Sect. 259The Matter and Form of the Eucharist: Minister, Recipient, EffectsThe Matter and Form of the Eucharist: Minister, Recipient, Effects

I. The Holy Eucharist being a sacrament, it must have matter and form in the sense already explained (§ 246).

1. Just as in the case of Baptism washing is the natural act, so here in the Eucharist eating and drinking are the natural acts chosen by our Lord to be the means of conveying spiritual nourishment to our souls. “Eat,” “drink” (Matt. 26:26, 27). But an important difference should be noted. No change takes place in the water used for Baptism; whereas in the Eucharist the bread and wine are, as we have seen, changed into the body and blood of our Lord. The Blessed Eucharist is therefore a permanent sacrament, our Lord’s body and blood being present not only while the sacrament is being received, but also before and after use (Council of Trent, sess. xiii. can. 4). Bread and wine may be said to be the matter of this permanent sacrament (Decr. pro Armenis), as they are the natural things raised by transubstantiation into the body and blood of our Lord. Wheaten bread (ἄρτος) and wine of the grape must be used, as they are the typical food and drink used by our Lord. Whether the bread should be leavened or unleavened has long been a point of dispute between the Eastern and Western Churches. The Council of Florence (1439) decided that either kind of bread was sufficient for the validity of the sacrament; but that leavened bread should be used in the East, and unleavened bread in the West. “It hath been enjoined by the Church on priests to mix water with the wine that is to be offered in the chalice; as well because it is believed that Christ the Lord did this, as also because from His side there came out blood and water; the memory of which mystery is renewed by this commixture, and whereas in the Apocalypse of blessed John the peoples are called ‘waters,’ the union of that faithful people with Christ their Head is hereby represented” (Council of Trent, sess. xxii. ch. 7).

2. The form of the sacrament, by which the bread and wine are changed into the body and blood of our Lord, consists of the words, “This is My body,” “This is My blood,” or “This is the chalice of My blood.” After what has been said in the preceding sections, no further proof of this is required. We may observe, however, that the Epiclesis after the consecration in the Greek liturgy,—praying “God to send His Holy Spirit upon the gifts set forth, and to change the bread into the body of Christ, and the wine into His blood,”—does not produce the change (which has indeed already been made), but serves to declare what has taken place, and to implore that it may have a salutary effect upon Christ’s mystical body, the Church (see Franzelin, De Euckaristia, thes. vii.).

II. As the Eucharist is a permanent sacrament, we must distinguish between the act of consecration and the act of administration.

I. No one but a bishop or a priest has the power of consecrating. Our Lord Jesus Christ “offered up to God the Father His own body and blood under the appearances of bread and wine, and under the symbols of those same things He delivered (His own body and blood) to be received by His Apostles, whom He then constituted priests of the New Testament; and by those words, ‘Do this in commemoration of Me,’ He commanded them and their successors in the priesthood to offer (them), even as the Catholic Church hath always understood and taught.… If any one saith that by those words, ‘Do this,’ etc., Christ did not institute the Apostles priests, or did not ordain that they and other priests should offer His own body and blood, let him be anathema” (Council of Trent, sess. xxii. ch. 1, can. 2). And the Fourth Lateran Council (ch. 1) had already defined that “no one but a priest (sacerdos) rightly ordained can perform (conficere) this sacrament.” St. Justin, describing the ceremonies of the Mass, says, “To him who presides over the brethren [τῷ προεστῶτι,, i.e. the bishop or priest] bread is brought, and a cup of wine mixed with water, and he, having taken them, sends up praise and glory to the Father of all things, through the Name of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and at much length he makes a Eucharist (Εὐχαριστίαν … ποιεῖται) for that God hath vouchsafed to them these things.… He who presides having given thanks (eucharistized), and all the people having expressed their assent, they who are called among us deacons give to each of those present a portion of the consecrated (eucharistized) bread, and wine and water, and carry away a portion to those who are absent” (Apol., i. n. 65; see also Tertullian, De Præscr., cap. xli.; De Corona Militis, cap. iii.; St. Cyprian, Epist., iv.; Origen, Hom. iv. in Num., n. 3). “Not even deacons,” says St. Epiphanius (Hær., lxxix. n. 4), “are allowed to perform any sacrament in the ecclesiastical order, but merely to be the ministers of those already completed.” St. Jerome says that the heretic Hilarius, when he left the Church as a deacon, “could not perform (perficere) the Eucharist, as he had no bishops or priests” (Adv. Lucif., n. 21; see also St. John Chrysostom, De Sacerdotio, lib. iii. n. 4, etc.). “It hath come to the knowledge of the holy and great synod,” says the Council of Nicæa (can. 18), “that in certain places or cities the deacons give the Eucharist to the presbyters; a thing which neither canon nor custom hath handed down, that they who have not authority to offer, should give the body of Christ to those who do offer (τοὺς ἐξουσίαν μὴ ἔχοντας προσφέρειν, τούτους τοῖς προσφέρουσι διδόνται τὸ σῶμα τοῦ Χριστοῦ).”

2. The administration of the Eucharist to the faithful properly belongs to priests, though under extraordinary circumstances a deacon may administer. “It was always the custom in the Church of God,” says the Council of Trent (sess. xiii. chap. 8), “that laymen should receive the Communion from priests, but that priests when celebrating should communicate themselves.” The passages just cited from the Fathers clearly show who are the ordinary and extraordinary dispensers of the sacrament. We may add the authority of the Fourth Council of Carthage (398), which, in its 38th canon, permits the deacon to administer if necessity requires (si necessitas cogat). So far we have been speaking of solemn administration. In former ages of the Church, clerics in minor orders, and even the laity, were permitted in cases of necessity to carry the Blessed Sacrament and administer it. St. Tarcisius, a young acolyte, was beaten to death by the pagans while he was bearing the Holy Eucharist; and St. Dionysius of Alexandria tells how he gave the Holy Eucharist to a boy to carry to the dying Serapion (see Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History, book vi. chap. 44).

III. The dispositions required for the worthy reception of the Eucharist are treated of in moral and ascetical theology. Here it will be sufficient to quote the words of the Council of Trent: “The more the holiness and divinity of this heavenly sacrament are understood by a Christian, the more diligently ought he to give heed that he approach not to receive it but with great reverence and holiness, especially as we read in the Apostle those words full of terror, ‘He that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh judgment to himself.’ Wherefore he who would communicate, ought to recall to mind the precept of the Apostle, ‘Let a man prove himself.’ Now, ecclesiastical usage declareth that necessary proof to be, that no one conscious to himself of mortal sin, how contrite so ever he may seem to himself, ought to approach to the sacred Eucharist without previous sacramental confession” (sess. xiii. chap. 7). We shall now discuss two important questions: (1) the necessity of receiving this sacrament, and (2) communion under one kind.

I. The Holy Eucharist is not absolutely necessary for salvation (necessitate medii); that is to say, it is possible for a person to be saved without ever having received the sacrament. “Little children who have not reached the use of reason,” says the Council of Trent, “are not by any necessity obliged to the sacramental Communion of the Eucharist, forasmuch as having been regenerated by the laver of baptism, and being incorporated with Christ, they cannot at that age lose the grace which they have already acquired of being the sons of God. Not therefore, however, is antiquity to be condemned if in some places at one time it observed that custom; for as those most holy Fathers had a reasonable (probabilem) cause for what they did in respect of their times, so assuredly is it to be believed without controversy that they did this without any necessity thereof unto salvation” (eos nulla salutis necessitate id fecisse; sess xxi. chap. 4). And Scripture teaches that baptism alone is necessary: “He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved” (Mark 16:16); “He saved us by the laver of regeneration” (Tit. 3:5); “Baptism being of the like form now saveth you also” (1 Pet. 3:21). Moreover, theological reasoning tells us that if the Eucharist were necessary, it would be so either for acquiring the state of grace or for preserving it; whereas, on the contrary, it requires us to be already in a state of grace, and that state can be lost only by sin. We have said not absolutely necessary, because the Eucharist is necessary in the sense that we are obliged by our Lord’s express command to receive it: “Except you eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink His blood, you shall not have life in you” (John 6:54); “Do this in commemoration of Me” (Luke 22:19; 1 Cor. 11:23 sqq.). “Our Saviour, when about to depart out of this world to the Father, instituted this sacrament, in which He poured forth, as it were, the riches of His Divine love towards man, making a remembrance of His wonderful works; and He commanded us, in the participation thereof, to venerate His memory, and to show forth His death until He come to judge the world. And He would also that this sacrament should be received as the spiritual food of souls, whereby may be fed and strengthened those who live with His life Who said, ‘He that eateth Me, the same also shall live by Me’ “ (Council of Trent, sess. xiii. chap. 1). The Council, renewing the decree of the Fourth Lateran Council (1215), commands the faithful to communicate every year, at least at Easter (can. 9).

2. “Laymen and clerics, when not celebrating,” says the same Council (sess. xxi. chap. 1), “are not obliged by any Divine precept to receive the sacrament of the Eucharist under both kinds (species); neither can it by any means be doubted, without injury to faith, that communion under either kind is sufficient for them unto salvation. For although Christ the Lord in the Last Supper instituted and delivered to the Apostles this venerable sacrament in the species of bread and wine, not therefore do that institution and delivery tend thereunto that all the faithful of the Church are bound by Divine ordinance (statuto) to receive both kinds. But neither is it rightly gathered from that discourse which is in the sixth of St. John … that communion under both kinds (utriusque speciei communionem) was enjoined by the Lord; for He who said, ‘Except you eat,’ etc., also said, ‘He that eateth this bread shall live for ever.… The bread that I will give is My flesh for the life of the world.’ “ We read in the Acts that the faithful “were persevering in the doctrine of the Apostles, and in the communication of the breaking of bread (τῇ κοινωνίᾳ τῇ κλάσει τοῦ ἄρτου), and in prayer” (2:42). St. Luke is here describing what the faithful did. The Apostles, of course, consecrated under both kinds. St. Paul, writing to the Corinthians, alludes to the same practice of receiving under one kind: “Whosoever shall eat this bread, or drink the chalice of the Lord, unworthily, shall be guilty of the body and of the blood of the Lord” (1 Cor. 11:27).

It is commonly objected that the present practice is (a) completely modern, and (b) contrary to the essence of the sacrament.

(a) We grant that for the first twelve centuries it was customary for the faithful to receive under both kinds. Nevertheless we have numerous instances of communion under one kind alone. Thus, to infants the Eucharist was often given under the form of wine, as is still the practice among the Greeks. In times of persecution or under difficulties, the consecrated bread was carried away from the church for private Communion. The sick also often communicated under one kind alone. It may be inferred from St. Leo (Serm. 42, De Quadragesima) and Sozomen (Hist., viii. 5) that both at Rome and at Constantinople, even in public, the Communion was sometimes received by the faithful under the appearances of bread only. So, too, in England in the old Saxon days (see Bede, Hist. Eccl. ii. 5). In the so-called “Masses of the Presanctified” of the Greek Church during Lent, and of the Western Church on Good Friday, both the priests and the people received the consecrated Host alone. Our Good Friday “Mass” is described in the ancient Ordo Romanus (Migne, Patr. Lat., tom, lxxviii. p. 954). Moreover, theological reasoning tells us that if Christ is whole and entire under either kind alone, those who receive under either kind receive the whole of Christ.

(b) But does not communion under one kind destroy the very essence of the sacrament, which consists in eating and drinking? We reply that we do receive both the body and blood of Christ under either kind, and so the essence of the sacrament (partaking of the heavenly banquet) is retained. Those who do not believe in the real objective presence of our Lord in the Host, and who maintain that the essence of the sacrament consists in eating mere bread and drinking mere wine, are of course logically bound to insist on receiving under both kinds. But our doctrine of the Real Presence lays us under no such necessity.

The reasons why the Church has enjoined the use of one species (kind) are thus stated by the Catechism of the Council of Trent: “The greatest caution was necessary to avoid spilling the blood of the Lord on the ground, a thing that seemed not easy to be avoided if the chalice ought to be administered in a large assemblage of the people. Besides, as the Holy Eucharist ought to be in readiness for the sick, it was very much to be apprehended that if the species of wine were long unconsumed it might turn acid. Moreover, there are very many who cannot at all bear the taste or even the smell of wine; lest therefore what is intended for the health of the soul should prove noxious to that of the body, most prudently has it been enacted by the Church that the faithful should receive the species of bread only. It is further to be observed that in several countries they labour under extreme scarcity of wine, nor can it be brought from elsewhere without very heavy expenses, and very tedious and difficult journeys. In the next place, a circumstance most of all to the point, the heresy of those was to be uprooted who denied that Christ, whole and entire, is contained under either species, and asserted that the body only without the blood is contained under the appearances (species) of bread, and the blood only under the appearances of wine” (Part ii. ch. iv. n. 64).

IV. The effects of the Holy Eucharist are described at length by our Lord Himself (John 6:48 sqq.): “I am the bread of life.… If any man eat of this bread he shall live for ever.… He that eateth My flesh and drinketh My blood hath everlasting life, and I will raise him up at the last day … [he] abideth in Me and I in him.… He that eateth Me, the same also shall live by Me.… He that eateth this bread shall live for ever.” The Author and Fount of life becomes the true meat and drink of our souls; He abides in them, gives them life and preserves it in them. The physical union of Christ with us by entering within us, is not strictly the effect, but rather the application, of the sacrament; it is the spiritual union by charity which is the proper effect. See the passages quoted from the Fathers, supra, § 257.

1. The Eucharist, however, is a sacrament of the living (p. 372). It was not instituted to confer the first grace; it cannot properly produce its effects unless the soul is already spiritually alive. “Whosoever shall eat this bread, or drink the chalice of the Lord, unworthily (ἀναξίως), shall be guilty of the body and of the blood of the Lord.” “Let a man prove himself (δοκιμαζέτω … ἑαυτόν, ‘put himself to the test, examine himself’), and so let him eat of that bread and drink of the chalice; for he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh judgment (κρίμα) to himself” (1 Cor. 11:27–29). So, too, the Fathers and the Liturgies insist that the Eucharist shall not be given to any who are in a state of sin. The very nature of the sacrament—the food and drink of our souls—requires that the recipient should be already alive in order to receive it. “If it is unbeseeming,” says the Council of Trent, “for any one to approach to any of the sacred functions unless he approach holily; assuredly the more the holiness and dignity of this heavenly sacrament are understood by a Christian, the more diligently ought he to give heed that he approach not to receive it but with great reverence and holiness, especially as we read in the Epistle those words full of terror, ‘He that eateth,’ etc. Wherefore he who would communicate ought to recall to mind the precept of the Apostle: ‘Let a man prove himself.’ Now, ecclesiastical usage declares that necessary proof to be, that no one conscious to himself of mortal sin, how contrite soever he may seem to himself, ought to approach to the sacred Eucharist without previous sacramental confession” (sess. xiii. ch. 7, and can. 11). “If any one saith that the principal fruit of the most Holy Eucharist is the remission of sins … let him be anathema” (can. 5).

2. But do not the Fathers and the Liturgies often speak of remission of sins among the effects of the Eucharist? True; but this remission is attributed to the Eucharist as a sacrifice, or else it refers only to daily defects and venial sins. Many theologians also maintain that even mortal sins may be remitted by the Eucharist, though only per accidens; that is to say, if a person, unaware that he is in mortal sin, and having attrition for sin, approaches the sacrament, his sin will be remitted by the action of the sacrament. The remission of venial sins is a consequence of the principal effect of the Eucharist; for the union of charity with God, who is charity itself, removes all obstacles to the perfection of this union. Hence our Saviour “would that this sacrament should be received … as an antidote whereby we may be freed from daily faults, and be preserved from mortal sins” (Council of Trent, sess. xiii. ch. 2).

3. The Fathers frequently speak of the effects of the Eucharist upon our bodies. The intimate union of our bodies with Christ’s body makes us of one body and one blood (σύσσωμοι καὶ σύναιμοι) with Him. And from this union with Him, who cannot see corruption (Ps. 15:10), there results an antidote to that bodily corruption which is the effect of sin. “The body attains … to a participation of, and commixture with, Him Who is life. For as they who from some device have taken poison, quench its deadly potency by some opposite (other) remedy … so we, again, after having tasted of that which dissolves our nature, as a matter of necessity must also stand in need of that which reunites what has been dissolved.… What, then, is this? Nothing else but that very body which was manifested to be more powerful than death, and which was the principle of our life. For as a little leaven, according to the Apostle, leaveneth the whole lump, so when that body which was by God smitten with death is within our body it changes and transfers the whole unto itself” (St. Gregory of Nyssa, Or. Cat., c. 37). This action on our bodies consists partly in allaying concupiscence (St. John Chrysostom, In Joann. Hom., xlvi. n. 4), partly in adapting them for resurrection. “He that eateth My flesh and drinketh My blood hath everlasting life, and I will raise him up at the last day” (John 6:55). See St. Cyril of Alexandria, In Joann., tom. iv. p. 363; St. Irenæus, lib. iv. cap. 18, n. 5. Our Saviour would have the Eucharist “to be a pledge of our glory to come and everlasting happiness, and thus be a symbol of that one body whereof He is the Head, and to which He would fain have us, as members, be united by the closest bond of faith, hope, and charity, that we might all speak the same things, and there might be no schisms among us” (Council of Trent, sess. xiii. ch. 2). See St. Thomas, 3, q. 79; Franzelin, theses xvii.–xix.; De Augustinis, part ii. art. 7; and Bossuet, Traité de la Communion sous les deux espèces.

On the Sacrament of the Eucharist see, in addition to the authors mentioned in the beginning of this chapter: Chardon, Hist. des Sacrements, livre i. sect. iii.; Billot, De Ecclesiæ Sacramentis, p. 287 sqq.; Turmel, Hist. de la Théologie Positive, pp. 132, 306, 432; Batiffol, Etudes d’Histoire et de Théologie Positive, 2e série; Bp. Hedley, The Holy Eucharist; Bridgett, The Holy Eucharist in Great Britain.