Evening Mass of the Lord's Supper
The
Seder meal—
the ritual supper which is at the very heart
the ritual supper which is at the very heart
of
the Jewish celebration of Passover—
was
already a fixed tradition more than a thousand
(maybe
even twenty five hundred) years old
when
Jesus reclined at table
to
share his Last Supper with his disciples.
We
heard the menu—still careful followed today—
prescribed
by God to Moses in the Book of Exodus:
unleavened bread, because the Israelites
left Egypt in such haste
there
was no time for the dough to rise;
bitter herbs, recalling the harsh and bitter
cruelty
of
the slavery they had endured;
and
roasted lamb, recalling the sacrifice
whose
blood was applied to the doorframe of the house,
that
the angel of death might pass over God’s chosen ones.
are
not ones you tinker with lightly.
So
it should make us sit up and pay attention
when
just this year a group of American rabbis
They’ve
suggested adding…a tomato.
You
see, Passover was never intended
to
simply commemorate
an event from long ago.
It’s
about liberation—
about
the freedom the Lord desires
for his people,
both
way back then and still even now.
The
supper isn’t mean to just recall
what happened in history;
it’s
meant to set people free in each new generation.
And
these American rabbis have looked around
and
realized that not all slavery was left behind in Egypt.
They’ve
looked at the migrant workers—
tomato-pickers,
in particular—
whose
hidden labor provides us with so much of our food,
and
seen a people often underpaid and overworked,
sometimes
even beaten.
“The
truth is,” one of the rabbis said,
“there
are people in our own country
who
don’t have to imagine what it is like to be a slave.”
These
socially-conscious rabbis, of course,
are
not the first to tinker with the Passover supper.
Jesus
did the same thing nearly twenty centuries ago.
And
it would have surely been quite attention-grabbing to the Apostles
when
their Master and Teacher began to deviate from the script
as
they shared the Seder in that upper room.
First,
Jesus knelt down to wash feet.
It
was customary to have a household servant
make
the rounds early in the proceedings,
ceremonially
washing the hands of all the guests.
It
was unheard of, however, that the head of the household
should
take such a lowly task upon himself—
and
bathing not hands already scrubbed clean,
but
dusty, stinky, calloused feet.
Do for one another, he commands, as I have done for you.
When
it comes to charity among those
who
dare speak and act in his name,
there
can be no task too humble.
And
after returning to the table, Jesus shakes things up again.
Instead
of blessing the God of all creation
for
providing us with bread from the earth
and
the sweet fruit of the vine,
he
says, Take, eat, and drink.
This is my Body. This is my Blood.
Flesh
and blood were repeatedly mentioned during the Seder meal,
but
they were the flesh and blood of the Passover lamb,
not
of the supper’s host.
And
so Jesus reveals himself to be the Lamb of God,
instituting
a Sacrament—the Holy Eucharist—
that
he might remain present always
among
those who believe in him—
food
to sustain us on life’s pilgrimage
as we
wait for the Lord to come.
But
Jesus didn’t stop there, either.
This
Body is to be given up,
and
this Blood is to be poured out.
That
is the language of sacrifice,
and
sacrifice is uniquely the work of a priest.
Now,
Jesus did not come from a priestly family—
his
lineage from the tribe of Judah, not Levi.
And
yet he speaks of making an offering to God—
offering
not animals on an altar of stone,
but
making a total gift of himself on the wood of the Cross.
Who
better, really, to be our High Priest,
the
mediator—the bridge—between heaven and earth,
than
he who is both true God and true man?
And
in his most daring move of all,
that
his one, perfect sacrifice might be renewed in every age—
that
God might continually touch the lives of his people
and
that his people might continually
be able
to reach out and touch their God—
Jesus
shares his priesthood with those men he has chosen
and
called to his side.
Do this in memory of me.
No,
Jesus didn’t add any tomatoes to the Passover menu;
tomatoes,
in fact, wouldn’t be introduced in the Middle East
for
another eighteen hundred years.
But
the startling changes he did make
were
for much the same purpose:
he
had come into this world to set slaves free.
When
God created man and woman,
he
placed them in Paradise—in a playground, a pleasure garden.
(And
is it not walking again in a garden
that
we’ll find our Lord at the end of this sacred Triduum?)
We
were made, you see, for freedom,
not
to ceaselessly toil and till the ground.
But
sin and—with it—death
have
made the human experience one tainted by suffering.
The
Son of God has taken this suffering upon himself
and—like
the Sedar ritual—turned it completely on its head.
What
once bespoke destruction
has
become in him the source of everlasting life.
To
ransom us slaves, God gave away his Son.
As a
French poet once insightfully put it,
“Christ did not come to do away with suffering;
he did not come to explain it;
he came to fill it with his
presence.” (Paul
Claudel)
And
so Jesus remains present with us
wherever
charity and love prevail.
Jesus
remains present with us
wherever
we break the Bread of Life.
Jesus
remains present with us
wherever
his holy priesthood is exercised.
He
remains present
because
he radically altered and fulfilled the Passover.
He
remains present that he might set us free forever
and
renew the face of the earth.
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