The Entire Mass is from Scripture!

If you’ve ever been to a Catholic Mass, you know that it is formal, largely  scripted, and can be a bit long. We’re all for the movement of the spirit, but we’re not begin on the priest  making it up as he goes along. What you might not know, even if you’re Catholic,  is that everything we do at mass, and nearly every word, finds its origins in scripture.

Where  does the mass come from and how will knowing this deepen our prayer? This is Catholicism in Focus. — As with all Catholic prayers, the mass  begins with the sign of the cross, praying in the name of the Father, and  of the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

This Trinitarian formula is given to the disciples in  Matthew 28 as a part of how they are to baptize. The sign of the cross is loosely connected to  statements in the books of Ezekiel and Revelation, but it’s more just a nice old tradition to  remind us of what Jesus has done for us. If the principle celebrant is a priest, he greets  the people with “The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God, and the communion  of the Holy Spirit be with you all,” a direct quote of St.

Paul from 2 Corinthians 13:13,  “Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ,” from Ephesians 1:2,  or simply “The Lord be with you” from Ruth 2:4. If the celebrant is a bishop, he uses Jesus’  greeting from John 20:21, “peace be with you. ” In response, the people say “and with your  spirit,” which comes from 2 Timothy 4:22, Philippians 4:23, and Galatians 6:18. 

The formality of this greeting reminds the faithful that the priest has  a special vocation and what he is about to celebrate is no ordinary  meal, but a deep spiritual sacrifice. The penitential act follows, of  which there are three options, all of which fulfills the command in James  5:16 to “confess your sins to one another and pray for one another,” and which can  be seen in practice in Nehemiah 9:2. The Gloria follows, quoting directly from Luke  2:14: “Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests.

” The hymn  makes further allusions to Revelation 17:12 and 19:6, the letters of St. John, Romans 8,  Luke 4, and Psalm 83, and a few others. It’s really just a mashup of  the Bible’s greatest hits.

From there, a prayer is said, called a  collect. The words vary from mass to mass and rarely not come directly from scripture  but are often crafted using Biblical images. What does come directly from scripture,  and where scripture takes center stage in the liturgy, is what comes next,  the actual reading of scripture, something early Christians can be seen  doing in the Acts of the Apostles, Jesus did at the beginning of Luke, and the  Hebrews practiced regularly in the Old Testament.

Unlike some other churches, though, we do not read  but a single verse or passage, we have four. A reading from the Old Testament, psalms, the New  Testament, and finally the Gospels themselves. Next time you hear that Catholics don’t read  or care about scripture, remind them of this.

Of course, it not just that scripture  is read that’s significant, but that the responses and gestures throughout have  scriptural origins. After each reading, the congregation responds “blessed be  God forever” and “praise to you Lord Jesus Christ,” references to the  psalms and the book of revelation. After a homily, a time for the priest  to explain the readings just proclaimed, the congregation says the creed, or  profession of faith.

These words all came from centuries after the Bible, but  fulfill 1 Peter’s command that we “Always be ready to give an explanation to anyone  who asks you for a reason for your hope. ” Petitions are then brought before God,  to which the faithful respond in some form of “Lord hear our prayer. ” Petitions  of this nature can be found in Exodus 10, Jeremiah 42, Acts 8, and throughout the Gospels.

At which point we reach the end of the first  half of the liturgy, the Liturgy of the Word, and transition to the Liturgy of the  Eucharist. And we’re just getting started. The structure of this portion of the mass  is based off of Jesus’ actions regarding the Last Supper in Matthew, Mark,  and Luke, and the feeding of the 5000 in John.

“While they were eating, Jesus  took bread, said the blessing, broke it, and giving it to his disciples. ”  Take, bless, break, and distribute. This begins with the preparation of  the gifts where offerings from the congregation are brought to the altar. 

This is like the boy who offered loaves and fish in the feeding miracles, and  the many instances in the Old Testament when people brought their sacrifices  to the priest to be offered to God. The priest, receiving these offerings,  says “Blessed are you, Lord, God of all creation,” calling to mind the words of 1  Chronicles 29:10, Psalm 83:53, and Romans 5, “for through your goodness we have received the  bread we offer you: fruit of the earth,” James 5:7 “and work of human hands,” Ecclesiastes 3:13, “it  will become for us the bread of life. ” (John 6:35) The people, in their part, respond “Blessed  be God forever,” closely matching Psalm 68:36, and then the priest invites them  to pray that the sacrifice may be acceptable to God, an allusion to Hebrew 12:28.

The priest then offers a silent prayer of  humility before the sacrifice that it may be received by God, just as Azariah does in  Daniel 3:39-40, before washing his hands, as was prescribed by Moses in Leviticus 30:18-21. A little dialogue follows “The Lord be with  you; And with your spirit; Lift up your hearts,” followed by Lamentations 3:41: We lift them up to  the Lord,” which leads to another triumphant hymn, the Sanctus, which quotes directly from  Isaiah 6:3, Matthew 21:19, and Psalm 118. At this point, the sacrifice is ready to be  offered, a practice with deep scriptural roots.

In Genesis 14, Melchizedek,  the King and priest of Salem, offered bread and wine to  God as a blessing on Abram. In Exodus, the people celebrating a passover meal just before fleeing Egypt in which they  ate unleavened bread and drank wine, and an unblemished lambed is killed for  the safety and cleansing of the people. Of course, the Last supper itself plays an  important role here, as the priest takes on the role of Jesus at the altar, recreating  his actions and speaking his words: “Take this, all of you, and eat of it, for this is  my Body, which will be given up for you.

” After the institution narrative is  complete and the sacrifice offered, the congregation together with the priest  says what is called a memorial acclamation, a simple phrase connecting the sacrifice  to Jesus’ death and resurrection, and ultimately his saving help. Each  of these options speak directly of the mystery of Christ in the Gospels, but  do not quote directly from any source. The priest continues praying after this, offering  more petitions for the Church, its leaders, the people gathered, and the dead, calling upon  the saints to be with us in our time of need.

Again, none of this comes directly from  scripture but acts as a continuation of our call to pray and rely on God for all  our needs, deeply biblical in nature. The section ends triumphantly with the  great Amen, a common biblical prayer, before leading into the Our Father, a prayer  directly from Jesus’ mouth in Matthew 6 and Luke 11, followed by the embolism by the  priest, asking for deliverance and affirming our hope with the words from Titus 2:13, and  the doxology by the people, “for the kingdom, the power and the glory are yours now and  for ever,” a line, interesting enough, appeared in some early manuscripts of the  Bible but was ultimately deemed inauthentic. The priest then moves to the 3rd stage of  Jesus’ fourfold actions in the eucharist, breaking the bread, while the people sing or chant  the words of the Lamb of God, a song inspired by the Gospel of John and the Book of Revelation,  before the priest says the actual words of John the Baptist, “behold the lamb of God who takes  away the sins of the world” from John 1:29.

Together with the people, the whole congregation  responds by quoting Matthew 8:8, “Lord, I am not worthy that you should enter under my roof, but  only say the word and my soul shall be healed. ” The actual quote says servant, not soul, as  the centurion is speaking of his sick slave, but it’s probably best to  personalize it for the moment. At which point, the sacrifice has been  offered and the people made ready to receive, leaving just the distribution.

Like the  feeding miracles in which the disciples were called upon to reach the overwhelming mass  of people, so, too, extraordinary ministers of communion can be used when the minister  himself is not able to reach everyone. Once everyone has received and the leftover hosts  placed in the tabernacle, a reference, naturally, to the tabernacle of the Lord found throughout  the Old Testament as the dwelling place of God, the priest concludes with a prayer, offers  a final blessing, and dismisses the people. For some, a merciful end to a boring  liturgy, for others, an inspirational exhortation to evangelize the nations as Jesus  commanded in Matthew 28.

To each their own. Beginning, in a way, just how we started,  with Jesus’ words and the sign of the cross, bookending what is a liturgy entirely devoted  to proclaiming and living the Word of God. We do not just speak or study scripture, we  follow its instructions in our gestures, postures, and rituals, giving meaning  to everything we do.

There is nothing in the liturgy that is of human origin,  nothing for its own sake. Our purpose for gathering is to offer praise and sacrifice  to God for all that he has done for us, and we think there is no better way to do that  than ordered our entire liturgy around the words of the Bible. The Catholics don’t care about  the Bible?

Clearly you’ve never been to mass.