What Constitutes Eucharist as a Sacrament?

by Fr. Eddie Samaniego, S.J.

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Catholicism has never hesitated to affirm how all reality: the cosmos, nature, history, events, persons, objects, rituals, words, is “mysterious.” Everything, in principle, can embody and communicate the divine. In other words, God is embodied in everything including us, and everything is embodied in God, especially us, for we are made in the image and likeness of God, are we not?

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God is at once everywhere and all powerful, and there’s nothing in this world God cannot put to use. On the human side, we humans, have nothing else apart from our world to express our response to God’s self-communication. Just as God reaches us through the finite, so we reach God through the finite. The point at which this “divine interchange” occurs is the point of the sacramental encounter.

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The word “sacramental,” in general, applies to “any finite reality through which God is perceived to be present and communicated, and through which our human response to God assumes some measure of shape, form, and structure.” In its most specific sense, a sacrament is “a finite reality through which God is communicated to the Church and through which the Church responds to God.” An old formula definition that was in my Baltimore catechism growing up is: “A sacrament is an outward sign instituted by Christ to give grace.” So, if we understand grace to mean God’s own communication of God’s own self, then we receive God’s life through the exercise of the sacraments as offered by the Church. The formal sacraments are seven, but anything that communicates God’s presence is a “sacramental.”

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The Church is considered the fundamental sacrament of God’s promise and deliverance of the Kingdom of God in Jesus Christ. “The sacraments,” those seven specific actions which the Church has defined to be sacraments are: Eucharist, Baptism, Confirmation, Penance, Anointing of the Sick, Marriage, and Holy Orders. They are acts of God, acts of Christ, and acts of the Church. Most people don’t understand that sacraments, in the Catholic sense, relate the individual to the Church. For example: Penance’s fundamental purpose isn’t reconciliation with God, which can be/is done in private with a perfect act of contrition. It’s an action that recognizes the breach by a person of the mission of the Church to be a holy people. So, making amends with the Church is at the heart of the sacrament of Penance.

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If you read Catholic treatises on the sacraments, you will find much talk about “sign” and “cause.” The priority of Sign-over-Cause existed throughout the history of the Church until the scholastic revival of the 12th Century. Cause took over from Trent in the 1540’s until Vatican II. It was the clear teaching of the Council of Trent (Decree on the Sacraments, Session VII, 1547) and before that of Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologica III, qq. 60-65) that “sacraments cause grace as they signify it.” Before Aquinas, the emphasis had been on the sign. He was the 1st to define sign of grace as “a visible sign of invisible grace.” (See Catholicism, Richard Mc Brien, Harper & Row, 1970, pg. 735-6)

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In general Aquinas said sacraments are signs that do 4 things. 1st, signs should instruct. In using a sign we express our faith in the unseen reality hidden underneath the sign. 2nd, the sign must express worship in ritual actions. 3rd, these actions express the unity of the Church. And 4th, they express Christ’s presence and the presence of God. 

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The Council of Trent tried to safeguard the basic truth that the grace of the sacraments is caused not by human forces but by God acting in and through Christ and the Church. “It is not the personal merit of the recipient that causes the grace received.” On the other hand, God does not force the human will. God freely offers access to his life in grace. It is up to us to receive it and let it flow through us, or not. Much has been written about the “right disposition” of the recipient. And so, much has been confused and abused throughout the centuries. But we can say that a sacrament is a public acknowledgement of a grace that is already there.

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Since the Council of Trent, the Eucharist has been seen as the pre-eminent among the seven Catholic sacraments because Christ is present in the Eucharist even before the sacrament is used. Christ is present in the Assembly, gathering in Christ’s name. Christ is also present in the person of the priest, in the Word of God, in the consecrated bread and wine, and, when performed well, in the music. So Christ’s “real presence” is manifest in 5 ways in the Eucharist. So, in a real sense, we come to Mass as disciples of the Word. We learn (discipleship) in order to apply what we learn (Apostleship) in the world. We are fed during the Mass in order to feed when we leave. It is in doing that we are fed.

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So, to really be in Communion with Jesus, the Christ, means that we become what we receive and take that to the world. We become a sacramental by our life, which takes on the mission of Jesus. Just as Jesus told his apostles that his food is “to do the will of the one who sent me and complete his work,” so our food is to “do the will of the one who sends us (Jesus), and complete his work,” as well. We receive in order to give, we are fed in order to feed. One without the other is not Communion. Christ’s mission is expressed in the Corporal and Spiritual Works of Mercy. This is what we are really to do in the memory of Christ. Amen.