2025/11/03

220. Priesthood of the New Covenant

The word "apostle" does not appear in the Gospel of John. This is because the theme of the Gospel of John is the "priesthood of the New Covenant." However, God planned the "priesthood of the New Covenant" to be inseparable from the apostolate (cf. Jn 19:26-27), which makes it difficult for us to draw attention on that theme. Thus, we tend to think that this Gospel simply deals with highly spiritual issues. 

Furthermore, the fact that the "priesthood of the New Covenant" is inextricably linked to the Eucharist makes us feel even more challenged by John's Gospel. Therein lies an unknown territory that human information and knowledge, even today, cannot quite keep up with. The lack of clarity about it may cause a particular conflict between the "priesthood of the New Covenant" and the men who receive it, concerning the Eucharist, such as "I am not a Eucharist-making machine" and "I have an apostolate to aspire to." 

It seems to me that this is very similar to the conflict that occurs between pregnancy and the woman who accepts it. For example, a particular conflict may arise concerning the child she bears in her body, such as "I am not a child-making machine" or "I have my own life." There may be similarities between these two cases in the various issues that arise there, even though they seem unrelated. The fact that they feel conflicted in this way and that problems arise in these situations is itself proof that each of them is sincerely, if unconsciously, engaged with eternal life and human life. This proof is supported by the sincere response of those around them who are not directly involved in these issues at the moment. I believe that increasing their supporting power also depends ultimately on revealing the truth about the "priesthood of the New Covenant." 

The Gospel of Luke tells us that when Jesus instituted the Eucharist, he said, "This is my body which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me" and "This cup which is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood" (Lk 22:19-20). The "new covenant," said to be "for you," is the “priesthood of the New Covenant”. Jesus commanded, "Do this." This command is addressed to all believers gathered in Jesus' name. The Gospel of John does not depict the scene of the institution of the Eucharist, so that the "priesthood of the New Covenant" described in the Synoptic Gospels can be highlighted. 

Observing the opening phrases of the Synoptic Gospels, the Gospel of Matthew begins with Abraham, the Gospel of Mark begins with a quotation from the prophet Isaiah, and the Gospel of Luke takes the form of a report. If we focus only on this distinction, we can imagine, in the Gospel of Matthew, the Father who intends God's plan, in the Gospel of Mark, the Son who fulfills prophecy, and in the Gospel of Luke, the Holy Spirit who leads us to the result (enlightenment). The characteristics of these Gospels are easy to understand, as they seem to point in different directions and yet deal with the same theme of apostolate. 

The Gospel of John, on the other hand, begins with the words: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God" (Jn 1:1-2). These words imply that the Father and the Son are one. It is proof that the "priesthood of the New Covenant," which Jesus conferred on the Apostles along with the Eucharist, was in accordance with the will of the Father. The following words, "all things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made" (1:3), indicate that at Jesus' last table, as at Creation, the body and blood of Christ were made through the Word. 

Many of the disciples who heard the words of Jesus testifying about the bread of life did not understand his words, as it is written, "In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it" (Jn 1:4-5) (cf. 6:60). Similarly, it is also difficult to understand the "priesthood of the New Covenant." But in the "priesthood of the New Covenant," which is with the Eucharist, made through the Word, is life, and it is the light of men. The light shines in the darkness. At the end of the scene on the bread of life, we read as follows. 

"After this many of his disciples drew back and no longer went about with him. Jesus said to the twelve, 'Do you also wish to go away?' Simon Peter answered him, 'Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life; and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God.'" (Jn 6:66-69). 

Maria K. M.

 2025/10/27

219. The Priesthood and the Gospel of John

The fishermen who followed Jesus and became Apostles after hearing his word became the first to eat from the Tree of Life, which no one had ever eaten from before. Thus, Jesus Christ showed the world "the way to the tree of life" (Gen 3:24), which God had protected by expelling Adam and placing cherubim east of the Garden of Eden with the flaming sword turning every way. That was as Jesus said, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father, but by me" (Jn 14:6). Jesus spoke these words in the Gospel of John. 

The priesthood is a major theme in the Gospel of John. The words that the priest says to the heavenly Father on the altar, "so that it may become for us the Body and Blood of your most beloved Son, our Lord Jesus Christ," cause the same phenomenon in the priest as what happened to Mary, the mother of Jesus. At that moment, the Holy Spirit descends on the priest, and the power of the Most High overshadows him. So, the child to be born, the Eucharist, "will be called holy, the Son of God" (Lk 1:35). The Mother who gave birth to Jesus in the world, filled with the Holy Spirit, symbolises the priesthood. On the cross, Jesus united his mother and the disciple whom he loved in a parent-child tie. The Gospel says, "And from that hour the disciple took her to his own home" (Jn 19:27). This scene informs the successors of the Apostles that the proof is here that Jesus conferred the new priesthood on the Apostles and that they received it. 

The content of John's Gospel develops, often relating to the three Synoptic Gospels, as described below. It does so in order to get at the theme of the priesthood. As discussed in the previous issue, the dialogue between Jesus and Peter in Luke's Gospel, when Jesus summons the first disciples, contained a significant context for the priesthood. When Jesus finished teaching the people from Peter's boat, he instructed Peter to let down the nets for a catch. To which Peter replied, "Master, we toiled all night and took nothing! But at your word I will let down the nets" (Lk 5:5). These words of obedience by one man who would later receive the priesthood, cancelled Adam's disobedience to God, which was the source of many people's sins. This obedience, which was derived under Jesus' guidance, was inherited by the successors of the Apostles and became the foundation on which many were made righteous. 

Peter, surprised by the great catch, said, "Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord" (Lk 5:8). These words were accepted by God as words that met his will and made up for Adam's treachery to God. Peter was chosen to be the one to fulfil God's words to Adam in Genesis, "In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; you are dust, and to dust you shall return" (Gen 3:19), i.e., the one to assume the priesthood. The words, "In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread," refer to the priesthood. In the words of God that follow, the hope is implied that even with the natural body of a creature returning to the earth, one will be resurrected as one who returns to a body of dust, which God has formed from the dust of the earth and breathed into it the "breath of life" (2:7). The new priesthood is charged with bringing this hope to all. That is testified to by the words of Jesus when he said, "Henceforth you will be catching men" (Lk 5:10). 

Apostle Peter was not only chosen as the head of the Apostles and the rock of the Church, but was also the Second Adam, so to speak, whom Old Testament history had prepared to be given the priesthood so that He could celebrate with the people the days that He had blessed and hallowed (cf. Gen 2:3). This important dialogue between Jesus and Peter in Luke's Gospel can be more clearly understood by connecting it with the scene in John's Gospel when he summons the first disciples, as follows. And we can also make up for the fact that the name of Peter's brother, Andrew, is not mentioned in this important scene. 

According to the Gospel of John, one of the first two among the disciples of John the Baptist to follow Jesus was Simon Peter's brother, Andrew. He took Simon to Jesus. Jesus looked at him and said, "So you are Simon the son of John? You shall be called Cephas (which means Peter)" (Jn 1:42). If we read the scene of the fishermen in Luke's Gospel based on this sequence of events, we see that Jesus and Peter had not met each other for the first time, which makes us focus on the dialogue between them here. 

Maria K. M.

 2025/10/20

218. The Establishment of Reconciliation

As Christians, we can still read God's plan from what is written in Genesis. That is because the New Testament has been established. 

When creatures of the same species become plural, accidental information is generated among them. This accidental information first appeared when God brought the woman he had created to the man. The man said, "This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh" (Gen 2:23). However, Genesis states that God used the bone of the "man" in the creation of the woman but does not mention the flesh. I believe the man expressed the accidental information because God had taken one of ribs of the "man" and "closed up its place with flesh" (2:21). 

The man, Adam, was not created by God specifically as a male. The "man" -- the one before there were men or women --, when one of his ribs had been taken away, became the man, Adam. So, the man, who inherited the body and memories of the "man", had three memories. The memory of God-given "work" (cf. Gen 2:15), the memory of "knowledge": "You may freely eat of every tree of the garden; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die" (2:16-17), and the memory of the "experience": "Whatever the man called every living creature, that was its name. The man gave names to all cattle, and to the birds of the air, and to every beast of the field; but for the man there was not found a helper fit for him" (2:19-20). However, as we later learn, as for the memory of "knowledge", the man could not exactly share it with the woman. That is because human accidental information continually arose between them, and their memories were newly overwritten (cf. 3:1-5). 

"In the cool of the day" (Gen 3:8), the Lord God came walking through the garden and called Adam. God had a plan. He planned to prepare Adam for priesthood so that He could celebrate with the people the day which he had blessed and hallowed (cf. 2:3). For this purpose, "The LORD God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to till it and keep it" (2:15). But Adam and the woman, whose memory had been overwritten, forgot God's command, "You may freely eat of every tree of the garden" (2:16), and did not take from the "tree of life" and eat. Instead, they took and ate from the "tree of the knowledge of good and evil", of which God had commanded, "You shall not eat" (2:17). 

Adam then ignored the memory of his "experience" that "for the man there was not found a helper fit for him" (Gen 2:20) in those he had named, and named the woman, whom God created from "the man", as he had given names to other creatures. That was because he was misinformed that "she was the mother of all living" (3:20). Thus, Adam's disobedience in perceiving the woman as equal to other living creatures was decisive, and he was driven out of the Garden. However, God did not change His plan to give Adam the priesthood, as it is written, "The LORD God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from which he was taken" (3:23). 

Eventually, Noah, who had survived the flood, built an altar to the Lord (cf. Gen 8:20), Abraham met Melchizedek, king of Salem, the priest of God Most High (cf. 14:18), and God ordained Aaron and his sons as priests (cf. Ex 29:9). Thus, the long story of the Old Testament, beginning with Genesis, shaped the history of the formation and development of Adam, i.e. men, to make them fit for the priesthood that God planned. These Old Testament histories and the old priesthood end with the birth and life of John the Baptist as Jesus said, "For all the prophets and the law prophesied until John" (Mt 11:13). And Jesus Christ, the Son of God, at the beginning of his ministry, finally found a new Adam to whom he gave the priesthood of the New Covenant. They, later called the Apostles, were the very descendants of Adam who grew to the extent that they achieved reconciliation with God. 

"And he [Jesus] saw two boats by the lake; but the fishermen had gone out of them and were washing their nets. Getting into one of the boats, which was Simon's, he asked him to put out a little from the land. And he sat down and taught the people from the boat" (Lk 5:2-3). 

The fishermen must have somehow listened to what Jesus was saying. "And when he had ceased speaking, he said to Simon, 'Put out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch.' And Simon answered, 'Master, we toiled all night and took nothing! But at your word I will let down the nets.'" (Lk 5:4-5). How long God had been waiting to have such an exchange with the descendants of Adam! 

"And when they had done this, they enclosed a great shoal of fish; and as their nets were breaking, ... But when Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus' knees, saying, 'Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord.'" (Lk 5:6-8). With these words of Peter, God has received the true answer of the man to the question He had asked that day in Genesis, "Have you eaten of the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?" (Gen 3:11). 

"And so also were James and John, sons of Zeb'edee, who were partners with Simon. And Jesus said to Simon, 'Do not be afraid; henceforth you will be catching men.' And when they had brought their boats to land, they left everything and followed him" (Lk 5:10-11). Having heard Jesus' words and followed him, they became the first to take the fruit from the "tree of life" and eat of it. 

Maria K. M.

 2025/10/13

217. Reconciliation

As we discussed in the previous issue, the words that the priest says to the heavenly Father on the altar, "so that it may become for us the Body and Blood of your most beloved Son, our Lord Jesus Christ," cause the same phenomenon as what happened to Mary, the mother of Jesus. At that moment, the Holy Spirit descends on the priest, and the power of the Most High overshadows him. So, the child to be born, the Eucharist, "will be called holy, the Son of God" (Lk 1:35). The words Mary received from the angel were testified to by the Apostle Peter, who called Jesus "the Christ, the Son of the living God" (Mt 16:16) and "the Holy One of God" (Jn 6:69). In imitation of this, priests and believers today are to witness to these words of Peter continually to the Eucharist. 

But when Peter said, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God,” why did Jesus noted that the Father's will was in those words, saying, "Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jona! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven" (Mt 16:17)? This question takes us back to the Genesis account, "And they heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden. But the LORD God called to the man" (Gen 3:8-9). God may have called Adam to give him a mission. But they had already disobeyed God's will at that time. God did not know this because the Lord God, who had "created man in his own image" (1:27), did not dare to know how the will of man, whom He had "breathed into his nostrils the breath of life" (2:7), making him His likeness, would work. 

So, God must have been very disappointed when Adam replied, "The woman whom thou gavest to be with me, she gave me fruit of the tree, and I ate" (Gen 3:12). For not only had he disobeyed God, but he had also attributed the cause of his disobedience to God. Adam was literally not created by God as a male in particular. What God created was "man," before there was a man or a woman, and then a "woman." And it is the "woman" with her womb who will carry on God's work of creating man (man and woman). As for the male, God had a plan for what was to come. God must have wanted to be reconciled with the "man." 

God encouraged Adam by saying, "In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; you are dust, and to dust you shall return" (Gen 3:19). We can now see that these words were an allusion to the fact that one day Adam would work with the sweat of his face to obtain the "bread of life," die and return to the ground, and be resurrected with a body of dust into which God had breathed the "breath of life." God's plan, which He had tried to announce to Adam when He called him in the Garden, was to give him the priesthood and to celebrate with the people the day which God had blessed and hallowed (cf. 2:3). This plan was fulfilled by Jesus Christ in the priesthood of the New Covenant. This priesthood is a mission to life, like that of a woman carrying an unborn child. That is the mission regarding the Eucharist. 

What takes the initiative in the placentation process in the pregnant woman's womb is the fertilized ovum, or foetus, while the maternal body is passively involved. Therefore, it is the foetus, not the mother, who is the main placental maker. Half of the genes in the foetus and placenta are of paternal origin and are therefore "foreign" to the maternal body. Nevertheless, the mother does not reject the foetus. This reminds us that many of the disciples who rejected Jesus' words about the “bread of life” left and no longer walked with him, but the Apostles remained with him (cf. Jn 6:66-69). 

Placenta formation is said to be based on a close dialogue between the maternal and foetal sides. The foetus re-educates the mother's immunity, so to speak, and the mother permits and controls the foetus's invasion. The mechanism by which the uterus accepts the placenta is so precise that it is a "miracle of reconciliation between mother and foetus," a placentation process unique to the human species. This delicate balance of negotiations is the essence of the phenomenon of pregnancy, and the reconciliation that takes place here is not just a static peace, but the maintenance of a dynamic balance. This is what Jesus meant when he said, "Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid" (Jn 14:27). This reconciliation must also be happening to the priest on whom the Holy Spirit descends at the altar. 

The womb is not just an "organ." It supports the establishment of human life. It has an extremely profound meaning that affects the development, immunity, brain, and sociality of the human species. Women bear a burden, unique to the human species, unparalleled in other creatures, in their placentation process. It is the same with the priesthood of the New Covenant. Bearing the role of being filled with the Holy Spirit and giving birth to the Eucharist, priests who live like Mary, the mother of Jesus, will achieve the "reconciliation" that the history of God and man has so strongly demanded. Peter's answer was in accordance with the Father's will when he said, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God". Jesus went on to say as follows. 

"And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the powers of death shall not prevail against it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven" (Mt 16:18-19). 

Maria K. M.

 2025/10/06

216. Invitation to a New Transubstantiation

In a dream, Joseph was told by the angel: "She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins" (Mt 1:21). The "his people" in these words refers to those who, then and now, like us believers, have believed in Jesus. As Jesus had said, "concerning sin, because they do not believe in me" (Jn 16:9), Jesus always saved those who believed in him from this sin. After this episode, the Gospel inserts an explanation: "'Behold, a virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and his name shall be called Emmanuel' (which means, God with us)" (Mt 1:23). Jesus realised this relationship between God and people for this purpose. Its effects are manifested in those who have believed in Jesus. 

At the time, each believer who followed Jesus and was with him was saved from the sin, "they do not believe in me," by being close to him. Jesus had the opportunity to touch the believers, while believers could feel that God was so near that they could sense God's salvation. Thus, Jesus protected "his people" who would become “my church” (Mt 16:18). By instituting the Eucharist, Jesus prepared the way for what was impossible for himself, who was God but had a body as a man, to become possible. Jesus' words, “He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood is always in me, and I am always in him” (Jn 6:56), are made possible by the Eucharist, thus continuing the work of God to “save his people from their sins”. It is not that God is near. God enters into the believer. 

The Eucharist is the second mystery of the Incarnation, so to speak, through transubstantiation. The Eucharist continues to save the believers who receive it from the sins, "they do not believe in me." Believers share the things they have learned from the Apostles through the New Testament, such as Jesus’ birth, death, resurrection, and ascension, which Jesus himself testified to, and the fact that his body was gone, even though they had indeed buried it in the tomb and confirmed it. The Eucharist dies by being eaten by us believers, and his body is gone, just as Jesus' body was gone from the tomb. In that short time, a transubstantiation takes place in believers, by the Eucharist, into those who keep in them the body of Christ, in which God is present. Therefore, the memory of those who receive the Eucharist must be firmly imprinted with who the Eucharist is. 

Mary, on the other hand, was first told by the angel: "And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus. He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High; and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob for ever; and of his kingdom there will be no end" (Lk 1:31-33). This announcement meant that Jesus would live his public life in such a way, and fulfill the words, "the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David," on the cross. The inscription over Jesus on the cross, "This is the King of the Jews" (23:38), testifies to that. Indeed, "he will reign over the house of Jacob for ever; and of his kingdom there will be no end." 

Then, the angel said, "The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be called holy, the Son of God" (Lk 1:35). These words were fulfilled in Mary, who became the mother of Jesus. These words lead us to the scene where Jesus united his mother Mary and an Apostle in a parent-child bond on the cross. They were inherited by the Apostles, who had become the sons of Mary, the mother of Jesus. Hence, when a priest asks the Father, saying, "so that it may become for us the Body and Blood of your most beloved Son, our Lord Jesus Christ," the Holy Spirit descends on the priest and the power of the Most High overshadows him. So, the child who is born, that is, the Eucharist, "will be called holy, the Son of God." 

When Jesus said to his disciples, "But who do you say that I am?" (Mt 16:15), Apostle Peter replied, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God" (16:16). Then Jesus said, "Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jona! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven" (16:17). The words that the Father revealed to Apostle Peter represent His will that all believers who call God their Father would look at Jesus and say, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God." We believers respond to the will of our Father by saying these same words to the Eucharist. 

By repeating the words, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God," looking at the Eucharist, the fact that the Eucharist is "the Christ, the Son of the living God" becomes firmly etched in the believer's memory. And when the believer, who calls God his Heavenly Father, receives the Eucharist and, for the short time that the Eucharist remains, undergoes a transubstantiation into a person who has the body of Christ, in which God is present, he comes to realise, even if only slightly, that he is the son of God. This realisation becomes the force that makes faith in Jesus certain. 

Maria K. M.

 2025/09/29

215. Transubstantiation

The Eucharist is the Body and Blood of Christ. Lumen Gentium, one of the documents of the Second Vatican Council, states that the Eucharist is "the fount and apex of the whole Christian life" (Lumen Gentium № 11). Belief in the fact that the Eucharist is the body and blood of Christ is therefore at the core of our faith. But do we as believers understand it and accept it with a sense of reality? 

The priest, at the alter, asks the Father for the work of the Holy Spirit, takes the bread and the chalice and says: "This is my body which will be given up for you" and "This is the chalice of my blood, the blood of the new and eternal covenant, which will be poured out for you and for many for the forgiveness of sins", repeating Jesus' words at the Last Supper (cf. The Roman Missal). Thus, the petition to the Father is fulfilled, and the bread and wine are transformed into the body and blood of Christ. The Church has long addressed this fact as "transubstantiation." The Council of Trent clearly defined this term as follows. "By the consecration of the bread and wine there takes place a change of the whole substance of the bread into the substance of the body of Christ our Lord and of the whole substance of the wine into the substance of his blood. This change the holy Catholic Church has fittingly and properly called transubstantiation" (Council of Trent (1551): DS 1642). 

This is confirmed again in Pope Paul VI's encyclical Mysterium Fidei (Sep. 1965). The "transubstantiation", in which the bread and wine, which bear no resemblance to the body and blood of Christ, are transformed into the Eucharist by the united work of the priest and the Holy Spirit, whom the Father has sent in the name of Jesus, means not only a change, but that the bread and wine become the very body in which the Lord himself is present. The priest works in union with the Holy Spirit, and the Eucharist is born. Without the priest, the Eucharist would never be born. 

The term "transubstantiation" is one that evokes deep empathy for women who have experienced pregnancy and childbirth. That is because the fertilised egg, which bears no resemblance to a human body, is protected by the woman's womb and eventually is born as a human body. In the body of the foetus is the life of a human being, which God has desired, through the word of God "Be" and the work of the Holy Spirit. Even now, without the woman, human life would never be born. 

The Gospel of Luke tells: "And when Elizabeth heard the greeting of Mary, the babe leaped in her womb" (Lk 1:41). John the Baptist, at this time, in his mother's womb, bore witness to Jesus, who had become a man. A fertilised egg, something that bears no resemblance to a human being, grows and quickens inside a woman's body. That could be called another "transubstantiation." Hence, Jesus, at the Last Supper, told the Apostles about the joy that a child is born into the world, giving a parable of a woman giving birth to a child. 

Jesus said, "When a woman is in travail she has sorrow, because her hour has come; but when she is delivered of the child, she no longer remembers the anguish, for joy that a child is born into the world" (Jn 16:21). Then he continued, "I will see you again and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you" (16:22), thus foretelling his resurrection as well as the birth of the Eucharist. 

Jesus then gave them an assurance by saying, "In that day you will ask nothing of me. Truly, truly, I say to you, if you ask anything of the Father, he will give it to you in my name. Hitherto you have asked nothing in my name; ask, and you will receive, that your joy may be full" (Jn 16:23-24). The Church has asked for the best in this world. It has responded to these words of Jesus by asking and praying, "so that it may become for us the Body and Blood of your most beloved Son, our Lord Jesus Christ." The words, "if you ask anything of the Father, he will give it to you," will be realised immediately. At this time, the priest, united with the Holy Spirit, is demonstrating the words of Jesus. 

When considered in this way, the "transubstantiation" of the bread and wine into the Body and Blood of Christ on the altar is not difficult to accept, even for people today. When receiving the Eucharist, we, as believers, must realise that we have become one with the Body of Christ in which God is present with a sense of reality. Therein lies a hope for the future when we will be called to a new "transubstantiation." 

Maria K. M.

 2025/09/22

214. “Catechism of the Catholic Church” № 1386

This blog has spent a considerable amount of time so far carefully observing and reflecting on the episode of the centurion in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke. That is because I thought it necessary to review this episode from the perspective that the words of the centurion, asking Jesus to heal his servant (slave), are the words used in Mass liturgies around the world in important occasions when the priest and the congregation together respond to the invitation to communion in front of the Eucharist that the priest raises up. In both of the above Gospels, the centurion appears in two scenes. One in which he asks Jesus to heal his servant (slave), and the other in which he stands by the cross of Jesus and expresses his faith in Jesus. The latter is also described by the Gospel of Mark. Whether or not the centurion in these scenes is the same person, we can see two stages of faith in the centurion's words. 

In the first scene, where the centurion asks Jesus to heal his servant (slave), the centurion could come to Jesus drawn by the drawing power of the Father, as Jesus said: “No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him” (Jn 6:44). And his faith allowed him to have Jesus heal his sick servant (slave). This is the first stage. On the other hand, in the scene of Jesus' crucifixion, it is written: “And when the centurion, who stood facing him, saw that he thus breathed his last, he said, ‘Truly this man was the Son of God!’" (Mk 15:39). The centurion's words here are a fulfilment of Jesus' words, “I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to myself” (Jn 12:32). The second stage. 

In the Catechism of the Catholic Church (second edition, 1997), № 1386, it is written: “Before so great a sacrament, the faithful can only echo humbly and with ardent faith the words of the Centurion: ‘Domine, non sum dignus ut intres sub tectum meum, sed tantum dic verbo, et sanabitur anima a mea’ (’Lord, I am not worthy that you should enter under my roof, but only say the word and my soul will be healed.’” But the centurion's words here are the words he uttered when he came to Jesus, drawn by the Father, i.e., the words in the first stage. It is a different stage from that of us Christians who have come to Jesus, drawn by the words of Jesus, who said, “I, when I am lifted up from the earth ...” We believers were drawn to Jesus, who was lifted up from the earth, i.e., Jesus on the Cross. 

The Catechism of the Catholic Church then presents the words of prayer in the Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom. They include the cry of the thief who was crucified with Jesus: “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” This cry is, so to speak, the cry of the first man who was drawn to Jesus on the Cross. 

Although the Divine Liturgy of St John Chrysostom certainly contains a response towards Jesus on the Cross, this scene never leads to the scene of the centurion in the account in the Acts of the Apostles after the descent of the Holy Spirit. The Acts of the Apostles describes the centurion as “a devout man who feared God with all his household, gave alms liberally to the people, and prayed constantly to God” (Acts 10:2). The centurion's relationship with the Apostle Peter (cf. 10:1-48) was the catalyst for the Church's move towards Gentile missionary work. The trajectory of faith conveyed by the episode of the centurion symbolizes the development of the Church that we, as believers, aspire to. 

The Catechism of the Catholic Church, № 1382, states: “The Mass is at the same time, and inseparably, the sacrificial memorial in which the sacrifice of the cross is perpetuated and the sacred banquet of communion with the Lord’s body and blood. But the celebration of the Eucharistic sacrifice is wholly directed toward the intimate union of the faithful with Christ through communion. To receive communion is to receive Christ himself who has offered himself for us.” As such, should we, believers, not apply the words of the centurion's second stage to Jesus on the Cross, “Truly, this man was the Son of God”, to the response we make “before so great a sacrament”, the Eucharist? 

The words of the priest's invitation to communion, according to the Roman Missal, are: “Behold the Lamb of God, behold him who takes away the sins of the world. Blessed are those called to the supper of the Lamb” The Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world is what John the Baptist said when he saw Jesus coming towards him. Hence, “the supper of the Lamb” is the last supper of Jesus. At this time in the Mass, we certainly see Jesus lifted up on the Cross in the Eucharist that the priest raises. 

Maria K. M.