Holy Thursday

It always amazes me how the Gospel of John does not have an Institution Narrative. Surely, you would think, for the sake of completeness, that this gospel would have an account of the Eucharist. Yet, what we are given is the washing of the feet and the "farewell discourses." John may well respond to such a critique asking why the disciples left out the washing of the feet! John would also point to the fact that he uses the term for Eucharist in the feeding of the five thousand (Jn 6: 11) and follows this with the Bread of Life discourse. The feeding reference was so important that the early Christian document The Didache, most likely dating from the 1st Century, used it in its Eucharistic Prayer: "Over the broken bread say: “we give you thanks, Father, for the life and the knowledge which you have revealed to us through Jesus your servant. To you be glory for ever. As this broken bread scattered on the mountains was gathered and became one, so too, may your Church be gathered together from the ends of the earth into your kingdom. For glory and power are yours through Jesus Christ for ever”." 

From this we can understand that the act of washing feet, distributing food and Eucharist are all interlinked - service, charity and sacrifice. Pope St John Paul II wrote in his first encyclical, Redemptor hominis, from 1979: "It (the Eucharist) is at one and the same time a Sacrifice-Sacrament, a Communion-Sacrament, and a Presence-Sacrament." (RH, 20) Hence, it is difficult to sum up the mystery of the Eucharist in any single homily, lecture or blog post. Rather, it must be prayed, received and lived just like the washing of the feet.