Publisher's Synopsis
Excerpt from The Duke Divinity School Review, Vol. 30: The James A. Gray Lectures on "the Second Vatican Council"; Winter 1965
Up with your hearts. And it was quite in order that Paul, in his Eucharistic First Epistle to the Corinthians, should conclude his message with Maranatha - come Lord; and that that same word is found in the earliest non-scriptural description of the Eucharist, in the Didache, or the Teaching of the Twelve Apostles. Most im portantly, the Eucharist is not merely the expression of our hope postponed into the future. It is, in God's mercy, hope already realized, for He Who is to come in glory already now becomes present in the Eucharistic assembly, in gracious anticipation of that future day.
Of charity. And finally, the Eucharist or the Lord's Supper is our greatest personal and communal act of charity. I will not elaborate this point here, but will speak of it somewhat more at length in my next lecture. The purpose of the Lord's Supper, its role in the Church, is to unite us in Christ and with each other, in a charity that embraces all our brethren in Christ, whether slave or free, whether Jew or Greek, whether black or white, whether Catholic or Protestant or Moslem or Buddhist or Animist or Atheist. The Bread we receive is Christ's body broken for the many! And we eat it and drink Christ's blood unworthily, unto our judgment, unless we open our hearts thereby and in their strength, not just to a warm over-all glow of good will, but open our hearts to bleed for Medgar Evers and for those who killed him. The Table of the Eucharist is our Christian declaration to the world of our duty of social justice and charity.
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