Homily for Holy Thursday

Homily for Holy Thursday

April 21, 2011
1 Cor 11: 23-26
John 13: 1-15
Willow Towers, New Rochelle

This is adapted from a homily originally given at Holy Cross Church in Fairfield, Conn., in 1990.

“This day shall be a memorial feast for you, which all generations shall celebrate” (Ex 12: 14).

Some years ago the revolver that Teddy Roosevelt used in the charge up San Juan Hill was stolen from its display case at his home on Long Island. The gun was valued at $500,000.

Why would someone want to possess that revolver? Why is one pistol worth half a million bucks? Because that gun is associated with the most famous event in the colorful career of the greatest showman ever to serve as our President. That pistol is a grand souvenir.

Tonight is about remembering. Jesus left us 3 souvenirs of his presence among us. Unlike the cold steel of TR’s revolver, Jesus’ souvenirs are warm and alive. These memorials are the Eucharist, the priesthood, and the new commandment.

When we eat our family dinner on Thanksgiving Day, we thank God for all the blessings we presently experience, including a tradition of freedom going back to the Pilgrims. But in no way do we consider ourselves to be reliving the Pilgrim experience of exodus, starvation, harvest, and salvation. They and we are safely separated by 390 years, and we promptly forget them till the following November.

The Jews, on the other hand, do relive the exodus from Egypt. At each Passover seder, the nation is saved anew from the avenging angel and from the army of Pharaoh. They remember who they are and how, out of slavery and the experience of the desert, God has forged them into a nation of his own.

In the Eucharist, we “proclaim the death of the Lord until he comes” (1 Cor 11:26). He will come again, for he is alive. He is our risen Lord; so our remembrance is not just of Calvary but of the resurrection. We feast on his body and blood, the great memorial, the living memorial, of his love for us, his presence among us. On our altars, in our tabernacles, is no mere symbol—as, say, holy water is a baptismal symbol—but the risen, living Lord, strong to save us from sin and from eternal death. This marvelous gift Jesus gave us on the night before he died, so that he might always remain personally with us.

The Last Supper, by Tintoretto

The 2d living souvenir of Jesus is the priesthood. The priesthood exists for the Eucharist and for Christ’s people; to carry out Jesus’ instruction: “Do this…in remembrance of me” (1 Cor 11:25). When we gather for the Eucharist, we gather to eat his body and thus become his body. When the body of believers calls a man to priesthood, it calls him to be the living Christ in our midst. It calls him to act as Christ by preaching the word of salvation and by celebrating the sacraments, above all, the Eucharist. The Eucharist is both the source and the summit of all our Christian lives. Without the Eucharist we are no longer Christ’s people; we forget how and why he died for us; we forget that he rose for us; we forget that he will come again in glory for us. Without the Eucharist the life of Christ within us is not nourished, and without the priesthood there is no Eucharist. The only priesthood is that of Christ; the mortal men who preach and preside at the Eucharist do so in the power and in the person of Christ.

But there is also a common priesthood distinct from the ordained priesthood. The priesthood of all believers is nourished and formed by the Eucharist, and it to is empowered to act in Christ’s name. The 3d souvenir that Christ gave us this holy night is his commandment: “Love one another. As I have loved you, so you also should love one another. That is how all will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another” (John 13:34-35).

Before and after this new commandment, Jesus showed us how he has loved us—“loved [us] to the end,” as St. John says (13:1). Jesus loved us so much that he died for us on the cross.

Jesus washing Peter's feet, by Pietro Lorenzetti

But before his passion, before his last supper, he also showed us his deep love, humble love, forgiving love. He did the slave’s duty of washing the feet of his guests. He washed the feet of Peter and of Judas, though he knew what they were about to do. He washed the feet of the other 10, though he knew what they were about to do. He gave us a vivid example of love, forgiveness, and service. And this example becomes a living memorial of Jesus our Lord, like the Eucharist and the priesthood, when we imitate it, when we disciples do for one another as Jesus did. Jesus’ humble service symbolizes the love, the service, the forgiveness that you and I must be ready to give to one another so that our Eucharistic Lord may live in our hearts, so that the whole world may know that we are his disciples.