Kolo. I read a lot of things. What I can't seem to get on this forum is a straight answer to a lot of questions asked. You've been kind enough to answer questions. But, the original topic was concerning the sacrifice of Christ. The statement was made that God does not desire sacrifice. I then asked what is the Eucharist. The response was "Thanksgiving."
The EWTN website says "The Holy Eucharist is a sacrament and a sacrifice." On the OCA's website it says" The Orthodox Church denies the doctrine that the Body and the Blood of the eucharist are merely intellectual or psychological symbols of Christ's Body and Blood. If this doctrine were true, when the liturgy is celebrated and holy communion is given, the people would be called merely to think about Jesus and to commune with him "in their hearts." In this way, the eucharist would be reduced to a simple memorial meal of the Lord's last supper, and the union with God through its reception would come only on the level of thought or psychological recollection...the Orthodox tradition does use the term "symbols" for the eucharistic gifts. It calls, the service a "mystery" and the sacrifice of the liturgy a "spiritual and bloodless sacrifice."
So, if God does not demand or desire sacrifice, why is one offered up to Him on a regular basis? Such was the question.
"So, if God does not demand or desire sacrifice, why is one offered up to Him on a regular basis? Such was the question."
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. 55 He that eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath everlasting life: and I will raise him up in the last day.
John 6
First, in a way trivial but in a way not: Sacraficere means "to do a holy thing, as I have done said before. I've said it three times now, so it's true.
Of COURSE, the Holy thing we're doing usually is giving something up, like a man running to first base or an unblemished ram a year old either from our sheep or from our goats.
Second, the sacrifice of Christ on Calvary is THE sacrifce par excellence. All sacrifices up until then point to it.
Because it was a Sacrifice offered by the Christ, it is at once temporal and eternal. And once you hit eternal, the normal rules of time change.
Therefore in the Mass, we are, so to speak invoking or otherwise contacting the eternal. Calvin (!) says, (I read this a LONG time ago -- it may even be true) that when we sing the Sanctus, the hymn of the Seraphs, we are taken up into heaven - or something like that.
It is not some NEW sacrifice, some repetition, that we are doing. It is THE sacrifice, brought into the now.
At one point in my life I had a very great grief. (The cause was small, not a great tragedy at all. I'm a sap.) I have read about grief and ministered to those in grief, so I had some clue about what was happening to me. But what was happening was that I lost all sense of where and when I was in time and space. Really. I was driving and not only did I not know where I was, though I'd been on the road many many times before, I didn't know WHEN I was. Was I in my 50's or was I in my 20's? I was uncertain and confused. The new loss trashed my memory for a few minutes.
When we "remember" in the mass, we "remember" big time. We do some SERIOUS remembering.
What was THEN is NOW, what was THERE, is HERE.
Now, of giving-up-type sacrifices there are many kinds. Some are to propitiate an angry person, as one might give some money to someone one had injured. Some are to procure the release of a bond, as one pays off the debt and gets title to the pickup.
And some are to get to where you can crunch the bad guys. One sends a small weak unit to distract the enemy's big and strong one, while one's own big and strong unit gets behind the enemy. All these are sacrifices in the "Giving something up, like for instance your life" sense.
And every parent knows that he or she has taken on some burden and given up some ease to show the little ones that, yes, Papa can, from time to time, be disciplined so they can too.
In these and possibly other ways I, without benefit of the Magisterium looking over my shoulder with the lighter fluid nearby, think we can properly call the Mass a sacrifce and what Jesus did on Calvary (but also with his whole life) a sacrifice.
Once again, rushing in where other fools fear to tread, I remain your most humble and verbose servant ....
I did answer. Because we want to. Were the Eucharist demanded of us, it would be of no benefit to us.