Why Eucharist every single week?

[ora_pro_nobis]

Could be. Thanks for your response. I’d still like to understand why someone wouldn’t receive the Eucharist each week, assuming their soul is in a state of grace? It’s just hard for me to fathom why someone would choose to remain seated and not join in? I’d like to understand where those folks are coming from.

Off the top of my head, if I haven’t observed the Eucharistic fast, I wouldn’t receive. If I came in late, I wouldn’t receive. If I got annoyed with the person in the pew behind me who kept kicking my pew, I wouldn’t receive until I was sure I had really forgiven them.

I knew someone who mistakenly believed that because he was divorced, he couldn’t receive - he attended Mass every week for fifteen years without receiving until someone put him right.

I try to go to Mass daily and receive as often as I can.

 

[YoungTradCath]

Could be. Thanks for your response. I’d still like to understand why someone wouldn’t receive the Eucharist each week, assuming their soul is in a state of grace? It’s just hard for me to fathom why someone would choose to remain seated and not join in? I’d like to understand where those folks are coming from.

I don’t think anybody wouldn’t want to.

 

[Evan]

Eucharist and Mass are the same thing.

There seems to be some idea that receiving the body and blood of Christ is ‘receiving the Eucharist’. Eucharist means thanksgiving. It is something we offer to God.

from the Catechism:

II. WHAT IS THIS SACRAMENT CALLED?

1328 The inexhaustible richness of this sacrament is expressed in the different names we give it. Each name evokes certain aspects of it. It is called:

Eucharist, because it is an action of thanksgiving to God. The Greek words eucharistein and eulogein recall the Jewish blessings that proclaim - especially during a meal - God’s works: creation, redemption, and sanctification.

1329 The Lord’s Supper, because of its connection with the supper which the Lord took with his disciples on the eve of his Passion and because it anticipates the wedding feast of the Lamb in the heavenly Jerusalem.

The Breaking of Bread, because Jesus used this rite, part of a Jewish meat when as master of the table he blessed and distributed the bread, above all at the Last Supper. It is by this action that his disciples will recognize him after his Resurrection, and it is this expression that the first Christians will use to designate their Eucharistic assemblies; by doing so they signified that all who eat the one broken bread, Christ, enter into communion with him and form but one body in him.

The **Eucharistic assembly **(synaxis), because the Eucharist is celebrated amid the assembly of the faithful, the visible expression of the Church.

1330 The memorial of the Lord’s Passion and Resurrection.

The Holy Sacrifice, because it makes present the one sacrifice of Christ the Savior and includes the Church’s offering. The terms holy sacrifice of the Mass, “sacrifice of praise,” spiritual sacrifice, pure and holy sacrifice are also used, since it completes and surpasses all the sacrifices of the Old Covenant.

The** Holy and Divine Liturgy**, because the Church’s whole liturgy finds its center and most intense expression in the celebration of this sacrament; in the same sense we also call its celebration the Sacred Mysteries. We speak of the Most Blessed Sacrament because it is the Sacrament of sacraments. The Eucharistic species reserved in the tabernacle are designated by this same name.

1331 Holy Communion, because by this sacrament we unite ourselves to Christ, who makes us sharers in his Body and Blood to form a single body. We also call it: the holy things (ta hagia; sancta) - the first meaning of the phrase “communion of saints” in the Apostles’ Creed - the bread of angels, bread from heaven, medicine of immortality, viaticum. . . .

1332 Holy Mass (Missa), because the liturgy in which the mystery of salvation is accomplished concludes with the sending forth (missio) of the faithful, so that they may fulfill God’s will in their daily lives.

 

[Vico]

Evan, that is an important clarification that you posted, and there is also a use of the term Eucharist with a different meaning than Mass, that is given in the Catechism, for the specific sacrament of Holy Communion:

The fruits of Holy Communion 1391 Holy Communion augments our union with Christ. The principal fruit of receiving the Eucharist in Holy Communion is an intimate union with Christ Jesus. …
Father Hardon, Modern Catholic Dictionary gives three meanings to Eucharist: EUCHARIST.

The true Body and Blood of Jesus Christ, who is really and substantially present under the appearances of bread and wine, in order to offer himself in the sacrifice of the Mass and to be received as spiritual food in Holy Communion. It is called Eucharist, or “thanksgiving,” because at its institution at the Last Supper Christ “gave thanks,” and by this fact it is the supreme object and act of Christian gratitude to God.

Although the same name is used, the Eucharist is any one or all three aspects of one mystery, namely the Real Presence, the Sacrifice, and Communion. As Real Presence, the Eucharist is Christ in his abiding existence on earth today; as Sacrifice, it is Christ in his abiding action of High Priest, continuing now to communicate the graces he merited on Calvary; and as Communion, it is Christ coming to enlighten and strengthen the believer by nourishing his soul for eternal life.

(Etym. Latin eucharistia, the virtue of thanksgiving or thankfulness; from Greek eucharistia, gratitude; from eu-, good + charizesthai, to show favor.)

See also SACRAMENT OF THE ALTAR.

Therefore weekly reception of the Holy Eucharist is logical because it is the completion of the liturgy.

 

[Evan]

Therefore weekly reception of the Holy Eucharist is logical because it is the completion of the liturgy.

Good. In studying the Lord’s Prayer, I came across a quote of St Ambrose in the commentary of the Navarra Bible series. I don’t have the quote, but he was of the opinion that one of the Lord’s Prayers (Matthew and Luke each have a copy) the ‘Daily Bread’ could be a reference to the True Bread come down from heaven (John 6) and the Bread of Eucharist.

Since the Mass is offered each day, we should be encouraged to daily reception. He was haranguing those who chose only to receive annually!!

I am at Mass as often as possible but only receive the host when prepared, BUT if I am not prepared that does not stop me from going to Mass. For many graces are received when you make a spiritual communion if you cannot go forward to communion.