✠ FRANCISCAN ORDER OF THE EUCHARIST (OFS), the sacrament of Eucharist is the predominant point of our Order.
The Eucharist, also called Holy Communion, the Blessed Sacrament or the Lord’s Supper, is a Christian rite, considered a sacrament in most churches and an ordinance in others. Christians believe that the rite was instituted by Jesus Christ at the Last Supper, the night before his crucifixion, when he gave his disciples bread and wine. Passages in the New Testament state that he commanded them to “do this in memory of me” while referring to the bread as “my body” and the cup of wine as “the blood of my covenant, which is poured out for many”. According to the synoptic Gospels, this was at a Passover meal.
The elements of the Eucharist, sacramental bread, either leavened or unleavened, and sacramental wine (among Catholics, Anglicans, Lutherans, Eastern Orthodox and Oriental Orthodox) are consecrated on an altar and consumed thereafter. The consecrated elements are the end product of the Eucharistic Prayer.
The New Testament was originally written in the Greek language and the Greek noun eucharistia, meaning “thanksgiving”, appears a few times in it, while the related Greek verb is found several times in New Testament accounts of the Last Supper, including the earliest such account:
For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it, and said, “This is my body which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me“.~ 1 Corinthians 11:23–24
The “Blessed Sacrament”, the “Sacrament of the Altar”, and other variations are common terms used by Catholics, Lutherans and some Anglicans (Anglo-Catholics) for the consecrated elements, particularly when reserved in a tabernacle.
The term “Mass” is used in the Catholic Church, the Lutheran churches (especially the Churches of Sweden, Norway and Finland), and by some Anglicans. It derives from the Latin word missa, a dismissal: “Ite missa est”, or “go, it is sent”, the very last phrase of the service. The term Divine Liturgy (Ancient Greek) is used in Byzantine Rite traditions, whether in the Eastern Orthodox Church or among the Eastern Catholic Churches. These also speak of “the Divine Mysteries”, especially in reference to the consecrated elements, which they also call “the Holy Gifts”. The synoptic Gospels, Mark 14:22–25, Matthew 26:26–29, and Luke 22:13–20 depict Jesus as presiding over the Last Supper prior to his crucifixion.
Most Christians, even those who deny that there is any real change in the elements used, recognize a special presence of Christ in this rite. Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy, Oriental Orthodoxy, and the Church of the East teach that the reality (the “substance”) of the elements of bread and wine is wholly changed into the body and blood of Jesus Christ, while the appearances (the “species”) remain. Transubstantiation (“change of the substance”) is the term used by Catholics to denote what is changed, not to explain how the change occurs, since the Catholic Church teaches that “the signs of bread and wine become, in a way surpassing understanding, the Body and Blood of Christ”. The Orthodox use various terms, such as transelementation, but no explanation is considered official, as they prefer to leave it a mystery.
In the Catholic Church, the Eucharist is considered a sacrament; according to the church, the Eucharist is “the source and summit of the Christian life”. “The other sacraments, and indeed all ecclesiastical ministries and works of the apostolate, are bound up with the Eucharist and are oriented toward it. For in the blessed Eucharist is contained the whole spiritual good of the Church, namely Christ himself, our Pasch.” (“Pasch” is a word that sometimes means Easter, sometimes Passover). In the Eucharist, the same sacrifice that Jesus made only once on the cross is believed to be made present at every Mass. According to the Compendium of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, “The Eucharist is the very sacrifice of the Body and Blood of the Lord Jesus which he instituted to perpetuate the sacrifice of the cross throughout the ages until his return in glory.”
Jesus Christ is present in the Eucharist in a true, real and substantial way, with his body, blood, soul and divinity. By the consecration, the substances of the bread and wine actually become the substances of the body and blood of Christ (transubstantiation) while the appearances or “species” of the bread and wine remain unaltered (e.g. colour, taste, feel, and smell). This change is brought about in the eucharistic prayer through the efficacy of Christ’s word and the action of the Holy Spirit. The Eucharistic presence of Christ begins at the moment of the consecration and endures as long as the Eucharistic species subsist, that is, until the Eucharist is digested, physically destroyed, or decays by some natural process (at which point, theologian Thomas Aquinas argued, the substance of the bread and wine cannot return)
Modified from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eucharist
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