Word to the Wise
Thursday, April 14, 2022 - Holy Thursday: Evening Mass of the Lord's Supper - ABC
[Exod 12:1-8, 11-14; 1 Cor 11:23-26; John 13:1-15]He loved his own in the world and he loved them to the end. [John]
These words, which appear at the beginning of today's gospel scripture from the Gospel According to John, could sum up the entirety of the Sacred Triduum. Scripture scholars tell us that the accounts of Jesus' passion, death and resurrection were the first parts of the gospels to be composed. Everything about Jesus seemed to center on these last three days of his earthly journey, and this is still true of our faith.
Today we celebrate the first of the three days (the "Sacred Triduum"). The focus is on the "Last Supper." I see the whole story as a three-part drama. Act one is the "washing of the feet." The account in the Gospel According to John alone mentions the gesture of Jesus washing the feet of the disciples. It also omits any mention of the words we hear at Mass every time, "This is my body.....etc." We have to return to John 6:22-59 for that. What we hear (and see at the service this evening) are the words, "You call me 'teacher' and 'master,' and rightly so, for indeed I am. If I, therefore, the master and teacher, have washed your feet, you ought to wash one another's feet. I have given you a model to follow, so that as I have done for you, you should also do."
The second act centers on the betrayal by Judas, which we heard in the gospel scriptures on Tuesday and Wednesday. There is an ominous line when Judas accepts a morsel of food from Jesus and leaves: "And it was night!"
The third act is probably the most familiar to us because we tend to focus on it at every celebration of the Eucharist. Jesus takes bread, blesses it, breaks it and gives it to the disciples saying, "This is my Body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me." And the same is done with the cup, again with the reminder, "Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me." It is the second scripture for today, from St. Paul's First Letter to the Corinthians, that reminds us of this third act of the drama.
The larger context for the Last Supper, the celebration of the Passover and God's plan of salvation revealed in the Old Testament is given to us in the first scripture of this celebration and shapes the remembrance. But the power of the opening line in today's gospel remains: "He loved his own in the world and he loved them to the end." AMEN.