EXPLANATION OF THE CEREMONIES OF HOLY MASS:A Six-Part Homily Series

Revd Fr Christopher Smith, STL

Part 1: Before Holy Mass

Sunday is the LORD’s Day. Christians rise with the sun on

the eighth day, the first new day of a new age of the

Resurrection, and go to buildings which have been set apart

for divine worship by the name church. They are called church

because it is the Mystical Body of Christ, the Church, which

assembles there in the presence of God just as the twelve

tribes of Israel assembled at the foot of Mt Sinai to

receive the Law and came to the temple in Jerusalem to offer

sacrifices to ask God to forgive their sins. Christians

come to celebrate the sacrament of the Eucharist, a word

which means thanksgiving, in the context of a liturgy filled

with rites and ceremonies called the Mass.

Every baptized Christian becomes a member of the Church when

water and the Holy Spirit are poured over him at baptism.

And so the Christian enters the church building just as he

entered the Church through baptism, taking holy water as a

reminder of his baptism and tracing upon himself the Sign of

the Cross which brought about his insertion into the life of

the triune God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit whose Name he

invokes.

The Christian finds a space in an assembly where there are

no divisions between rich and poor, races or social class.

When he crosses the threshold of the church from the outside

world into the church, he leaves behind all earthly cares to

enter into a foretaste of the Heavenly Jerusalem, the place

where heaven meets earth at this Mystical Banquet. Jesus

Christ reigns in the church as surely as He reigns in

heavens, from his throne in the tabernacle, where He waits

for us to come and worship and adore Him. We enter the

church and gaze at Christ who waits for us in the tabernacle

and we touch the right knee to the ground in a simple act of

adoration to Him who is worshipped by the angels and saints

and by men. At the name of Jesus, every knee shall bow. We prepare

for Mass by kneeling, a symbol of our own submission to the

will of God. We make prayers of adoration, contrition,

thanksgiving and supplication. We silently prepare

ourselves for the re-enactment of the drama of Calvary, to

receive the fruits of the one sacrifice offered to the

Father for the salvation of men.

The priest, a man ordained to offer sacrifice for the living

and the dead, has no other reason to exist than to make

present in the here and now the same sacrifice that the LORD

accomplished on the Cross, and to give to us the fruits of

that sacrifice. Every day he offers the Mass, so that at

every moment somewhere in the world there is the one

sacrifice of redemption is celebrated in ritual forms and

under symbolic guise, from the rising of the sun to its

setting, and throughout the watches of the night.

The priest enters the sacristy clad in his black cassock, a

sign of his renunciation of the world and of penance for his

sins. He washes his hands and prays, CLEANSE my hands, O Lord,

from all stain, that, pure in mind and body, I may be worthy to serve Thee. Just

as the priests of the Old Testament purified the hands that

would offer sacrifices of animals and plants, the priest of

the New and Eternal Covenant washes his hands as a symbol of

a prayer that he may be worthy to offer the last sacrifice

for the People of God. The priest then puts on vestments

reminiscent of those worn by the priests of the temple and

the doctors of the law. Adore the LORD in holy attire, the Psalmist

says, and the priest, putting on these special clothes,

reminds himself that what he is doing is no ordinary,

everyday action, but the Act by which Jesus redeems and

saves us. He makes the Sign of the Cross and picks up the

amice, a linen cloth held by strings evoking the prayer

shawls of Jewish men, and prays, PLACE, O Lord, the helmet of

Salvation upon my head to repel the assaults of the Devil. Satan hates the

Mass, because by that sacrifice commemorated here his reign

over the hearts of men was destroyed, and so he seeks to

distract the priest from his noble task and draw him into

hell with the damned. Undaunted, the priest picks up the

alb, a white garment stretching to the feet which reminds

him of the pure white robe given to him at baptism as a

symbol of his restored innocence. The word alb comes from

the Latin word alba, which means white. When St John had his

vision of the end of the world, he saw a multitude which no man

could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and tongues,

standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with

palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, Salvation

belongs to our God who sits upon the throne and to the Lamb!1 The priest

standing in the place of the people, appears before them a

sign of the blessed in heaven praising the Lamb slain for

them in this sacrifice, and prays, CLEANSE me, O Lord, and purify

my heart, that, being made white in the Blood of the Lamb, I may attain

everlasting joy.

The priest then puts the cincture around his waist, GIRD me,

O Lord, with the girdle of purity and quench in me the fire of concupiscence, that

the grace of temperance and chastity may abide in me. He is reminded

that he is a sinful man, prone to the lusts of the flesh as

any man, but called to a life of angelic chastity for the

love of souls. As Jesus said to the Apostle Peter, he says

now to the priest, When you were young, you girded yourself and walked

where you would, but when you are old, you will stretch out your hands and

1 Revelation 7.9-10

another will gird you and carry you where you do not wish to go.2 Christ

reminds the priest that he is promised to an obedience which

transcends his own desires, a sacrifice willingly undertaken

for love of souls. In ancient times, the priest put on his

left arm a maniple, a handkerchief to wipe his sweaty brow

during the Mass, and he prayed, GRANT me, O Lord, to bear the light

burden of grief and sorrow, that I may with gladness take the reward of my

labor. The priest’s life is one of hard work and solitude, so

he asks for the strength to live the life Christ has asked

him to live. GIVE me again, O Lord, the stole of immortality, which I lost

by the transgression of my first parents, and although I am unworthy to come

unto Thy Holy Sacrament, grant that I may attain everlasting felicity. This man

of obedience, this man of sorrows, kisses and places round

his neck a stole, a long, narrow piece of cloth. Roman

government officials wore stoles as signs of their

authority, and the priest, who has the authority from God to

teach, sanctify and govern, wears this ancient emblem of

office whenever he celebrates a sacrament. But more

important than authority, however legitimate, is love, and

2 John 21.18

so the priest covers the stole and everything else with the

chasuble, from the Latin word casula, or little house,

signifying that charity is to cover all else in the priest’s

life. He prays, LORD, who hast said, My yoke is easy, and My burden is

light, grant that I may so bear it, as to attain Thy grace. Amen. The priest

may then put on his headcovering, the biretta. Having its

origin in the Middle Ages as a scholar’s cover, the priest

must be learned in the sacred sciences, so it is appropriate

that he wear the sign of that learning in church.

The priest spends time in silent preparation for what he is

about to do. When the time has come, he bows to the Cross

in the sacristy, as just as the Word made Flesh came forth

from the body of the Virgin into the world, the Word’s

herald comes vested in the ancient garments of tradition

from the womb of the sacristy into the Church, the Body of

Christ given for the life of the world. He rings a bell as

a sign that the drama of Calvary is about to begin, and

everyone is ready to witness its power and glory.

Part 2: I will go unto the altar of God

Today there is an option to sing man-made hymns chosen by

the priest or a parish staff member during Mass. But the

Church has always appointed texts from the Psalms to

accompany ritual actions at Mass. The Introit, or Entrance

Antiphon, is taken from the Psalms and other scriptural

texts to proclaim the theme of this particular celebration

of the mysteries of divine life. The Church has never

believed in singing at the Mass or praying at the Mass; the

Church sings and prays the Mass. At the beginning of the

Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, the sacred ministers and those

who serve them make their way in a dignified procession to

the altar. A thurifer leads the procession with a smoking

vessel of incense called a thurible. The smoke of the

incense symbolizes our prayers rising to God and has since

antiquity been a sign of homage to holy people and holy

things. Another angel came and stood at the altar with a golden censer, and

he was given much incense to mingle with the prayers of the saints upon the

golden altar before the throne; and the smoke of the incense rose with the

prayers of the saints from the hand of the angel before God. Then the angel took

the censer and filled it with fire from the altar and threw it on the earth.3

Behind the thurifer comes the crucifer, who holds aloft

before our eyes the image of Christ who came to save us.

Just as the Israelites wandering through the desert looked

upon the image of a bronze serpent and were healed of their

illnesses, Christians gaze upon the likeness of the

Crucified and are stirred to devotion, to reverence and to

prayer. The crucifer is accompanied by two candlebearers,

who carry lights that symbolize Christ, the light of the

world who pierces the darkness of sin and death, lights

given from candles blessed on the Feast of the Presentation

of the Infant Jesus in the temple on 2 February, made from

the wax of bees who work diligently like Christians at their

appointed task. Other servers, representatives of the

faithful at the Sacrifice, process as so many saints to the

Throne of Grace. A deacon, the servant of the priest and

the Church, clad like the priest except for his dalmatic of

3 Revelation 8.3-5

joy and gladness, enters, holding before him the beautifully

bound Book of the Gospels to place upon the altar. The

priest enters the church as Jesus rides into Jerusalem on

Palm Sunday, amidst great joy and Hosannas, always mindful

of the awe-inspiring events which will take place in this

holy place.

The priest arrives at the foot of the altar. In ancient

times, he did not enter the Holy of Holies, the sanctuary of

the Church, until he had taken off his biretta as a sign of

submission to God and genuflected to Christ in the Blessed

Sacrament reserved in the sanctuary. He would recite with

the ministers the words of Psalm 42, I will go to the altar of God, to

God the joy of my youth and then recite a formula for the

confession of his sins.

The priest then, right foot first, enters the inner precinct

of the sanctuary. In the temple of Jerusalem, only the High

Priest could enter the inner sanctum once a year, and say

the name of God. Now the minister of the Eternal High

Priest, Jesus Christ, enters into the holy place another

Christ, so that God may become present amongst men and dwell

within their hearts.

In the sanctuary there is a table. This is no ordinary

table for an ordinary meal; it is an altar of sacrifice and

the table of Passover. The Jewish ritual of the Passover

meal and the sacrifices in the temple of Jerusalem find

their fulfillment on the altar of the wood of the Cross on

which was sacrificed the Lamb of God. The altar of the

Mystical Sacrifice of the Mass is of wood or of marble, but

it represents Christ in His tomb.

The altar is covered with three fair linen cloths, which

symbolize the winding sheets in which Christ was placed in

the tomb. Christians from earliest times celebrated Mass in

altars raised over the remains of those who gave their lives

as witnesses to the faith, sacrificing their lives because

of their belief in the sacrifice of Christ. Today the

Church places relics, physical remains of or objects

belonging to the saints, to remind us of the connection

between the sacrifice of the Eucharist and the sacrifice of

those who are nourished by the Eucharist.

Behind the altar is always to be found an image of the

Crucified Christ. This image is a powerful reminder of the

unity between the sacrifice of Calvary and the sacrifice of

the Mass. When Christ died on the Cross, he faced outward

to the West. Since the beginning of the Church, Christians

have prayed facing east, facing Christ who died gazing at

them and whom tradition holds will come again at the end of

time, from the east. The universal custom of the Church has

always been for priest and people to face, if not

directional East, at least liturgical East, at Mass,

indicated by the image of the Crucified. Only two

exceptions are known: in Rome, the ancient basilicas were

built westward facing, so the priest stood behind the altar

people actually turned their backs to the altar to face East

during the consecration of the Mass; and now, in many places

in the West, where Mass is celebrated facing the people so

they may see the rites on the altar. The eastward position

is not so that the priest can have his back to the people;

on the contrary, it is so that priest and people may be

together on the same side of the altar, worshipping the LORD

together and awaiting His Second Coming.

In the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite, also referred

to as the Old Latin Mass, the priest prayed as he approached

the altar, Take away from us our iniquities, we implore Thee, Lord, that with

pure minds we may worthily enter into the holy of holies: through Christ our

Lord. Amen. Now as then, he kisses the Altar, the symbol of

Christ. In the Extraordinary Form he prays, We implore You,

Lord, by the merits of all Thy Saints, whose relics are here, and of all the Saints,

that thou wouldst deign to forgive me all my sins. Amen. The Mass is not

just a celebration for the men and women physically present

in the church; it is a celebration of the entire celestial

court, and the priest calls on the saints to assist him in

his ministry to the People of God. He kisses the altar to

make reparation for the traitorous kiss of Christ. He

kisses the altar to remind us all of the intimate

relationship between God and the soul professed by the

Beloved in the Song of Songs, Let him kiss me with the kisses of his

mouth. The Mass is more than an act of worship; it is that

intimate kiss of love between Christ and His Bride, the

Church, a kiss by which new life is generated and death

overcome by the Resurrection.

In the Extraordinary Form, the priest-celebrant assists at

most of the Mass from his position at the altar. Only a

Bishop would preside from a throne set off to the side. In

the Ordinary Form, after the priest or bishop reverences the

altar he goes to a special chair off to the side. Chairs in

the ancient world were a symbol of authority. When Jesus

explained the scriptures in the synagogue where the Jews

gathered to study the Word, he sat and taught from a chair.

A bishop’s church is called a cathedral because the Bishop

teaches sitting in a large throne-like, called a cathedra in

Latin. Today, priests have smaller and less ornate chairs

than Bishops, but the principle is the same: the one who is

seated has authority to teach.

Part 3: Introductory Rites

The priest starts out the Mass with the sign of our

salvation as we all make the Sign of the Cross over our

bodies as he sings, In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the

Holy Spirit. The Mass is a Trinitarian act of worship to the

Father, through the Son and in the Holy Spirit. Many of the

prayers of the Mass are addressed to the Father, through the

Son and in the Holy Spirit for this reason. The priest than

turns to the faithful and addresses them, The Lord be with you.

This invocation occurs several times in the Mass. It is

taken from the Book of Ruth, where the pious farmer Boaz

greets his wheat reapers with those words before he takes

the foreigner Ruth as his wife. Boaz is a type of Christ,

who gives the LORD to the Church, His Spouse. We respond

and with your spirit, as we realize that the priest is performing

a work of the Spirit, and by these simple words pray that

the priest who offers the sacrifice may be in the Spirit, to

fulfill his office as priest worthily and well.

Priest and people recite together the Confiteor, a prayer

asking for the intercession of Mary and the saints in our

request that God may forgive our sins. This prayer, borne

aloft by sorrow for our sins, suffices to wipe away venial

sin and orient us to receive the graces that come from the

Mass. We then sing the Kyrie, the ninefold invocation of

Father, Son and Spirit for mercy which is often reduced in

the Ordinary Form to six fold. The Kyrie is the remnant of

a longer litany which disappeared from the Roman liturgy

very early on and was restored, in Greek, in the Latin

liturgy in the sixth century because of its antiquity. On

Sundays and feasts the celebrant intones the first words of

the Gloria just as they were announced by the one angel at

Bethlehem to the shepherds before a chorus of angels took up

the song of praise. This ancient hymn was put into the Mass

around the year 160. This hymn ends, as end so many prayers

and hymns, with the Hebrew word Amen. This little word,

which is the automatic end of our prayers, means so many

things: so it is, let it be done, I believe. It is a

statement of belief, a profession of hope, and an

exclamation of trust in God.

The priest then prays the first of three prayers which

change according to the day. This prayer is traditionally

called the Collect, because by it the Church collects together

various strands of thought in a short prayer, usually to the

Father, sometimes directly to Christ, but always invoking

the entire Trinity. The priest performs a gesture called

the Orans position, from the Latin word for praying. He

stretches out his hands in supplication before God, to show

that his prayer is directed to God on behalf of His people.

The priest raises his hands before God like the poor man

begging alms from a rich man, the priest praying on behalf

of poor sinners to the source of all riches, Christ.

Whenever he mentions the Holy Name of Jesus, everyone in the

congregation bows their head reverently at the Name before

which the demons flee.

Part 3.2: The Liturgy of the Word

Jews gathered in places called synagogues to study the Word

of God. At the center of the synagogue is the Ark in which

the scrolls of the Law were kept and from which they were

joyfully removed to be studied. In front of the Ark is the

bema, a raised platform with a reading desk on which the

Word is read and from which the teachers of the Law

expounded on its meaning. Christians gather in their

churches to study the same Hebrew Scriptures as well as the

writings of the Evangelists and Apostles which are also the

Word of God. At the center of the church is the Tabernacle

in which the Word made Flesh dwells and from which the

Blessed Sacrament is joyfully removed to nourish the

faithful. Because Christ is truly present in the Eucharist

under the forms of bread and wine, the written word,

although it is treated with great reverence, takes second

place. The bema of the church is called a pulpit or ambo,

and on it is placed the Lectionary from which the appointed

readings for the day are proclaimed.

In the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite, the first

readings were proclaimed facing the altar. Because those

were the readings which pre-dated Christ, they were like the

preaching of John the Baptist which pointed to Christ, hence

they were proclaimed towards the altar which is the symbol

of Christ. In the Ordinary Form those readings are

proclaimed towards the people, as a sign of God speaking to

the people through them.

Between the Epistle and Gospel in the Old Rite and between

the Old Testament and New Testament readings in the New

Rite, the Gradual is sung. The gradual comes from the Latin

word for steps; it is a psalm, and just as the Jews sang

psalms as they ascended the steps of the temple in

Jerusalem, Christian cantors sang the psalms from the steps

of the altar. Often today the Gradual is replaced by a

responsorial version of the psalm.

Before the Gospel, the Church places on the lips of her

people another Hebrew word, Alleluia. The Church has always

sought to praise her LORD with the same word that Christ

praised His Father, in the same tongue, a word which merely

means, Praise the LORD! The proper Gregorian chant

Alleluias will often have a large number of notes on one

syllable, symbolizing the effusion of joy of the Spirit in

praising the Father, pointing out the yearning for union

with Him. On penitential days, the mournful Tract or the

simple Gospel Acclamation replaces the Alleluia. During the

Alleluia or Tract, the deacon asks for the blessing of the

priest to proclaim the Good News worthily and well. He goes

to the altar upon which at the beginning of the Mass he

placed the Book of the Gospels. In Revelation, we read I saw

in the right hand of him who was seated on the throne a book written within and

on the back, sealed with seven seals. As the altar is the symbol of

the throne of Christ, the deacon takes the Book of Life from

Christ Himself to announce the word of salvation to men in

the Gospel. He says, The LORD be with you, but he does not

open his hands in the Orans position as the priest does, not

usurping the priestly gesture of raised hands. He then

reads the name of the Gospel writer as the faithful make the

sign of the Cross on their forehead, mouth, and chest,

praying that the Gospel will be in their minds, on their

lips and in their hearts. In the Extraordinary Form of the

Mass, the Gospel is chanted facing north, against the cold

and dark regions of the earth that symbolize the malice of

the Evil One. The Gospel is audaciously sung in the face of

evil itself. Now it is usually read towards the people,

that the evil in their hearts may be driven out by the words

of the Saviour.

Faith is a gift from God; the priest, who stands in the

person of the object of faith, Jesus Christ, intones the

first word, Credo, I believe, to show that faith is a gift from

God that demands a response, a response given by the

faithful taking up the words of a profession of faith drawn

up at two ecumenical councils of the Church at Nicea and

Constantinople, in the fourth century. When Henry, the Holy

Roman Emperor, went to Rome in the eleventh century, he was

scandalized to find that they did not sing the Creed like

they did everywhere else in both West and East, at Mass.

The Pope told him that the Church at Rome had no need to

profess her faith because she had never needed to be

corrected from error like so many other places, but shortly

thereafter the Pope ordered that the Creed be sung on

Sundays just to make sure that no one would ever claim they

didn’t know the central truths of the faith even if they

came to Mass. In the middle of the Creed are the words, and

by the Holy Spirit was incarnate of the Virgin Mary and became man. To

symbolize the condescension by which Christ came down to

earth in the Incarnation, the ministers and the faithful bow

profoundly during these words, except on Christmas and the

Annunciation, when they kneel.

At the end of the Creed, General Intercessions, prayers for

the state of the Church and the world, may be prayed.

Part 4: The Offertory

The altar must be prepared for the sacrifice. The Missal,

the book out of which the priest signs the prayers, is

placed on the altar along with the sacred vessels, all made

from precious metals. The chalice in which the LORD’s

Precious Blood will become present is placed on the altar

under a veil. There are many veils in the church, and all

of them have the same symbolism. A veil partially or

completely covers something, pointing to the fact that what

is beneath it is a mystery not entirely accessible to man.

Thus, much of what has to do with the sacrifice is veiled.

The chalice is veiled. The tabernacle where the Blessed

Sacrament is veiled, like the tabernacle of old. Inside the

tabernacle are to be found veils, which symbolise the veil

separating the Holy of Holies from the rest of the temple.

The ciborium which contains the Sacred Host has a veil on it

after the hosts inside are consecrated. Saint Paul in even

instructs women to veil their heads when they pray: any

woman who prays or prophesies with her head unveiled dishonours her head . . .

a woman ought to have a veil over her head because of the angels . . . if anyone

is disposed to be contentious, we recognize no other practice, nor do the

churches of God.4 The altar itself is often veiled with an

antependium, a covering over the whole altar. In the Middle

Ages a large veil called the hunger veil hid the entire

sanctuary from the people at Mass during Lent, to highlight

the separation of man from God by sin. In the East, an

iconostasis, a large wall covered with holy images, blocks

the view of the people so that they may not gaze on the

mysteries and have contempt for them. In the West, rood

screens and grilles are often seen in churches to underscore

that God and the things of God are sacred, removed from the

profane, wholly other. The language of Latin also serves as

a veil; the words which are used in sacred worship are

different than ordinary words, consecrated for divine use to

4 I Corinthians 11.5, 10, 16

emphasise that the actions that are taking place now are

truly from another world.

In ancient times, the faithful often made the bread and wine

for Mass and brought them, along with all kinds of gifts for

the poor and the needy, to the altar. The deacons would

distribute them from the altar while the priest went with

the bread and wine to the altar. In the Ordinary Form it is

common to have a procession during which monetary offerings

for the good of the parish are brought up along with the

bread and wine for the Eucharist. The bread is unleavened,

just like the bread used by Christ at the Last Supper on

Passover. The wine is ordinary wine made from grapes with

nothing else added or taken away. The bread is fashioned

into smaller and larger hosts. The word host comes from the

Latin hostia, victim, because the bread of the host then

becomes Christ who is both Priest and Victim. A larger host

is placed on a paten, a large dish, and smaller hosts in

ciboria.

In the Extraordinary Form of the Mass, the subdeacon takes

the paten away from the altar and stands with it wrapped in

a humeral veil placed around his shoulders. During the

entire Eucharistic Prayer, he stands with the paten over his

face, to symbolise the cherubim who covered their faces from

the Divine Presence in the Book of Ezekiel, again calling to

mind the mystery of the God hidden underneath the

sacramental veils of bread and wine.

The priest and deacon prepare the chalice with wine, careful

to use a purificator, a linen cloth, to wipe away drops

which adhere to the sides of the chalice, A small quantity

of water, no more than a drop, is added to the wine. The

wine is a symbol of Christ, and is not blessed. The water

symbolizes us, and is blessed before it is placed in the

wine, just as by baptism in water we are blessed in Christ

and then submerged into his divine life. When water is

mixed with wine in the chalice, the people are united to

Christ. The sacred vessels are placed on another linen

cloth called a corporal, from the Latin corpus, or body,

because the Body of Christ will become present in the Host

which rests upon it. The chalice is covered by a rigid

piece of cloth to protect it called a pall, the same word

used for the covering of a coffin at a funeral Mass.

Everything on the altar at this moment makes reference to

the death of Christ, which the Mass commemorates. The round

paten is the stone rolled over the tomb. The Chalice is the

sepulcher. The purificator and pall are the winding sheets

and the veil used to cover the face of Jesus in the tomb.

The stage is set for the Sacrifice of Calvary to be re-

enacted in an unbloody manner.

These gifts of bread and wine, work of human hands, are now

set apart from any use other than that of sacrifice. In the

temple in Jerusalem, there were three sacred spaces, an

altar of incense, an altar of bread and the Holy of Holies.

The church melds all three sacred spaces onto the altar

which is the Cross on which Christ is sacrificed and upon

which bread and wine are transubstantiated into the Body and

Blood of Christ. The priest imposes incense in the thurible

once more. In the Extraordinary Form, he asks the blessing,

not of the angel standing at the right hand of the altar in

heaven in John’s dream of the Apocalypse, but of the

Archangel Michael, the prince of the heavenly hosts. Just

as the Cross was the battle by which Christ vanquished the

Father of Lies and the Prince of Darkness, the Church

invokes the blessing of him who offers us protection from

the wickedness and snares of the Devil as our prayers ascend

before the Father on His Celestial Throne. The priest

incenses the gifts, the Cross, the altar, all in groups of

three, which recalls the three comings of Mary Magdalene to

anoint the LORD with aromatic spices: at the house of Simon

the Pharisee, t the house of Simon the Leper, and at the

empty tomb.

The priest is then incensed, and one by one, every one in

the sanctuary is also incensed in order of rank, and then

the faithful assembled in the church. This hierarchical

incensation is a reminder of the hierarchical nature of the

Church. Just as there are nine choirs of angels, there is a

hierarchy in the order of grace and in the order of nature.

When the priest has been incensed, while the thurifer

incenses others in the church, filling it with the smoke

which hearkens back to the pillar of cloud in the Book of

Exodus which guided the people of Israel and the fragrance

of holiness, the priest washes his hands. In ancient times,

the priest frequently became dirty from handling all of the

material gifts the people brought at Mass and the use of

incense. Now, it is generally a ceremonial washing. But it

is still important. As the priest quietly prays, Wash me, O

LORD, from my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin, he reminds himself

that he must be entirely pure to be admitted into the

presence of the LORD and that his life must be coherent with

his preaching. He returns to the altar, the words of Psalm

26 accompanying his movement, I wash my hands in innocence, and go

about thy altar, O LORD.5

The priest invites the people, Pray, brethren that my sacrifice and

yours may be acceptable to God, the almighty Father. The sacrifice of

the priest is different from, although not unrelated, to

that of the people. Only a priest can offer sacrifice; only

5 Psalm 26.6

a priest can celebrate the Mass because he is ordained by

God to do so. He offers the sacrifice in the person of

Christ the Head. Yet, where the head is, so too the Body,

and the faithful unite the sacrifice of their praise and

their lives with the action on the altar.

After saying another prayer, the priest engages in a

dialogue with the people that is present in all forms of

worship from all times. He shouts out, Lift up your hearts and

raises his hands from where they have been resting on the

corporal in that priestly gesture of prayer. He then bows

low before the Divine Majesty as he says, Let us give thanks to the

LORD our God. The moment of sacrifice has arrived, the death

of Christ comes upon us. But it is not a sad and tremendous

occasion as it was on Calvary. We look upon the unbloody

re-enanctment of this one sacrifice with great joy as the

price for our redemption, paid once for all on a green hill

far away, is made present in the here and now of our lives.

And we rejoice as the priest prays the Preface, a prayer to

recall to us the mystery of salvation, sung according to the

same melodies the Greeks used to welcome their heroes home

fro the Olympic Games. The priest calls upon the angels and

the saints to be present on the altar before the choir

representing the blessed in heaven along with the Church

militant on earth and the Church suffering in purgatory all

cry out, Sanctus, sanctus, sanctus.

Holy, Holy, Holy LORD, God of hosts, heaven and earth are filled with your glory.

The heavens open to unite themselves with earth and the cry

of the angels in the Book of Revelation becomes ours as we

proclaim the awesome majesty of God. We cannot help but cry

out in the primitive language of the Church, Hosanna, save

us, the Hebrew invocation to Jesus as he rode triumphantly

amidst palm and olive branches into Jerusalem. The veiled

vision of the glory of God inspires us to call out to Him to

save us and we are reminded of that great truth, Blessed is he

who comes in the name of the LORD, affirming that the man who has

faith to come to God to ask for mercy has is truly blessed

in this moment when the doors to heaven are mystically

opened to the believer in the Mass.

Part 5: The Eucharistic Prayer

Holy Thursday meets Good Friday in the most sacred part of

the Mass, the Eucharistic Prayer. This prayer of

consecration changes bread and wine into Christ Himself.

This is the kernel of the Mass, the actual sacrifice.

Christ bent over bread and wine during a Passover meal and

said, This is my Body, which is given up for you, the same body which

would be given up for men the next day on the Cross .

Christ’s actions on that first Holy Thursday night were not

yet another re-enactment of the traditional Jewish Passover

meal. There was something different about this meal, as

evidenced by how Jesus celebrated it. Christ gives the

definitive meaning to this meal only the next day, when he

dies. The sacrifice of Christ, which is ordered to be

commemorated by the memorial of eating bread and drinking

wine which is His Body and Blood, is the fulfillment of

Passover, the passing over of Christ from death to life in

the Resurrection.

What happens in the Eucharistic Prayer is no more an exact

replica of the Last Supper meal than Jesus exactly

replicated the Passover meal. In fact, what is called the

Institution Narrative, the words that surround the

consecration of the bread and wine, are not taken exactly

from the scriptures at all, but is an amalgamation of

scriptural texts into the form of the sacrament. The

reality is that what Christ did is commemorated in a way

which makes the entire Christ present, Body and Blood, Soul

and Divinity, under the outward appearances of bread and

wine.

Up until the liturgical reforms after Vatican II, the entire

Eucharistic Prayer was said in silence. The priest never

turned to face the people, intent on contemplating the

divine alone, and raised his voice only seven times from the

beginning of the Offertory until Communion, reminiscent of

the seven words of Jesus from the Cross. The entire church

was plunged into silence, rapt in the mystery of what was

happening before them. The silence is there, not to obscure

the prayer, but to draw attention to the fact that Christ is

doing something on our behalf which is beyond our rational

comprehension, it is something to be submitted to in faith.

The text of the first Eucharistic Prayer, or Roman Canon,

was fixed already by the end of the second century. In the

Ordinary Form of the Mass it is heard aloud, as are the new

Eucharistic prayers introduced in 1970. During the first

part of the Canon, the Church prays that the LORD will

accept the gifts, offerings, unspotted sacrifices she offers

to Him. She then prays for the living and remembers the

apostles and martyrs before beseeching the LORD to accept

this offering as a sacrifice to deliver the elect from

eternal damnation.

Then something wonderful happens. The priest then spreads

his hands over the gifts of bread and wine. Just as the

priests of the Old Law placed their hands on animal

sacrifices to set them apart and sacrifice them to the LORD,

the priests of the New Covenant do the same to the bread and

wine, praying the Father that they become the Body and Blood

of His Son, Jesus. This moment of the Mass is called the

Epiclesis, the invocation of the Holy Spirit who will change

the elements into God Himself. The graceful motion by which

the priest’s hands flutter over the gifts symbolizes the

descent of the Holy Spirit upon the gifts to change them.

The priest then proceeds to the Institution Narrative, the

Consecration. The bread and wine are consecrated separately

just as they were at the Last Supper, using the very words

of Our LORD as appear in the scriptures, although not in any

one place. After each consecratory formula, the priest

holds the element aloft for the faithful to see. The Body

of Christ under the form of bread is showed to the faithful

so that they may be stirred to devotion and hope in their

salvation. As the LORD said, If I be lifted up from the earth, I will

draw all things to Myself,6 and He brings to Himself at that moment

all who gaze upon Him with living faith under the

sacramental veils of bread and wine. The priest replaces

the Host and the Chalice on the corporal, and genuflects: he

bends the knee in adoration before the Divine Majesty.

The priest continues to pray that this sacrifice may be

carried to the Father in glory and that all who participate

in the sacrifice may be blessed. He remembers all the holy6 John 12.32

dead who sleep in hope of the resurrection, the souls in

purgatory. Then, remembering his own sinfulness, the priest

asks on behalf of the people that the LORD will remember all

sinners and grant them entrance into the heavenly Kingdom.

After Christ died, the centurion beat his breast and said,

Truly, this is the Son of God and the priest does likewise, showing

forth the humility of the sinner before the great sacrifice

of Christ which he has just witnessed by touching his heart

with a sign of repentance.

The Canon ended, the sacrifice is over. At this moment the

Church dare not invent a prayer as she stands beneath the

Cross of Jesus. Her sins taken away by the Passion and

Death of Christ just re-presented, all the Church can do is

pray the words that her LORD taught her to pray: Our Father,

who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy Name. This LORD’s Prayer contains

seven petitions, and symbolises the seventh day of the week,

when Jesus rested in the tomb. The priest prays the

Embolism, Deliver us, LORD, from every evil, afterwards; in the

Extraordinary Form it is prayed in the silence of the

sepulcher. The Church awaits the Resurrection.

Part 6: Preparation for Holy Communion

No one was there when Jesus rose from the dead. But he

appeared on the evening of His Resurrection to two disciples

walking on the Road to Emmaus. They do not recognize Him

until He breaks bread with them. In the Mass, no one sees

the Resurrection, even in symbol, for no symbol could ever

do it justice. But the priest breaks the consecrated bread

so that we may recognize the presence of the Crucified and

Risen Christ in the Eucharist as surely as the disciples

knew Him in the breaking of the bread. Just as the angel,

removes the stone from the tomb, the deacon removes the pall

from the chalice. The priest breaks the host into three

parts, signifying that Christ was in three parts: His body

was in the tomb, His Blood poured out upon the earth, and

His soul was freeing the just from hell. The priest places

one section of the three into the chalice. Jesus’ Body and

Blood are reunited in the Resurrection and this commingling

of Body and Blood is the eloquent and simple sign of that

Resurrection.

All the while, the choir and people sing, Agnus Dei, Lamb of

God, who takes away the sins of the world, have mercy on us. The priest

raises the Host, the sacrificed Lamb, and exclaims in the

words of John the Baptist when he sees Jesus: Behold the Lamb

of God who takes away the sins of the world!7 The people respond with

some of the same words as the Centurion said to Jesus when

asking Him to heal his sick child: LORD, I am not worthy that you

should enter under my roof, but only say the word and my soul shall be healed.8

The priest consummates the sacrifice by reverently consuming

the Host and the Precious Blood, couching that moment of

union with his God by preparation and thanksgiving. The

sacrifice has been made and consummated. Now the fruits of

that sacrifice can be shared with those who have

participated in that sacrifice, who have been witnesses to

it in faith. The fruits of the sacrifice of redemption are

shared in the sacrament of Holy Communion. Baptized

faithful who have been taught the faith and are in communion

7 John 1.298 Matthew 8.8

with the Church can approach the altar to commune, become

one, with God, through this great sacrament.

Part 6.2: Holy Communion

The faithful who have mystically participated in the

teaching and ministry of Christ in the Liturgy of the Word,

in his Passion and Death in the Liturgy of the Eucharist, in

his Resurrection through their prayerful and reverent

preparation for Communion, now come forward to consummate

their union with Christ in the sacrament of Holy Communion.

While all of the rites and ceremonies of the Church are now

open to all, while all may gaze upon them and participate in

them, Holy Communion is not for every one. The Church has

always had a strict discipline for who is to be admitted to

Holy Communion. Saint Paul admonishes believers, Whoever eats

the bread or drinks the cup of the LORD in an unworthy manner will be guilty of

profaning he body and blood of the LORD. Let a man examine himself, and so

eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For anyone who eats and drinks without

discerning the body eats and drinks judgment upon himself.9

9 I Corinthians 11. 27-29

Sacramental communion with God presupposes two things: union

with Christ through grace and union with Christ’s Body

through the Church. Only baptized and practicing Catholics

who are not in the state of mortal sin may approach

Communion, and then only if they have been fasting for at

least one hour. It is not something to be taken lightly,

for it is like passing through fire – a fire which purifies

some and makes them shine and which destroys others and

compounds their misery.

Just as the priest is consecrated from among men to offer

the sacrifice, he is also deputed to administer the

sacrament. At ordination his hands are anointed with sacred

chrism to set them apart for blessing, consecrating, and

administering the mysteries of God. He is the ordinary

minister of the Eucharist, and others administer Holy

Communion only when licensed by the Bishop to do so in cases

where priests are lacking for Communion to be distributed in

a timely and reverent manner.

The preferred method for receiving the Host is directly on

the tongue. Just as birds open wide their mouths to receive

from their mothers all they need to sustain life, the

faithful reverently open their mouths and receive the Bread

of Life from Christ. For much of history, Christians in the

West have received Communion kneeling, that profound symbol

of humility and adoration. Where Communion is received

standing or in the hand, by the Church’s permission but not

by her preference or tradition, care must be taken that no

one approaching the sacrament does so out of a sense of

right or that it is due to them. We should always approach

the altar not like the Pharisee, proudly standing, assured

of our own righteousness, but meekly kneeling, beating our

breast like the publican, LORD, have mercy on me, a sinner.

When the distribution of Holy Communion is finished, the

priest consolidates what is left of the consecrated bread

and places it in the tabernacle of the church, that

receptacle which recalls the Ark of the Covenant where God’s

presence dwelt with the Israelites and in which the Bread of

Heaven is kept so that we may visit and adore the LORD’s

wondrous presence. The vessels are carefully purified so

that not even the slightest particle or drop may remain.

The altar is despoiled of the Missal and the sacred vessels,

prepared for another celebration of the Divine Sacrifice.

Part 6.3: Mass is ended

We have seen the true light! We have received the heavenly Spirit! We have found

the true Faith! Worshipping the undivided Trinity, who has saved us. The

Eastern rites sing this hymn after Holy Communion. Our true

faith and worship have brought us to celebrate the mysteries

of Christ in the worship of the Trinity. The priest sings a

final prayer and then calls down God’s blessing upon us once

again through the sign of the life-giving Cross. Recalling

the descent of the Holy Spirit upon the Apostles and Mary at

Pentecost, the priest in the person of Christ blesses the

faithful disciples in the church gathered at the sacred

assembly. They have had the Holy Spirit poured out upon

them at Holy Mass so that they can go forth from the church

into the world, united to Christ by grace to share what they

have witnessed and experienced. The deacon sings, The Mass is

ended, go in peace, sending forth the baptized faithful into

their mission territory, the world. All sing back to him,

Thanks be to God, in one simple phrase summing up the nature of

the Eucharistic celebration itself: giving thanks to God for

His Sacrifice and for giving us the fruits of His Sacrifice

in Holy Mass.

The priest gives a final kiss of gratitude to the altar and

genuflects before the Holy Presence before he and his

ministers return to the sacristy. Going out of the people’s

sight, he enters the place where he vested, just as then

Christ ascended into heaven, the clouds took him from the

sight of those who gazed upon Him. And tomorrow, the whole

drama of the LORD’s sacrifice will be repeated once more and

God will be glorified as he has been adored through the Mass

at every moment every day until the last priest says the

last Mass and the LORD comes to proclaim a new heaven and a

new earth.