Maundy Thursday
Exodus 12:1-14And the Lord said to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt:
This month shall be to you the beginning of months; it shall be the first in the months of the year.
Speak ye to the whole assembly of the children of Israel, and say to them: On the tenth day of this month let every man take a lamb by their families and houses.
But if the number be less than may suffice to eat the lamb, he shall take unto him his neighbour that joineth to his house, according to the number of souls which may be enough to eat the lamb.
And it shall be a lamb without blemish, a male, of one year; according to which rite also you shall take a kid.
And you shall keep it until the fourteenth day of this month; and the whole multitude of the children of Israel shall sacrifice it in the evening.
And they shall take of the blood thereof, and put it upon both the side posts, and on the upper door posts of the houses, wherein they shall eat it.
And they shall eat the flesh that night roasted at the fire, and unleavened bread with wild lettuce.
You shall not eat thereof any thing raw, nor boiled in water, but only roasted at the fire; you shall eat the head with the feet and entrails thereof.
Neither shall there remain any thing of it until morning. If there be any thing left, you shall burn it with fire.
And thus you shall eat it: you shall gird your reins, and you shall have shoes on your feet, holding staves in your hands, and you shall eat in haste; for it is the Phase (that is the Passage) of the Lord.
And I will pass through the land of Egypt that night, and will kill every firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and beast: and against all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgments; I am the Lord.
And the blood shall be unto you for a sign in the houses where you shall be; and I shall see the blood, and shall pass over you; and the plague shall not be upon you to destroy you, when I shall strike the land of Egypt.
And this day shall be for a memorial to you; and you shall keep it a feast to the Lord in your generations, with an everlasting observance.
1 Corinthians 11:23-29
For I have received of the Lord that which also I delivered unto you, that the Lord Jesus, the same night in which he was betrayed, took bread,
And giving thanks, broke and said: Take ye and eat: THIS IS MY BODY, which shall be delivered for you. This do for the commemoration of me.
In like manner also the chalice, after he had supped, saying: This chalice IS THE NEW TESTAMENT IN MY BLOOD. This do ye, as often as you shall drink, for the commemoration of me.
For as often as you shall eat this bread and drink the chalice, you shall shew the death of the Lord, until he come.
Therefore, whosoever shall eat this bread, or drink the chalice of the Lord unworthily, SHALL BE GUILTY OF THE BODY AND BLOOD OF THE LORD.
But let a man prove 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 to himself, not discerning the body of the Lord.
John 13:1-15
Before the festival day of the pasch, Jesus knowing that his hour was come, that he should pass out of this world to the Father: having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them unto the end.
And when supper was done (the devil having now put into the heart of Judas Iscariot, the son of Simon, to betray him),
Knowing that the Father had given him all things into his hands and that he came from God and goeth to God,
He riseth from supper and layeth aside his garments and, having taken a towel, girded himself.
After that, he putteth water into a basin and began to wash the feet of the disciples and to wipe them with the towel wherewith he was girded.
He cometh therefore to Simon Peter. And Peter saith to him: Lord, dost thou wash my feet?
Jesus answered and said to him: What I do, thou knowest not now; but thou shalt know hereafter.
Peter saith to him: Thou shalt never wash my feet, Jesus answered him: If I wash thee not, thou shalt have no part with me.
Simon Peter saith to him: Lord, not only my feet, but also my hands and my head.
Jesus saith to him: He that is washed needeth not but to wash his feet, but is clean wholly. And you are clean, but not all.
For he knew who he was that would betray him; therefore he said: You are not all clean.
Then after he had washed their feet and taken his garments, being set down again, he said to them: Know you what I have done to you?
You call me Master and Lord. And you say well: for so I am.
If then I being your Lord and Master, have washed your feet; you also ought to wash one another's feet.
For I have given you an example, that as I have done to you, so you do also.
Throughout the English-speaking world, today is known as Maundy Thursday, also called Holy Thursday. Today celebrates the institution of many things peculiar to Christianity, but among the most important things instituted today was the Eucharist. Our Lord celebrated the first Mass in an upper room in Jerusalem, where he took the Passover with the Apostles for the final time. In instituting the Eucharist, Our Lord also instituted the Sacred Priesthood. In washing the feet of the Apostles, he gave us an example of humility as the People of God, and the washing of feet reminds the clergy especially that the Office they hold is one of service to the larger faithful. The honors and dignity that they receive as a part of their office are to be used for the benefit of the whole of the faithful. Holiness of the clergy is fostered in the same manner that holiness of the individual is promoted: There can be no holiness without humility. I find being humble to be a struggle, largely because humility is not in our nature, our nature as sinful human beings is to be proud and boastful. I think Jesus understood this, which is why he used a custom that the Apostles would know all about (a Passover meal) to institute a new sacrifice and a new lesson of humility: Our Lord gave us his own Body and Blood using the form and accidents of bread and wine as a way for us to commemorate and show his death until he comes again. He humbled himself twice over, once to give his body to death on a cross for the salvation of the whole world, and once to reduce his very body to the appearance of a simple piece of bread and his very blood in a simple cup of wine for the salvation of our own individual soul. He gave us the Eucharist so that we, individual and ordinary people, could have direct individual and personal contact with Jesus. We could touch, taste, and feel the very body, blood, soul, and divinity of the same Lord who died to save us!
The lack of faith of many of our Protestant brothers and sisters in this great truth is not unlike the lack of faith of many of Jesus’ early followers, when he explained to them that he was the Bread come down from heaven, and that if any eat of this bread, he will live forever. He said “Amen, amen, I say unto you: except you eat the flesh of the Son of man and drink his blood, you shall not have life in you.” The same passage of scripture tells us that the Jews murmured among themselves “how can this man give us his flesh to eat,” yet Jesus persists, saying: He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood hath everlasting life: and I will raise him up in the last day. “For my flesh is meat indeed: and my blood is drink indeed. He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood abideth in me: and I in him. As the living Father hath sent me and I live by the Father: so he that eateth me, the same also shall live by me. This is the bread that came down from heaven. Not as your fathers did eat manna and are dead. He that eateth this bread shall live for ever.” The scripture goes on to say that some disciples (not the twelve) said about Jesus’ description of the Eucharist: “This saying is hard, and who can hear it?” Jesus responded, doth this scandalize you? If then you shall see the Son of man ascend up where he was before? It is the spirit that quickeneth: the flesh profiteth nothing. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. But there are some of you that believe not. Therefore did I say to you that no man can come to me, unless it be given him by my Father.” The scripture tells us that many of these disciples were indeed scandalized because “after this, many of his disciples went back and walked no more with him.” (See John 6:32-70)
Many evangelicals and fundamentalists, while declaring with great confidence that the Bible is the infallible Word of God (and must be interpreted literally in nearly all instances), apparently lack the faith to believe that Jesus meant exactly what he said here. Instead of openly “walking no more with him,” they take the liberty of re-interpreting Scripture to fit their own lack of ability to comprehend the notion that Our Lord could appear under the auspices of bread and wine. In this sense, they lack faith, and in the sense of lacking faith, these same evangelicals have ceased to “walk with him.” To be fair, there are plenty of Catholics who deny the truth of the Eucharistic Christ as well, but these Ones do so out of rebellion and (more likely) lack of good catechesis as much as a lack of faith. For people who follow Our Lord Jesus Christ, however, to say “he is speaking symbolically here, he must be, he can’t possibly be talking about having us literally eat his body and drink his blood. That can’t be!” He never called those followers back for an explanation did he? He did not stop them and say “wait, I was speaking symbolically.” No…both they and he knew precisely what he was saying. When so-called followers of Christ deny that the Eucharist is the actual Body and Blood of Christ, they commit the same sin that those early followers did who “walked no more with him.” They deny Christ himself. The saddest thing about this is that most of them don’t even realize it.
Tonight marks the beginning of the Paschal Triduum, when the Lord begins his passage from death unto life. This is the Passover of the Lord.
Nicole and I try each year to celebrate this in a way that most reflects the spirit of the way the Apostles would have celebrated this night. We roast a breast of lamb, we eat unleavened bread and bitter herbs, and we drink four cups of wine. Although I am certain that we do not do this in the exact manner that Our Lord would have done (tonight, for example, we will braze the lamb in the crockpot as opposed to roasting it in the oven as we did last year, largely due to time constraints), we use the opportunity to do as the Apostles would have done and take the Passover with the Lord. One thing I know we do not do according to both the Scriptural account and the ancient custom of the Church is that in the ancient days, early in the Church, many Christians ate the Holy Thursday meal before the Mass of the Lord’s Supper. (For this reason, the customary one hour fast before receiving the Eucharist is dispensed with tonight.) However, taking the lamb and wine after Mass has no less meaning than taking it beforehand, largely because of the fact that in these three days, the Church takes great pains to try and be exact with the timing of how things occur, so as to use Her observances as a way to re-enact (in a sense) the Passion and Resurrection of the Lord. It is thus fair to say that Nicole and I will finish our Passover meal tonight at about the same time the Lord would have, and he would then go to the Garden of Gethsemane for the prayers that would precipitate his arrest and trial…
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A dear friend of mine and I were talking about the case of Terri Schindler Schiavo on the telephone last night. He seemed to believe that this terrible tragedy of a legalized murder would be enough to spur a great uprising. I agree that it could spur that, but I question whether it will. I fear that most people outside of the Catholic world (since most of the major characters in this real drama are Catholic: Terri, her parents, her pastor, even Governor Jeb Bush, who is trying so hard in his own way to uphold the teachings of Holy Mother Church) are painfully unaware that this woman is not in a persistent vegetative state, as the pro-death media are reporting. Many good non-Catholic Christians are under the false impression that the adulterer Michael Schiavo is merely carrying out the wishes of his wife, as opposed to murdering her that she might forever be silenced. The case today will go to the Supreme Court of the United States, whose Justices will be Terri’s last hope. Even now Governor Bush is trying to get state custody of Terri so that she may live. Pray for Terri Schiavo…she is truly this year’s Easter victim.
posted by Deacon David Oatney @ 11:07 AM
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