by our Lord at the saving mystery of The Last Supper. [1] This circumstance, which regards the time of its institution, does not however, justify the inference that the Eucharist is to be consecrated or received by persons not fasting: the salutary practice of consecrating and receiving it fasting, introduced, as ancient writers record, by the Apostles, has always been observed in the Church. [2]
Having thus premised an explanation of the names by which this Sacrament is distinguished, the pastor will teach that it has all the qualities of a true Sacrament, and is one of the seven which have been at all times recognised and revered by the Catholic Church. Immediately after the consecration of the chalice, it is called "a mystery of faith;" and to omit an almost innumerable host of sacred writers, vouchers of the same doctrine, that the holy Eucharist is a Sacrament is demonstrated by the very nature of a Sacrament. It has sensible and outward signs: it signifies and produces grace in the soul; and all doubt as to its institution by Christ is removed by the Apostle and the Evangelists. These circumstances, combining as they do to establish the truth of the Sacrament, supersede the necessity of pressing the matter by further argument. [3]
That in the Eucharist there are many things to which sacred writers have occasionally given the name ol Sacrament, the pastor will particularly observe: sometimes its consecration, sometimes its reception, frequently the body and blood of our Lord which are contained in it, are called the Sacrament; because, as St. Augustine observes, this Sacrament consists of two things, the visible species of the elements, and the invisible flesh and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. [4] We also say that this Sacrament is to be adored, [5] meaning of course, the body and blood of our Lord. But all these, it is obvious, obtain the name of Sacrament in its less strict sense: the species of bread and wine, strictly speaking, constitute the Sacrament.
The great points of difference between this and the other Sacraments are easily understood; the other Sacraments are perfected by the use of their matter, that is, by their administration; baptism, for instance, becomes a Sacrament when the ablution has been performed: the Eucharist is constituted a Sacrament by the sole consecration of the elements, and when preserved in a pyxis, or deposited in a tabernacle, under either species, it ceases not to be a Sacrament. In the material elements of which the other Sacraments are composed, no change takes place; in baptism, for instance, the water, in confirmation, the chrism, lose not in their administration, the nature of water and of oil; whilst in the Eucharist, that which before
- ↑ Cypr. de coma. Domini.
- ↑ Aug. Epist. 188, c. 6.
- ↑ Aug. lib. 3. de Trinit. cap. 4, et 1. 20, contra Faust, cap. 13, Ambr. lib. 1. de sacrara. cap. 2. Trid. sess. 13. de Euch. c. 5. D. Thorn. 3. p. q. 73. art. 1.
- ↑ De Catec. erud. lib. 5. c. 16. August, hie ad sensum potius quam ad verba ci-latus; sed lege hac de materia librum Lanfranci contra Berengarium: constat. 23, tantum capitibus: vide de consecr. dist. 2. lere tola.
- ↑ Trid. sess. 15, de Euch. cap. 5. et can. 6.
