Solemnity of the Body and Blood of Christ, Cycle B
St. Francis DeSales Parish
June 10, 2012
Contracts and Covenants That Make a
Difference
By (Rev. Msgr.) Nicholas P. Amato
Today’s Contracts and Covenants
Most of us have been involved in making some sort
of agreement like a contract, treaty, or covenant.
New employees often sign a contract or work
agreement with their employer. In our
society, athletes sign contracts usually for gazillions of dollars to play
baseball or football for a season.
Countries often make treaties with each other to
establish peace or enter into trade agreements.
When buying a home, we sign a contract of sale
and perhaps a covenant with the neighborhood association that stipulates what
color of exterior paint we can use.
Old Testament Contracts and Covenant
Our experience regarding agreements helps us to
appreciate similar covenants in sacred scripture.
In the Old Testament we find a basic pattern to
these covenants. Two parties bind
themselves to do something, verbally or in writing and then seal the deal.
They each swear an oath to keep their side of
the covenant. Unlike covenants today
that can be sealed with a handshake, Old Testament covenants were often sealed
with the sacrifice of an animal. The animal was killed, the blood drained from
the carcass, which was then cut in two.
Both of the contracting parties then walked
between the two halves of the animal, each agreeing that a similar fate would befall
them if they broke the covenant.
It may sound like a strange way to make an
agreement, but remember we’re talking 3,000 years ago in a Middle Eastern
culture.
Sprinkling
of Blood
In the covenant ceremony between God and God’s
people in today’s first reading, the blood that is taken from the animal is
sprinkled on them (demonstrate). Again,
this may seem strange and even repulsive to us, but we have to remember:
different time, different culture.
In the ceremony there is a real experience that
God is promising never to abandon his people and the people, in turn, agreeing
to obey the Ten Commandments.
These promises are signed, if you will, with the
rabbi sprinkling half of the blood on the altar and the other half on the
people. The altar symbolizes God and the
blood symbolizes the life of God himself.
Because blood is a life source, its sprinkling on
the people offers them a real experience of sharing in God who is the origin of
this red rich life source.
And because the killing of the animal is
permanent and lasting, the ceremony means that God will never stop caring for
his people and his people will never turn their backs on God.
The sprinkling of blood moves the promise from a
great idea up here in my reasoning mind (point
to temple) to here to my experiencing heart (point to heart.)
The New Covenant
The practice of covenant in the Old Testament
can help us experience Mass more fully, more deeply and in a way that can be
life changing.
A quick look at how the Mass is in Jesus’ own
words “the new and eternal covenant.”
For starters Jesus, as he literally hangs on the
cross, makes himself the
sacrifice. No longer is an animal to be
sacrificed; he sees himself as sacrificed.
Jesus then tells us to repeat this sacrifice of
himself, but using bread and wine. It is
very important to see the parallels here.
As the ancient Jewish people sprinkled half of
the sacrificed animal’s blood on the
altar, so now we consecrate the bread and wine as Jesus’ body and blood on the altar.
And as the ancient Jewish people sprinkled the
other half of the sacrificed animal’s blood on
the people, so we, the people,
now consume Jesus’ body and blood under the forms of bread and wine.
Altar (point
to altar) people (point to people.)
Our doing this gives us an actual sharing in God’s own life.
The second reading captures the reality beautifully:
“For if the blood of bulls and goats can
sanctify, how much more will the blood of Christ do this for us?”
And, of course, Jesus’ sacrifice of himself on
the cross is permanent, lasting, once-and-for-all-time.
His words “the
new and eternal covenant” at the Last Supper, and our repeating of them at
the consecration of every Mass assure us that our relationship with God and God’s
life in us will continue forever.
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