Study of the Readings
Ed. by
Joyce Ann Zimmerman,
et al
• Words, Phrases
• To the point
• First Two Readings
• Experience
Dennis
Hamm, SJ
The ancient world had a way of seeing the obvious: blood carries the stuff of life. When an animal loses its blood the life goes out of it. It made sense to reverence blood as the carrier and, therefore, a primal symbol of life.
John Kavanaugh, SJ
Communion … re-enacts our redemption. Each time we celebrate this sacrament we embody the covenant of Christ, wherein God sees in us anew the flesh of Jesus.
John J. Pilch
Anthropologists identify meals in antiquity as ceremonies rather than rituals. A ritual effects a change in status, but a ceremony is a regular and predictable occurrence which confirms and legitimates people's roles and status in a community.
As the old covenant had been ratified by the blood of sheep and calves, so the new covenant was to be ratified by the blood of the Lord.
Reginald H. Fuller
Why was it necessary in the Bible for a covenant to be ratified in blood? The idea seems to be that the death of the victim has a finality about it that makes it, and therefore the covenant that it ratifies, irrevocable.