Circulation Theology

Mark 14: 12-16, 22-26

On the first day of Unleavened Bread, when the Passover lamb is sacrificed, his disciples said to him, ‘Where do you want us to go and make the preparations for you to eat the Passover?’ So he sent two of his disciples, saying to them, ‘Go into the city, and a man carrying a jar of water will meet you; follow him, and wherever he enters, say to the owner of the house, “The Teacher asks, Where is my guest room where I may eat the Passover with my disciples?” He will show you a large room upstairs, furnished and ready. Make preparations for us there.’ So the disciples set out and went to the city, and found everything as he had told them; and they prepared the Passover meal.

While they were eating, he took a loaf of bread, and after blessing it he broke it, gave it to them, and said, ‘Take; this is my body.’ Then he took a cup, and after giving thanks he gave it to them, and all of them drank from it. He said to them, ‘This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many. Truly I tell you, I will never again drink of the fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new in the kingdom of God.’

When they had sung the hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives.

This Sunday we celebrate the Body and Blood of Jesus. The Real Presence of Christ in the consecrated bread and wine is beautiful and wondrous, the summit of our faith and is a powerful truth worthy of many books, reflections and homilies.

But this time around I am going to focus on an aspect of the Real Presence that only since Vatican II has been really emphasized and then not always emphasized well or consistently. The Church teaches that Christ is not only truly present in the consecrated bread and wine but he is also truly present in his Word and in his people. While we treat his Word with respect and honor I don’t think we have come to a place of full respect and honor for the other aspect of the Body of Christ, for the Real Presence of Christ in those who come and worship along side of us or in people we come in daily contact with whether they are Christian or not.

It is easier to believe that Christ is present in the consecrated bread and wine than it is to believe he is present in that person across the aisle who wounded us so badly or disagreed openly with our opinions. It certainly takes real faith to believe in Christ’s presence in a consecrated wafer but to believe in his presence in someone we can’t stand or in someone who doesn’t strike us as very spiritual or someone who makes us uncomfortable - wow! That takes immense faith.

When we are unaware of the Lord’s Real Presence in his people or when we avoid that somewhat uncomfortable aspect of our faith, preferring instead to focus on the consecrated elements, our faith life suffers. Unless we are serving one another and honoring and respecting each other as a true part of the whole Body and Blood of Christ, the flow of the Spirit through us gets plugged up. There may be a trickle of life coming through because most of us do try to serve but we miss so many opportunities to have the river of Christ’s blood, the blood of everlasting life, flow through us in a torrent of love. 

Jesus gave of himself without measure in his life as well as on the cross and he did not limit who could receive his love. If we receive his Body and Blood and simply make it a private devotion or if we make judgments about who is or who isn’t part of Christ’s body, there is a serious blockage. Christ’s body, in effect, suffers from a restricted flow of his blood.

It is against the nature of Christ to withhold his love from anyone. He shares with us his whole life energy in the consecrated bread and wine and if we come away from Mass sometimes and wonder why we don’t feel more stimulated and spiritually empowered by our reception of his Body and Blood, it’s most likely because we’re receiving the gift but we’re not allowing it to flow out again. It’s stagnating inside. The whole point of the Christian life is to keep the river of the life-blood moving in fullness and that fullness is not possible if we have put conditions on who we love or if we do not view the people around us as equally worthy of our love, service, honor and respect as Christ is. We are especially called to allow the flow to pour over those who, in our judgment, seem to deserve it the least. It is judgment, unforgiveness and an unwillingness to serve others that blocks the flow.

When we reflect on the Gospel passage this week where Jesus instituted the Eucharist, we should keep in mind that in the Gospel of John, Jesus immediately went on to wash the disciples’ feet and after doing so, he said, “So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. For I have set you an example and you also should do as I have done to you. Very truly, I tell you, servants are not greater than their master, nor are messengers greater than the one who sent them. If you know these things, you are blessed if you do them.”

The washing of the feet of those around us has to follow our reception of the Eucharist. In Jesus’ mind, the one naturally follows the other. It was no accident that he washed the disciples’ feet immediately following the first Eucharist. These are not two separate and unlinked incidents. Jesus was teaching his followers that partaking of his body and blood is not the end of the story. He was saying, “Yes, partake of my body and blood - but then you must turn and serve one another. You might not understand now but later on you will.” Later on, the disciples understood very well that the vitality of their own inner lives and the life of the community didn’t just depend on receiving the body and blood of Jesus; it depended on giving that life away. They may not have understood the circulation system of their own physical bodies but they certainly understood the circulation system of the body of Christ.

If Christ is the heart, then we are the veins. The blood we receive must continually pulse through us to nourish the rest of the body. It must flow freely in love or else the body will become cold, sluggish, prone to major internal problems and vulnerable to sudden death. The body might look all right on the outside but on the inside, everything suffers if the blood is not in full circulation. When we receive the Body and Blood in the Eucharist without the intention of washing the feet of those around us, we are like blockages of the arteries or blood clots. Both lead to death.

 

Without the body, blood has no function. Without blood coursing through it, the body dies. If we receive Christ’s body and blood and keep it to ourselves, simply making it our own little private moment of connection with God, we have completely misunderstood the basic principle of being alive in Christ.

St. Augustine wrote, “At Communion, the priest says, ‘The Body of Christ,’ and you say, ‘Amen.’ When you say ‘Amen’, you are saying yes to what you are.”

Say yes to what you are and then give yourself a cardio workout. Wash some feet.