Wednesday of the Eighth Week of Ordinary Time

Realize that you were ransomed from your futile conduct… with the precious Blood of Christ…

Using a computer search of the New Testament, I compared the frequency of the words bread/wheat/break/flesh and wine/drink/vine/blood. Discarding the irrelevant passages I found far more references to drinking the blood of Christ than to eating the body of Christ. The first Christians, it seems were fascinated by the cup of salvation which they shared during the Mass.

Since the Church now invites every practicing Catholic to share the cup today I often wonder why so many don’t.

Some, of course, are alcoholic and dare not risk the chemistry of alcohol in their mouths. Others have a morbid fear of germs and cannot set aside their panic as they approach the altar.

But many simply don’t because they don’t – no particular reason.

And yet Jesus says to us at every Mass:

Take this, all of you, and drink from it; this is the cup of my blood, the blood of the new and everlasting covenant. It will be shed for you and for all so that sins may be forgiven. Do this in memory of me.

Such a direct command should be pretty hard to ignore.

I quit drinking thirty years ago and I have much sympathy for the alcoholic. Certainly he or should approach the altar with great circumspection. As one whose illness is not triggered by the chemistry of alcohol, I believe the content of this cup is the Blood of Christ. Although I always drink from the chalice, I have not had a drop of alcohol in thirty years.

What can it mean to drink the blood of the new and everlasting covenant? It’s fascinating that the first council of Jerusalem, reiterating the command given to Noah, directed gentile Christians to abstain from blood. (Acts of the Apostles 15:20 and Genesis 9:4) Apparently Jews regarded that law pretty seriously. Why would Jesus make such a command despite the ancient taboo?

I suppose it was because his covenant was a radically new departure from the past. It demanded far more of believers than the old covenant.

As we contemplate the blood, we should also remember Moses’ sprinkling the blood of an ox on the altar and on the newly-covenanted people. Because the altar represented God the people were washed and immersed in the living blood of the sacrifice with their God. When we drink the blood of Jesus we are absorbed into the sacrifice of his cross. We cry "Amen" to the gift of his life. "His blood be upon us and upon our children!" 

It is hard to ignore the command of Jesus and equally hard to ignore it’s daring as He commands us to commit a tabooed sacrilege.

We might approach the altar with fear and trembling if we had not been invited to approach it with such confidence:

…since through the blood of Jesus we have confidence of entrance into the sanctuary by the new and living way he opened for us through the veil, that is, his flesh, and since we have "a great priest over the house of God," let us approach with a sincere heart and in absolute trust, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed in pure water. (Hebrew 10: 19-22)