these cases they can embody and express very different realities. Obeying an order, for example, can be a
symbolic action signifying either willing agreement or unwilling compliance: the meaning of the action and the
human reality involved are different in the two cases. Finally, the meaning of a symbolic action can change, and
the human reality that is signified changes with 1. Young men wore long hair in the 1960s as a sign of rebellion
against society, for example, but when they did so in the 1970s it was more usually a sign of their social
conformity. By the 1990s the length of a man's hair symbolized a lifestyle choice rather than a social statement.
 Symbolic actions, therefore, can embody and express and in that sense reveal things that cannot be
directly seen but are nonetheless real, and theologians like Schillebeeckx, Rahner, and Cooke have used this
philosophical insight in developing their understanding of the Catholic sacraments. Looked at in this way the
sacraments are symbolic actions, ritual actions of words and gestures, which embody and reveal not only
human realities but also divine realities. They are signs through which God's grace and presence are
communicated and through which people come in contact with the transcendent realities that the sacraments
signify. Yet these same theologians recognize (as earlier Catholic thinkers did not) that many of the symbolic
actions called sacraments were not invented by Jesus: baptisms, sacred meals, marriage, and ordination rites,
for example, already existed in ancient Judaism. What Jesus did then in "instituting" the sacraments (either
directly or through the church) was to change the significance of these actions, giving them new meanings and
enabling them to reveal the same divine mysteries that he himself incarnated and revealed during his lifetime. In
this sense, then, most of the sacraments were instituted not by direct invention but by transignification: Christ
changed the significance that existing rituals had for those who believed in him and in doing so changed the
realities that they embodied and revealed.
With respect to the eucharist, the proponents of transignification suggest that at the last supper Christ
changed the meaning of a common Jewish ritual to a memorial of his death and resurrection, and that he
changed the meaning of the bread and wine from what they signified for Jews to a sacrament of his body and
blood. But since meaning is an intrinsic aspect of reality as it is known to human beings, by changing the
meaning of the ritual and the elements he thereby transformed their reality, making them objectively and for all
time signs through which he would be present in the church and through which Christians could personally
encounter him. In parallel fashion the reality of the bread and wine is changed during the mass not in any
physical way but in a way that is nonetheless real, for as soon as they signify the body and blood of Christ they
become sacramental, embodying and revealing Christ's prese presence in a way that is experienceably real. In
other words, when the meaning of the elements changes, their reality changes for those who have faith in Christ
and accept the new meaning that he gave them, whereas for those without faith and who are unaware of their
divinely given meaning, they appear to remain bread and wine.
Despite its apparent orthodoxy, the Catholic hierarchy has had some difficulty in accepting
transignification as an explanation for the eucharist. To many of them, including Pope Paul VI in his
encyclical on The Mystery of Faith, transubstantiation seems to be part and parcel of the Catholic belief
in the real presence, and so to change the explanation of it seems tantamount to changing the doctrine
itself. In addition, words like "meaning" and "significance" seem to be very subjective, suggesting that the only
change in the eucharist is in the mind rather than in the sacramental elements themselves, and this is an
explanation that was explicitly rejected by the Council of Trent After historians demonstrated that
transubstantiation had never been proclaimed a doctrine of the faith by any pope or council, however, many
theologians came to accept transignification as a possible theory even if they did not endorse it
Another reason for theological tolerance had to do with changes in the theology of the mass itself,
changes that were proposed by the same theologians whose earlier ideas had been accepted by many of the
bishops at the council. Researchers in the liturgical movement discovered not only earlier forms but also earlier
theologies of the eucharist in the patristic era, and when theologians began to incorporate them in their own
writings. church leaders had to admit that these too were part of the Catholic heritage. At the same time scholars
in the biblical movement rediscovered the connection between the last supper and the scriptural ideas of
covenant, meal, and Passover, and since these connections were found in the Bible the hierarchy had no
objection to them. Slowly it became clear that for twelve hundred years Christians had been able to talk about
the eucharist without speaking of it in terms of transubstantiation, and that the scholastic understanding of the
mass was somewhat narrow when seen in the light of the entire Catholic tradition.
Since the Second Vatican Council, then, Catholic theology has been explicitly attempting to recover the
patristic and scriptural understanding of the eucharist and to translate it into terms that make sense to people
today. At the same time, it has been gradually abandoning the Tridentine insistence on transubstantiation and on
the mass as a sacrifice in favor of other interpretations that are equally Catholic but less scholastic. And in doing
this it has been shifting its attention from the Blessed Sacrament as an object of worship to the entire liturgy
as an act of worship.
The general direction of these changes could already be seen in Vati- can II's Constitution on the Sacred
Liturgy in 1963. The council spoke of the eucharist in scriptural rather than scholastic terms and it placed
the liturgy in the context of the mystery of Christ's death and resurrection as the fathers had often done. It
reiterated the Catholic belief in the real presence of Christ in the Blessed Sacrament, but not before it had
emphasized the presence of Christ in the church and in the entire eucharistic liturgy According to the council
document the mass is, then, an action of Christ and an action of the church. It is an action of Christ
because he initiated it and continues to be present in it through his presence in the worshiping community. As
the word of God he is present in the reading of scripture at each mass and he addresses himself to all those who
listen with faith in him. He is also present sacramentally in the bread and wine that are offered to God in
praise and thanksgiving and that are distributed as a sign of spiritual communion with him. But the mass is also
an action of the church, for it is in and through the community's worship that Christ's action takes place.
Christians join themselves to Christ's redemptive sacrifice by offering themselves in praise and thanksgiving to
God the Father just as Jesus had done at the last supper And by fully participating in the liturgy they most fully
express what the church is and hopes to be united with Christ and responsive to his word.
Of all the themes that the council developed in connection with the eucharist, the one which appears the
most in its other documents is unity the unity of each Christian with Christ and the unity of all Christians with
one another. "Really sharing in the body of the Lord in the breaking of the Eucharistic bread, we are taken up
into communion with him and with one other" (Church 7) As Paul said, Christians are the body of Christ, and
so by sharing in the eucharist they both affirm and become what they are In Christ. Catholics are united not
only with one another but also with all other Christians, and it is "the wonderful sacrament of the Eucharist by
which the unity of the Church is both signified and brought about" (Ecumenism 2). The mass is "a supper of
brotherly and sisterly communion and a foretaste of the heavenly banquet" (Church in the Modern World 38),
and so it should be "the center and culmination of the entire life of the Christian community" (Bishops
30). According to the documents of the council, therefore, the eucharistic liturgy was to be understood as a sign
of Christian unity, and it was largely with this theme in mind that the mass was revised to invite greater
congregational participation.
In the years following the council, theologians continued to emphasize the biblical and patristic
meanings of the eucharist without rejecting the scholastic interpretations still familiar to many Catholics. They
continued to explore the ideas that the eucharist is a meal and as such a sign of sharing with others, that it is a
memorial of the last supper and as such a sign of participation in Christ's death and resurrection, that it is an act
of thanksgiving and as such a communal action of the entire congregation. They continued to elaborate on the
prayers and rituals that have become a part of the mass through the centuries on the penitential rite, on the
readings and responses, on the hymn of glory and the profession of faith, on the prayers of petition and the
offering of gifts. The first effect of these theological reflections was the church-wide revision of the mass in the
late 1960s and the early 1970s, but they continued to affect the celebration of the liturgy in individual dioceses
and parishes around the world. For the eucharist had been shown to have not one but many meanings, any one
or combination of which can be highlighted during a particular mass.
Liturgical theology, starting in the 1980s, carried these developments ever further, as theologians
reflected on the experience of the renewed liturgy in the light of both historical scholarship and the teachings of
the Second Vatican Council. The council had broadened the notion of Christ's presence to include not only
his sacramental presence in the bread and wine but also his presence as the word of God in the scripture
readings of the mass, and indeed his presence as the risen Lord in the assembly of believers. Since these are
ideas that were prominent in the early centuries of Christianity, liturgical theologians prefer not to engage in the
type of metaphysical theologizing that emerged in the Middle Ages, instead they talk about the liturgy in
scriptural and liturgical terms. In other words, they talk about what is happening in the liturgy and do not use
philosophy to explain how it is happening. By looking at the entire liturgy instead of focusing on the
consecration of the bread and wine, they develop what might be called a theology of eucharistic worship rather
than a theology of eucharistic change.
From the perspective of liturgical theology, then, the eucharist is a prayerful action of an assembled
Christian community, gathered as the body of Christ in remembrance of his death and resurrection in which
they continue to participate, and united with one another as they worship God the Father in the power of the
Holy Spirit. The whole assembly is thus the principal actor in the liturgy, making eucharistic worship happen,
rather than the priest who presides at the liturgical action. The worshiping community makes it possible for
Christ to be present in the proclaiming of Gods word in the scriptures, in the thanksgiving that it offers to the
Father, in the remembrance of Jesus' last supper, and in the giving and receiving of the eucharistic bread and
wine. The community's worship is a memorial of the life, death, and resurrection of Christ, which they continue
to experience in their lives; it is sacrificial because they are united with Jesus in his offering of his will to God
and his life to others, and it is a sign of God's kingdom to come as a foretaste of the caring and love that join
people into God's family The section on the eucharist in the 1994 Catechism of the Catholic Church reflects
many of the developments that took place during the preceding decades. Its approach is predominantly
scriptural and patristic, liturgical and spiritual, with a minimal amount of reference to scholastic theology.
Traditional Catholic doctrines on the eucharist are firmly embedded in this section, but they do not dominate the
treatment. Given the centrality of Catholic worship, it is not surprising that the Catechism devotes more
attention to it than to any other sacrament, almost a hundred numbered paragraphs (1322-1419). Moreover, its
emphasis is on the eucharist as an act of worship rather than on eucharist as an object of devotion. In this
respect its treatment continues the approach taken by the bishops at the Second Vatican Council.
After noting that the eucharist is the third of the sacraments of initiation (1322), the Catechism drops all
reference to the eucharist's role in Christian initiation and focuses instead on its role in weekly and even daily
Catholic worship. Using an often-cited phrase of the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy, the Catechism
characterizes the eucharist as "the source and summit of the Christian life" (1324, the quotation is from
Liturgy 11) Acknowledging the "inexhaustible richness of this sacrament," it reviews the many terms used to
refer to it: eucharist, Lord's supper, sacrifice, liturgy, communion, and mass (1328-1332).
As the Catechism does for the other sacraments, it reviews references to the eucharist in the scriptures,
first looking at precedents primarily in the Old Testament (1334-1336) and then recounting the institution of the
eucharist in the New Testament (1337-1344). The Catechism devotes only three paragraphs to the history of the
mass (1345-1347), but it gives a somewhat lengthy explanation of the liturgical dynamics of eucharistic
worship, that is, the movement of the celebration from the initial gathering of the assembly to the reception of
communion (1348-1355).
 Within this liturgical context, the Trinitarian structure of eucharistic worship is noted (1356-1358),
followed by explanations of how the mass offers praise and thanksgiving to God the Father (1359-1361), how it
is a memorial of and participation in Christ's sacrificial death (1362-1372), and of how Christ is made present
by the power of the Holy Spirit (1373-1381). It is here that the Catechism treats traditional Catholic teachings
such as the mass as a sacrifice and the real presence of Christ both in the liturgy and in the consecrated
bread and wine. Its treatment reflects recent developments in liturgical and systematic theology, and
transubstantiation is mentioned only once, in a quotation from the Council of Trent (1376).
The Catechism concludes with a lengthy subsection on holy communion (1382-1401) and a less lengthy
subsection on the eucharist as an eschatological sign (1402-1405). Most of the treatment of communion focuses
on eucharistic spirituality, that is, interior self-preparation for communion, spiritual encounter with and union
with Christ through the reception of communion, and the spiritual benefits of this encounter. Although the Cat
In this subsection utilizes some very traditional terminology, its treatment is devotional rather than scholastic
when it talks about the fruits of communion being union with Christ, forgiveness of sins, removal of the
inclination to sin, constitution of the church, unity with other Christians, and commitment to the poor. These
themes lead naturally to the concluding paragraphs on the eschatological nature of the eucharist in which the
spiritual experience of communion is regarded as a taste of what heaven will be like.
At its present stage of development, therefore, the eucharistic liturgy is a multivalent religious ritual, that
is, it is a complex sacramental sign that can express and reveal a variety of Christian values and meanings. For
traditionalists it can still be primarily an act of private devotion focused on the real presence of Christ in the
host. For those in tune with the changes implemented after Vatican II it is fundamentally an act of public
worship, a common prayer of thanksgiving, and a celebration of Christian unity. For the majority of Catholics,
however, the meaning they find in any particular liturgy and the value they derive from it varies from mass to
mass. Some times the scripture readings or the homily may reveal a new dimension of the Christian mystery,
sometimes a prayer they listen to or say aloud may intensify their awareness of their relation to God and to
others, sometimes the actions of those at the altar or those around them may silently illuminate the purpose for
which they have gathered together. Sometimes the occasion for the liturgy, the place in which it is celebrated, or
the persons who take part in it may say as much or more to individual participants as the pre- scribed prayers,
the prepared readings, or the ritual actions. And for those who are inwardly ready for the liturgy when it begins
and who are receptive to whatever may disclose itself to them as it progresses, the mass can reveal a rhythmic
sequence of transcendent meanings in sacred space and time.
It is as though the eucharist today is not a single door to the sacred but a multiple door to sacred truth
and mysterious reality. In its long and varied history it has opened to Christians the reality of divine presence
and the inner truth of Christ's death and resurrection. Its bread and wine have symbolized the sacred
significance of being united as in one body and of being poured out in sacrifice like blood. Its multitude of
prayers have defined the meaning of Christian life and articulated the range of Christian experience from abject
sinfulness to joyful holiness. Its interchangeable readings from the Bible have laid open the full sweep of the
Judeo-Christian understanding of God and humanity, of good and evil, of life and death.
At various points in its history, eucharistic worship has emphasized now one and now another facet of
the Christian mystery, sometimes clearly and sometimes obscurely. Today, however, an awareness of that
history has opened the possibility of a multifaceted awareness of that same mystery, the mystery that Christ
incarnated in his life and that Catholics find in the Bible and the other sacraments. In its root, perhaps, it is a
single mystery but in its manifestations it is complex, revealing a sacred dimension to almost every aspect of
human existence. And the eucharist as a constantly repeated and variable liturgy is the only Catholic sacrament
of the seven that can unlock the door to the rich complexity of that simple mystery.