Holy Thursday Homily

Time and time again scripture tells us that His hour has not yet come, but tonight we are told that He "knew that His hour had come." This hour that is being referred to in our Gospel is that of the events of the passion which began to unfold with the Last Supper where Christ came to institute for the Church both the priesthood and the Holy Eucharist. We celebrate this reality each and every single time when we gather for the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. It is during the Mass that we join with Christ in this hour that begins to unfold tonight. We join with Him as He gives the Eucharist to His apostles and we join with Him as He is eventually crucified upon the cross at Calvary. The Mass is not just some human action, but instead it is a divine action where we are always transported to this hour that begins to unfold when Christ would "pass from this world to the Father." We must therefore take this time when we gather together for the Mass most seriously, because at this time we truly join with Christ at His hour of mercy.

The Mass is most serious because within it we have a priest who offers our sacrifices to God. We must therefore go back to what was offered time and time again by priests within the temple, which is sacrifice. This sacrifice would be offered on behalf of the sins of the people and therefore would have to be continuously offered because it was not perfect. What we have within the Church is far different because when Christ's hour came, He would make the perfect sacrifice that would set us free for our enslavement to sin. It is through the priests of the Church that we enter into the Mass and thus enter into Christ's sacrifice that has been offered once and for all. Christ knew that the hour that He had to embrace was quickly coming, and so He gathered His twelve apostles into the upper room, gave the words of institution, and said to them "do this in remembrance of me." In these words He is revealing that they are the ones who have been chosen as his first priests to continue the priestly sacrifice of the Eucharist for the Church.

 Not only are these words most important in the institution of the priesthood, but also these words are most important in our own relationship to the Eucharist. At the time of the Passover very similar words were used to remind the faithful of the need to continue to commemorate this action that was accomplished by God. The Eucharist is therefore something so much greater than being a mere symbol. Instead the Eucharist is literally the Body, Blood, soul, and divinity of our Saviour Jesus Christ. Despite the reality that His hour had finally come does not herald that we have been cut off from God. Instead Christ continues to dwell here among us in the Holy Eucharist. In the Eucharist we join our own hearts to our Lord and thus allow ourselves to enter into His sacrifice and thus to be conformed to the image of Christ more and more each day. When we commune with our Lord free from the state of mortal sin we begin to love Him more each day which in return will lead us towards true fraternal charity.

This past year on the Solemnity of Corpus Christi Pope Francis stated in his homily concerning those who receive the Eucharist: "The Lord leads us to follow his path -- that of service, sharing and giving; and that little that we have, the little that we are, if shared, becomes a treasure because the power of God, who is love, descends to our poverty and transforms it." Following this homily we will celebrate the ritual of the washing of feet which displays to all of us the true fraternal charity that is required because we have received Christ present in the Holy Eucharist into our life. This action of service shows that it is not enough to receive our Lord at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and to not allow ourselves to be moved away from our sin and also towards true service and respect for our brothers and sisters in Christ. To receive the Eucharist is to commune with God's perfect love that is over flowing and therefore it should bring about the desire to enter into "service, sharing, and giving" to God and those whom we encounter.

Tonight as the reality of Christ's hour arrives for all of us may we indeed see the great love that God has in store for each of us. His love is clearly seen upon the wood of the cross and from this sacrifice it is continued to be seen within the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. This love is seen because Christ did not leave us alone when His hour had arrived, but instead He left us with the gift of the priesthood and of the Holy Eucharist. May we not take these great gifts for granted, but realize that without them we would not have a Church to worship within. Instead of taking these gifts for granted may we be transformed through the greatest love story that has ever been told which is Calvary and therefore is also the Mass. When we commune this day with our Lord may we allow it to transform us to resemble Christ more and more. From this daily transformation we must move away from our sin, we must grow closer to God, and we must therefore be moved into fraternal charity. May we indeed embrace these realities on this day when Christ's hour has finally come to pass.