Explaination of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass

By Father Martin of Cochem


I) The Nature of Holy Mass (Continuation)

Father Martin of Cochem

The holy Catholic Church, in the Ecumenical Council of Trent, teaches us what manmner of sacrifice or sacred oblation Christ has given to and ordained in His Church.

«Forasmuch as, under the former Testament, according to the testimony of the Apostle Paul, there was no perfection, because of the weakness of the Levitical priesthood; there was need, God, the Father of mercies, so ordaining, that another priest should rise, according to the order of Melchisedech, our Lord Jesus Christ, who might consummate, and lead to what is perfect, as many as were to be sanctified. He, therefore, our God and Lord, though He was about to offer Himself once on the altar of the cross unto God the Father, by means of his death, there to operate an eternal redemption; nevertheless, because that His priesthood was not to be extinguished by His death, in the last supper, on the night in which He was betrayed, - that He might leave, to His own beloved Spouse the Church, a visible sacrifice, such as the nature of man requires, whereby that bloody sacrifice, once to be accomplished on the cross, might be represented, and the memory thereof remain even unto the end of the world, and its salutary virtue be applied to the remission of those sins which we daily commit, - declaring Himself constituted a priest for ever, according to the order of Melchisedech, He offered up to God the Father His own body and blood under the species of bread and wine; and, under the symbols of those same things, He delivered (His own body and blood) to be received by His apostles, whom He then constituted priests of the New Testament; and by those words, Do this in commemoration of me, He commanded them and their successors in the priesthood, to offer (them); even as the Catholic Church has always understood and taught. »¹

This, and more besides, holy Church teaches us, and enjoins upon us to believe that in the Last Supper Christ did not only change bread ands wine into His body and blood: He also offered them up to God the Father, and thus instituted and ordained in His own person the sacrifice of the new covenant. This He did in order to show Himself to be a priest according to the order of Melchisedech, of whom Holy Scripture thus speaks: «Melchisedech, the King of Salem, brought forth bread and wine, for he was the priest of the most high God, and he blessed Abram.»² The text does not here expressly state that Melchisedech offered sacrifice to the most high God; but from the first the Catholic Church has understood this to be meant, and the fathers have thus expounded it. David himself interprets it thus when he says: «The Lord hath sworn, and He will not repent: Thou art a priest forever according to the order of Melchisedech.»³

That both Christ and Melchisedech offered sacrifice is to be inferred from the words of St. Paul,l writing to the Hebrews: «Everty high priest is appointed to offer gifts and sacrifices.»⁴ «Every high priest taken from among men is ordained for men in the things that appertain to God, that he may offer up gifts and sacrifices for sins.»⁵ And almost immediately after he adds: «Neither doth any man take the honoir to himself, but he that is called by God, as Aaron was. So Christ did not glorify Himself, that He might be made a high priest, but He that said unto Him: Thou aret My Son, this day have I begotten Thee. … Thou art a priest forever according to the order of Melchisedech.» And again: «And being consummated, He became, to all that obey Him, the cause of eternal salvation, called by God a high priest according to the order of Melchisedech. Of whom we have much to say, and hard to be intelligibly uttered; because you are become weak to hear.»⁶

From these passages it is evident that, since Christ and Melchisedech were high priests, they both offered oblations to the true God. Melchisedech did not sacrifice victims, as did Abraham and the earlier adorers of the true God, but, acting by the inspirations of the Holy Ghost, and at variance with the custom of the times, he sanctified bread and wine with certain prayers and rites, raising tzhem aloft, and offering them to God as a holy, acceptable offering. Thus be became a type of Jesus Christ, and his offering a type of the bloodless sacrifice of Jesus Christ under the New Testament. Now since Christ was not anoited high priest by God the Father according to the order or manner of Aaron, who slaughtered victims, but according to the order of Melchisedech, who presented bread and wine as an oblation, it follows that He also exercised His priestly fuctions during His lifetime, and offered to God an oblation of bread and wine.

When, we ask, did Christ exercise His priestly office according to the order of Melchisedech? At the Last Supper, when He took bread, blessed it, and said to His discibles: «Take ye, and eat: This is My body.» In like manner, taking the chalice with wine, He blessed it, and gave it to His discibles, saying: «Drink ye all of this, for this My blood. Do this for a commemoration of Me.»⁷

On that occasion, therefore, Christ exercised His priestly office after the manner of Melchisedech. For if He did not do so then He never did so at all throughout His whole life, and in that case He would not have been a priest according to the order of Melchisedech. And yet in what exalted language St. Paul describes His priesthood: «The others indeed were made priests without an oath, but this with an oath, by Him that said unto Him: The Lord hath sworn, and He will not repent: Thou art a priest forever. ...But this, for that He continueth forever, hath an everlasting priesthood.»⁸ Hence we see the truth of what the Catholic Church teaches in the Council of Trent: «He offered up to God the Father His own body and blood under the species of bread and wine; and, under the symbols of those same things, He delivered (His own body and blood) to be received by His apostles, whom He then constituted priests of the New Testament; and by those words, Do this in commemoration of me, He commanded them and their successors in the priesthood, to offer (them); even as the Catholic Church has always understood and taught. ... And this is indeed that clean oblation, which cannot be defiled by any unworthiness, or malice of those that offer (it); which the Lord foretold by Malachias was to be offered in every place, clean to his name.»⁹

The offering of this clean oblation was predicted by the prophet Malachias in the following words: «I have no pleasure in you, saith the Lord of hosts; and I will not receive a gift of your hand. For from My name is great among the Gentils, and in every place there is a sacrifice, and there is offered to my name a clean offering.»¹⁰ All the fathers of the Church consider this passage to refer to the sacrifice of the Mass. For this prophecy does not find its fulfilment in the Old Testament, but in the New, wherein are also fulfilled the woprds which were spoken by God the Father to His Son: «Thou art My Son, this day have I begotten Thee. Ask of Me, and I will give Thee the Gentiles for Thy inheritance.»¹² This was accomplished when the heathen were converted to the faith by the preaching of the apostles. The sacrifice here predicted by Malachias cannot be that which was offered by Christ on the cross, as non-Catholics assert; for that was made in one place only, on Calvary, not in every place, as the prophet declares. Nor can the suppositrion be entertained that the prophecy refers to a sacrifice of praise or of good works, for these are no obligation in the proper sense of the word, nor are they always a clean oblation; as the prophet says: «All our justices are before Thee as a filthy rag.»¹³

This prophecy is consequently to be understood as expressly referring to the holy Mass as the one only and true sacrifice of the New Testament; an oblation in itself perfectly pure and holy, which is offerd up to God the Father in all times and in all places by Christ Himself through the instrumentality of His priests. Christ is the chief High Priest, our priests are but His servants, and He makes use of their hands and their lips for the offering of a material sacrifice. It is because Christ in His glorified body is not perceptible to our senses, it being at the same time necessary that there should be a visible victim seen by mortal eyes, that He employs the cooperation of the priest in offering up His sacrifice. This oblation will continue to be offered until the end of the world.

It is alleged against us as a reproach by non-Catholics that the word Mass is not found in the Bible. This is unquestionable true, but the same may be said of the word Trinity, yet we are bound to believe that sacred mystery. … In the writing of the early popes and doctors of the Church we frequently meet with the word Mass; witness the writings of St. Clement, the third successor of St. Peter, and those of Popes Evarist and Alexander, who lived in t6he first century. St. Augustine, St. Ambrose, St. Chrysostom, and other holy fathers of ther Church, make use of the word Mass when speaking of the sacrifice of the New Testament. St. Ambrose writes: «I remained at my post, commenced saying Mass, and during the sacrifice I besought Almighty God to come to our assistance.» St. Augustine says: «We see, in the lections which are ordered to be read in the Holy Mass,» etc. Both these doctors of the Church, who lived three hundred years after Christ, employ the word Mass, which shows that it was certainly in common use at that time.

That the apostles were in the habit of saying Mass we learn from Sacred Scripture and the lives of the apostles. St. Matthew was stabbed at the altar whilst offering the holy sacrifice. Tradition relates of St. Andrew that he said to the judge: «I offer daily to the Almighty God upon the altar not the flesh of oxen or the blood of goats, but the spotless Lamb of God.» Liturgies for the Mass composed by the apostles St. James and St. Mark are still extant. The Canon of the Mass is ascribed to St. Peter, and other parts were added by some other holy popes. From all that has been said it follows that Mass was celebrated in the Church from the very beginning, and that it has at all times been regarded as the true sacrifice of the New Testament.

1Council of Trent, Session XXII. Chapter 1.

2Gen. XIV. 18.

3Ps. CIX. 4.

4Heb. VIII. 3.

5Ibid. V. 1.

6Ibid. v. 4-6, 9-11

7St. Matt. XXVI. 26-28; St. Luke XXII. 19

8Heb. VII. 20, 21,24.

9Session XXII. ch. 1.

10Malach. I. 10, 11.

12Ps. II. 7, 8.

13Is. LXIV. 6.