From Brant Pitre’s, Jesus the Bridegroom:
If Jesus is the Bridegroom and the Church is his bride, the Lord’s Supper is not just a memorial, or a banquet of “thanksgiving,” or a sacrifice; it is also a wedding banquet in which Jesus gives himself entirely to his bride in a new and everlasting marriage covenant. 145
“Blessed are those who are invited to the wedding supper of the Lamb” (Rev 19:9)
Saint Augustine writes that every celebration of the Eucharist is a renewal of the wedding of Christ and the Church:
- Every Celebration [of the Eucharist] is a celebration of Marriage; the Church’s nuptials are celebrated. The King’s Son is about to marry a wife, and the King’s Son [is] himself a King; and the guests frequenting the marriage are themselves the Bride.… For all the Church is Christ’s Bride, of which the beginning and first-fruits is the Flesh of Christ, because there was the Bride joined to the Bridegroom in the flesh. (Augustine, Homilies on 1 John 2:12–17)
In other words, in the Eucharistic “marriage celebration” (Latin nuptiarum celebratio), Jesus the Bridegroom is united to the Church, not just in spirit, but in body as well. For while Jesus, as the divine Son of God, is spiritually present everywhere, in the Eucharist he is present bodily: it is the wedding banquet at which the Bridegroom Messiah is united to his bride in both body and spirit. 147
In a striking illustration of this mysterious union, Saint Ambrose, the fourth-century bishop of Milan, describes the Lord’s Supper as the fulfillment of the “kiss” shared by the bridegroom and the bride in the Song of Songs. In one of his sermons to newly baptized Christians, Ambrose declares:
- You have come to the altar, the Lord Jesus calls you, for the text speaks of you or of the Church, and he says to you: “Let him kiss me with kisses of his mouth” [Song of Songs 1:1]. This word can be applied equally to Christ or to you. Do you wish to apply it to Christ? You see that you are pure from all sin, since your faults have been blotted out. This is why He judges you to be worthy of heavenly sacraments and invites you to the heavenly banquet: “May he kiss me with the kiss of his mouth” [Song of Songs 1:1]. You wish to apply the same to yourself? Seeing yourself pure from all sins and worthy to come to the altar of Christ.… You see the wonderful sacrament and you say: “May he kiss me with the kiss of his mouth,” that is, may Christ give me a kiss. (Ambrose, On the Sacraments, 5:5–7)
What a grand vision of the Lord’s Supper! This is especially so when we recall the ancient Jewish interpretation of the Song of Songs as an allegory of the love of God for Israel as expressed through worship in the Temple. In the words of Jean Daniélou, for the Church Fathers, the Eucharist was nothing less than “the kiss given by Christ to the soul, the expression of the union of love.” In this way, the Eucharist fulfills the longing of bridal Israel for union with her God. 147
There is, however, a dark side to the mystery of the eucharistic kiss. Saint John Chrysostom, the fourth-century bishop of Constantinople, uses the very same image to warn against receiving the Lord’s Supper in a state of unrepented grave sin. In Eucharistic liturgy composed by Chrysostom, the Christian faithful pray these striking words: O Son of God, bring me into communion today with your mystical supper. I shall not tell your enemies the secret, nor kiss you with Judas’ kiss. But like the good thief I cry, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” (CCC 1386)
For the early Church Fathers, knowingly receiving the Eucharist in a state of grave sin is like recapitulating the “kiss” of betrayal given by Judas to Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane (Luke 22:47–48). Here again, sin is not just about breaking rules; it is the betrayal of a relationship. 148
As with baptism, the idea of the Eucharist as a wedding banquet is not something confined to the writings of ancient mystics or a few Church fathers. It too is part of the official teaching of the Catholic Church today.
Once again, Pope John Paul II brings this aspect to the fore when he teaches that in the Eucharist Jesus gives his bride the wedding gift of himself:
- [With the Eucharist,] we find ourselves at the very heart of the Paschal Mystery, which completely reveals the spousal love of God. Christ is the Bridegroom because “he has given himself”: his body has been “given,” his blood has been “poured out” (cf. Luke 22:19–20). In this way “he loved them to the end” (John 13:1). The “sincere gift” contained in the Sacrifice of the Cross gives definitive prominence to the spousal meaning of God’s love.… The Eucharist is the Sacrament of our Redemption. It is the Sacrament of the Bridegroom and of the Bride. (John Paul II, Apostolic Letter On the Dignity and Vocation of Women [Mulieris Dignitatem], no. 26) 148
How many people today think of the Eucharist in this way, as “the Sacrament of the Bridegroom and the Bride”? Yet if love is defined as the gift of oneself to another person, then the Eucharist is the highest possible expression of Jesus’ spousal love for the Church. In the Eucharist Jesus not only tells the Church he loves her; he shows his love by really and truly giving himself to her, in both body and spirit, as the divine Bridegroom. Note well that this kind of self-gift is only really possible if the Eucharist is not just a symbol of Jesus—like a wedding ring, for example—but Jesus himself: his actual body, blood, soul, and divinity. 149
How many people today think of the Eucharist in this way, as “the Sacrament of the Bridegroom and the Bride”? Yet if love is defined as the gift of oneself to another person, then the Eucharist is the highest possible expression of Jesus’ spousal love for the Church. In the Eucharist Jesus not only tells the Church he loves her; he shows his love by really and truly giving himself to her, in both body and spirit, as the divine Bridegroom. Note well that this kind of self-gift is only really possible if the Eucharist is not just a symbol of Jesus—like a wedding ring, for example—but Jesus himself: his actual body, blood, soul, and divinity.
Indeed, Pope Benedict XVI describes the Eucharist as the premier expression of the sacrificial love that Jesus demonstrated on the cross when he writes:
- The Eucharist draws us into Jesus’ act of self-oblation [self-sacrifice]. More than just statically receiving the incarnate Logos [“Word”], we enter into the very dynamic of his self-giving. The imagery of marriage between God and Israel is now realized in a way previously inconceivable: it had meant standing in God’s presence, but now it becomes union with God through sharing in Jesus’ self-gift, sharing in his body and blood.… We can thus understand how agape [Greek for “sacrificial love”] also became a term for the Eucharist: there God’s own agape comes to us bodily, in order to continue his work in us and through us. (Benedict XVI, Encyclical Letter, God Is Love [Deus Caritas Est], nos. 13–14)
For over four hundred years, one of the main debates between Protestants and Catholics has been over whether the Eucharist is a supper that calls to mind the Last Supper of Jesus or a sacrifice that makes present the self-offering of Jesus on Calvary. As Pope Benedict shows, the understanding of the Eucharist as a wedding banquet combines both of these notions into one:
- the Eucharist is both a wedding supper and a wedding sacrifice. It is the “marriage supper of the Lamb” (Revelation 19:9), whose sacrificial love for the Church is expressed by the gift of his body and blood in the Upper Room and on Calvary. In other words, the Eucharist is a “nuptial sacrament” of both the Last Supper and the cross (Benedict XVI, Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation Sacrament of Charity [Sacramentum Caritatis], no. 27). 149-50
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