Believing as the Church Believes
Jesus
Christ promised His disciples that they would have Bread from Heaven,
and He fulfilled that promise at the Last Supper as He said to His
Apostles:
“‘This
is my Body which shall be given up for you; do this in remembrance of
Me.’ In like manner also the cup, after He had supped, saying, ‘This cup
is the new covenant in My Blood; do this as often as you drink it, in
remembrance of Me. For as often as you shall eat this Bread and drink
the cup, you proclaim the death of the Lord, until He comes’”
(1Cor.11:24-26).
The
Church has always taken the Lord at His word. She offers upon her
altars a pure and acceptable Sacrifice to God the Father – the Body,
Blood, Soul and Divinity of His beloved Son, Jesus Christ. The Church
speaks of the presence of the living Christ in the Sacrament of the
Eucharist as the Real Presence. Whether we are receiving Him in
Holy Communion or venerating Him in the tabernacle on the altar, we bend
the knee before Him, paying Him homage by our reverent silence and our
prayerful attention, fulfilling the prophecy of St. Paul:
“Therefore
God also has exalted him and has bestowed upon him the name that is
above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend of
those in heaven, on earth and under the earth, and every tongue should
confess that the Lord Jesus Christ is in the glory of God the Father”
(Phil.2:9-11).
But
even as the Lord was telling them that He was the true Bread from
Heaven, and that they must eat of His flesh and drink of His Blood, many
doubted. St. John reports in his Gospel:
“Many of his disciples therefore, when they heard this, said, ‘This is a hard saying. Who
can listen to it?’… For Jesus knew from the beginning who they were who
did not believe, and who it was who should betray him… From that time
many of his disciples turned back and no longer went about with him”
(Jn.6:61;65b;67).
Although the Apostles did not as yet understand, they did not abandon Him:
“Jesus said to the Twelve, ‘Do you also wish to go away?’ Simon Peter therefore answered, ‘Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou
hast words of everlasting life, and we have come to believe and to know
that thou art the Christ, the Son of God” (Jn.6:68-70).
The
Council of Trent teaches “that after the consecration of bread and
wine, our Lord Jesus Christ, true God and true man, is truly, really and
substantially contained in the august sacrament of the Holy Eucharist
under the appearance of those sensible things (bread and wine)” (Session
XIII, Chapter I, The Real Presence of our Lord Jesus Christ in the Most Holy Sacrament of the Eucharist).
The Council further states: “There is, therefore, no room for doubt that all the faithful of Christ may, in accordance with a custom always received in the Catholic Church, give to this most holy sacrament in veneration the worship of latria, which is due to the true God” (Ch. V).
The
Council uses the term “transubstantiation” to express the Great Miracle
that takes place: “But since Christ our Redeemer declared that to be
truly His own body which He offered under the form of bread, it has,
therefore, always been a firm belief in the Church of God, and this holy
council now declares it anew, that by the consecration of the bread and
wine a change is brought about 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 properly and appropriately calls transubstantiation” (Chapter IV).
The Council excommunicates anyone who denies its teaching on the Eucharist: “If
anyone denies that in the sacrament of the most Holy Eucharist are
contained truly, really and substantially the body and blood together
with the soul and divinity of our Lord Jesus Christ, and consequently
the whole Christ, but says that He is in it only as in a sign, or figure
or force, LET HIM BE ANATHEMA” (Canons on the Most Holy Sacrament of
the Eucharist, Canon 1).
Without
our daily bread, that is, the nourishment we receive each day at our
meals, we soon die of starvation. Similarly, without the Bread from
Heaven, the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ, we cannot
survive spiritually. We must thank God and praise Him for this greatest
of all gifts, His very self in the form of Bread and Wine.
But
the Holy Mass, called by Father Faber “the most beautiful thing this
side of Heaven,” was replaced by the Novus Ordo Mass, literally, the
mass of the New Order. The chief architect of the new mass was
Archbishop Annibale Bugnini, who had been dismissed from all positions
of responsibility under John XXIII, perhaps under suspicion of being a
Freemason. But after being reappointed by Paul VI as Secretary for
Liturgical Reform, Bugnini set out to change the form of the Mass and of
all seven Sacraments. With six Protestant ministers as consultants, the
Novus Ordo “Mass” now closely resembles a Protestant communion service.
Lest
we should think there is still a chance the new mass might be valid, we
must remember that all of the Sacraments, including the Sacrament of
Holy Orders, were changed under Bugnini’s surveillance. This means that
all “bishops” and all “priests” ordained since Bugnini’s hatchet job are
now doubtfully ordained. And no bishops, no priests, means no Mass. The
Church’s enemies couldn’t be happier.
The
world at large does not believe in the Real Presence of Jesus Christ in
the Sacrament of the Eucharist. And, increasingly, those who attend the
Novus Ordo are losing the Faith and falling away in great numbers. May
we at St. Jude’s hold to the true Faith which has been handed down to us
from Our Lord Himself, for: