Catechesis · Inquirer
Holy Communion
Catechesis · Inquirer
Holy Communion
At Holy Communion, the faithful receive the true Body and Blood of Christ -- under the forms of bread and wine, but truly His Body and Blood. This is not a symbol of His presence,…
Question
What are we receiving at Communion?
At Holy Communion, the faithful receive the true Body and Blood of Christ -- under the forms of bread and wine, but truly His Body and Blood. This is not a symbol of His presence, not a memorial of His absence, but a genuine reception of the risen and glorified Christ. The communicant is united to Christ -- not merely spiritually, but bodily. His Body enters our bodies; His Blood enters our blood.
The practical form in Orthodox worship: the faithful receive from a spoon (called the holy spoon or *labis*), which holds both the Body (leavened bread, the *prosphora*) and the Blood (wine mixed with hot water, called the *zeon*) together. The intinction is total: the two kinds are received together, as a sign that Christ's Body and Blood are inseparable in the risen life they communicate.
The teaching
True Body, true Blood -- the medicine of immortality
Ignatius of Antioch (c. 107 AD) called the Eucharist "the medicine of immortality, the antidote against dying, the food that makes us live in Jesus Christ forever." This is the earliest post-apostolic description of the Eucharist, and it is medical: the Body and Blood of Christ are the treatment for the fundamental human illness, which is mortality and separation from God. Communion is healing; it is theosis in concentrated form.
The prayer of thanksgiving after Communion includes: "O Master, who hast made us worthy to partake of Thy heavenly and immortal mysteries, do Thou make us worthy of Thy kingdom." The Eucharist is already a participation in the Kingdom -- a foretaste of the heavenly table. Each Communion is a partial arrival at the destination: the communicant has received what the age to come will give in fullness.
The Eucharist is the medicine of immortality, the antidote against dying, food that makes us live in Jesus Christ forever.
Ignatius of Antioch wrote this on his way to martyrdom in Rome -- he was about to become the living expression of what he describes. He was about to die; he spoke of the medicine against dying. His point: the Eucharist is not merely a devotional act. It is a participation in the resurrection life of Christ -- a communication of the immortal life into mortal flesh. To receive it frequently and faithfully is to receive increasingly the life that death cannot touch.
St. Ignatius of Antioch
Letter to the Ephesians 20.2 · c. 107 AD
Holy Scripture
"Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day."
John 6:54
"The one who eats my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him."
John 6:56
Preparing for Communion
What it means to receive the Body and Blood worthily
The prayers before Communion in the Orthodox tradition are among the most beautiful in Christian spirituality. They move through fear ("I stand before Thee, knowing I am unworthy"), honest confession ("I have sinned in thought, word, and deed"), trust in Christ's mercy ("Thou camest to save sinners, of whom I am chief"), and desire ("I hunger and thirst for Thee, the immortal Bread"). Together they describe the posture of the soul before the most holy: open, honest, needy, and trustful.