The texts from the Roman Catholic Lectionary tonight invite us to meditate on the message to humanity of the humility and service of Jesus as we begin the Easter Triduum with the Mass of the Lord’s Supper.
Served at the Table
In the reading from Exodus the First Passover is instituted.
* [12:1–20] This section, which interrupts the narrative of the exodus, contains later legislation concerning the celebration of Passover.1
Psalm 116 is a thanksgiving for recovery from illness.
* [116:15] Dear in the eyes of the LORD: the meaning is that the death of God’s faithful is grievous to God, not that God is pleased with the death, cf. Ps 72:14. In Wis 3:5–6, God accepts the death of the righteous as a sacrificial burnt offering.2
The First Letter of Paul to the Corinthians describes the Institution of the Lord’s Supper.
* [11:23–25] This is the earliest written account of the institution of the Lord’s Supper in the New Testament. The narrative emphasizes Jesus’ action of self-giving (expressed in the words over the bread and the cup) and his double command to repeat his own action.3
In the Gospel of John, Jesus washes the Disciples’ Feet.
* [13:1–20] Washing of the disciples’ feet. This episode occurs in John at the place of the narration of the institution of the Eucharist in the synoptics. It may be a dramatization of Lk 22:27—“I am your servant.” It is presented as a “model” (“pattern”) of the crucifixion. It symbolizes cleansing from sin by sacrificial death.4
Tom Quinn comments that whenever the apostles gathered in Jesus' name, from that time on, the wine and bread would remind them of him. It would, in fact, be his body and blood, our Eucharist. We will never be without Jesus. Our hearts brace today for the recounting of the agony that Jesus endured on Good Friday. We are also quietly aware of the glory that is coming, and we do not despair.
Jesus had another purpose for gathering his friends the day before his crucifixion; he wished to underline the importance of serving and loving one another. When he stripped his outer clothing and put a towel about to wash their feet like a servant. Peter was not about to let this happen. The lesson, however, was soon apparent to all of them; Jesus was vehement in telling Peter and the other disciples, that they must allow this or they would part ways. Jesus, The Lord, and Our God humbled himself to serve all of us. What possible reason an we have for not loving and serving any person that God has created? Jesus underlined humility, love and service in the last hours with the disciples.5
Don Schwager quotes “Christ chose to be a servant who offered himself for us,” by Saint Augustine of Hippo, 354-430 A.D.
"Even though the man Christ Jesus, in the form of God together with the Father with whom He is one God, accepts our sacrifice, nonetheless He has chosen in the form of a servant to be the sacrifice rather than accept it. Therefore, He is the priest Himself Who presents the offering, and He Himself is what is offered." (excerpt from City of God, 10,20)6
The Word Among Us Meditation on John 13:1-15 comments that with awe and gratitude, we remember the night that Jesus entered his passion.
“Lord Jesus, I marvel at your humility. On this night, though your heart was heavy with the suffering to come, you didn’t think of yourself. Instead, you took on the role of a servant. You, who sustain the very universe, knelt and washed the feet of men who would betray you, deny you, and abandon you in your hour of need. You humbled yourself and showed us what it means to be great in the kingdom of God. You showed us how to love. You loved us to the end.7
Friar Jude Winkler discusses the connection of the Passover meal to the angel of death in Egypt and the passing over to the Promised Land. The events of Passover are re- presented to the faithful. In the early account of the celebration of the Eucharist (circa 50 CE) the words of consecration in Aramaic “This is me” are re-presentation of Jesus' Last Supper, Crucifixion, and Resurrection. Friar Jude reminds us that the horizontal dimension of the Eucharist is in “washing the feet” of others.
Cynthia Bourgeault comments that from a wisdom point of view, what can we say about the passion? . . . The key lies in . . . reading Jesus’s life as a sacrament: a sacred mystery whose real purpose is not to arouse empathy but to create empowerment. In other words, Jesus is not particularly interested in increasing either your guilt or your devotion, but rather, in deepening your personal capacity to make the passage into unitive life. If you’re willing to work with that wager, the passion begins to make sense in a whole new way. . . .
The path [Jesus] did walk is precisely the one that would most fully unleash the transformative power of his teaching. It both modeled and consecrated the eye of the needle that each one of us must personally pass through in order to accomplish the “one thing necessary” here, according to his teaching: to die to self. I am not talking about literal crucifixion, of course, but I am talking about the literal laying down of our “life,” at least as we usually recognize it. Our only truly essential human task here, Jesus teaches, is to grow beyond the survival instincts of the animal brain and egoic operating system into the kenotic joy and generosity of full human personhood. . . .8
The liturgy that begins tonight continues until the end of the Easter Vigil Mass. We have the opportunity to deepen the meaning of Easter to our daily lives in relationship with God and others.
References
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