1 Corinthians 11:24

Now concerning the Thanksgiving (Eucharist), thus give thanks. First, concerning the cup: We thank thee, our Father, for the holy vine of David Thy servant, which Thou madest known to us through Jesus Thy Servant; to Thee be the glory for ever. And concerning the broken bread: We thank Thee, our Father, for the life and knowledge which Thou modest known to us through Jesus Thy Servant; to Thee be the glory for ever. Even as this broken bread was scattered over the hills, and was gathered together and became one, so let Thy Church be gathered together from the ends of the earth into Thy kingdom; for Thine is the glory and the power through Jesus Christ for ever. But let no one eat or drink of your Thanksgiving (Eucharist), but they who have been baptized into the name of the Lord; for concerning this also the Lord hath said, Give not that which is holy to the dogs.

But after ye are filled, thus give thanks: We thank Thee, holy Father, for Thy holy name which Thou didst cause to tabernacle in our hearts, and for the knowledge and faith and immortality, which Thou modest known to us through Jesus Thy Servant; to Thee be the glory for ever. Thou, Master almighty, didst create all things for Thy name's sake; Thou gavest food and drink to men for enjoyment, that they might give thanks to Thee; but to us Thou didst freely give spiritual food and drink and life eternal through Thy Servant. Before all things we thank Thee that Thou art mighty; to Thee be the glory for ever. Remember, Lord, Thy Church, to deliver it from all evil and to make it perfect in Thy love, and gather it from the four winds, sanctified for Thy kingdom which Thou hast prepared for it; for Thine is the power and the glory for ever. Let grace come, and let this world pass away. Hosanna to the God (Son) of David! If any one is holy, let him come; if any one is not so, let him repent. Maran atha. Amen. But permit the prophets to make Thanksgiving as much as they desire.

Being mindful, therefore, of those things that He endured for our sakes, we give You thanks, O God Almighty, not in such a manner as we ought, but as we are able, and fulfil His constitution: "For in the same night that He was betrayed, He took bread" [1 Corinthians 11:23] in His holy and undefiled hands, and, looking up to You His God and Father, "He broke it, and gave it to His disciples, saying, This is the mystery of the new covenant: take of it, and eat. This is my body, which is broken for many, for the remission of sins." In like manner also "He took the cup," and mixed it of wine and water, and sanctified it, and delivered it to them, saying: "Drink all of this; for this is my blood which is shed for many, for the remission of sins: do this in remembrance of me. For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you do show forth my death until I come." Being mindful, therefore, of His passion, and death, and resurrection from the dead, and return into the heavens, and His future second appearing, wherein He is to come with glory and power to judge the quick and the dead, and to recompense to every one according to his works, we offer to You, our King and our God, according to His constitution, this bread and this cup, giving You thanks, through Him, that You have thought us worthy to stand before You, and to sacrifice to You; and we beseech You that You will mercifully look down upon these gifts which are here set before You, O God, who standest in need of none of our offerings. And accept them, to the honour of Your Christ, and send down upon this sacrifice Your Holy Spirit, the Witness of the Lord Jesus' sufferings, that He may show this bread to be the body of Your Christ, and the cup to be the blood of Your Christ, that those who are partakers thereof may be strengthened for piety, may obtain the remission of their sins, may be delivered from the devil and his deceit, may be filled with the Holy Ghost, may be made worthy of Your Christ, and may obtain eternal life upon Your reconciliation to them, O Lord Almighty.

The teaching of the blessed Paul is of itself sufficient to give you full assurance about the divine mysteries by admission to which you have become one body and blood with Christ.… When the Master himself has explicitly said of the bread, “This is my body,” will anyone still dare to doubt? When he is himself our warranty saying, “This is my blood,” who will ever waver and say it is not his blood?… With perfect confidence, then, we partake as of the body and blood of Christ.

Do you want to know why it is consecrated with heavenly words? Receive the words. The priest says: 'Make this offering written, ratified, reasonable, acceptable, which is the figure of the body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. Who, on the day before he suffered, took bread into his holy hands, looked up to you, holy Father almighty, eternal God, giving thanks, he blessed it, broke it, and gave it to his apostles and disciples, saying: Take and eat all of you from this; for this is my body which will be broken for many.' He took bread in his holy hands the day before he suffered. Before it is consecrated, it is bread; but when the words of Christ have been spoken, it becomes the body of Christ. And before the words of Christ, the cup is full of wine and water: when the words of Christ have been spoken, there the blood of Christ is made, which redeemed the people.

"For I received of the Lord," saith he, "that which also I delivered unto you: how that the Lord Jesus in the night in which He was betrayed, took bread: And when He had given thanks, He brake it, and said, Take, eat: this is My Body, which is broken for you: this do in remembrance of me."

Wherefore doth he here make mention of the Mysteries? Because that argument was very necessary to his present purpose. As thus: "Thy Master," saith he, "counted all worthy of the same Table, though it be very awful and far exceeding the dignity of all: but thou considerest them to be unworthy even of thine own, small and mean as we see it is; and while they have no advantage over thee in spiritual things, thou robbest them in the temporal things. For neither are these thine own."

However, he doth not express himself thus, to prevent his discourse becoming harsh: but he frames it in a gentler form, saying, that "the Lord Jesus in the night in which He was betrayed, took bread."

And wherefore doth he remind us of the time, and of that evening, and of the betrayal? Not indifferently nor without some reason, but that he might exceedingly fill them with compunction, were it but from consideration of the time. For even if one be a very stone, yet when he considers that night, how He was with His disciples, "very heavy," how He was betrayed, how He was bound, how He was led away, how He was judged, how He suffered all the rest in order, he becometh softer than wax, and is withdrawn from earth and all the pomp of this world. Therefore he leads us to the remembrance of all those things, by His time, and His table, and His betrayal, putting us to shame and saying, "Thy Master gave up even Himself for thee: and thou dost not even share a little meat with thy brother for thine own sake."

But how saith he, that "he received it from the Lord?" since certainly he was not present then but was one of the persecutors. That thou mayest know that the first table had no advantage above that which cometh after it. For even to-day also it is He who doeth all, and delivereth it even as then.

And not on this account only doth he remind us of that night, but that he may also in another way bring us to compunction. For as we particularly remember those words which we hear last from those who are departing; and to their heirs if they should venture to transgress their commands, when we would put them to shame we say, "Consider that this was the last word that your father uttered to you, and until the evening when he was just about to breathe his last he kept repeating these injunctions:" just so Paul, purposing hence also to make his argument full of awfulness; "Remember," saith he, "that this was the last mysterious rite He gave unto you, and in that night on which He was about to be slain for us, He commanded these things, and having delivered to us that Supper after that He added nothing further."

Next also he proceeds to recount the very things that were done, saying, "He took bread, and, when He had given thanks, He brake it, and said, Take, eat: this is My Body, which is broken for you." If therefore thou comest for a sacrifice of thanksgiving, do thou on thy part nothing unworthy of that sacrifice: by no means either dishonor thy brother, or neglect him in his hunger; be not drunken, insult not the Church. As thou comest giving thanks for what thou hast enjoyed: so do thou thyself accordingly make return, and not cut thyself off from thy neighbor. Since Christ for His part gave equally to all, saying, "Take, eat." He gave His Body equally, but dost not thou give so much as the common bread equally? Yea, it was indeed broken for all alike, and became the Body equally for all.

In blessing the bread even before his suffering, Jesus left behind a last commemoration, or memorial. This is rather like someone who, when about to go on a journey, leaves some token of himself with his loved one, so that whenever she looks at it she will be reminded of his goodness and love toward her.

Daniel the disciple of Arsenius used to talk also about a hermit in Scetis, saying that he was a great man but simple in the faith, and in his ignorance he thought and said that the bread which we receive is not in very truth the Body of Christ, but a symbol of His Body. Two of the monks heard what he said but because they knew of his sublime works and labours, they imagined that he had said it in innocence and simple-mindedness; and so they came to him and said unto him, ‘Abba, someone told us something that we do not believe; he said that this bread that we receive is not in very truth the Body of Christ, but a mere symbol.’ He said to them, ‘I said that.’ They begged him, saying, ‘You mustn’t say that, abba; according to what the Catholic Church has handed down to us, even so do we believe, that is to say, this bread is the Body of Christ in very truth, and is not a mere symbol. It is the same as when God took dust from the earth, and made man in His image; just as no one can say that he is not the image of God, so also with the bread of which He said, “This is My Body” is not to be regarded as a merely commemorative thing; we believe that it is indeed the Body of Christ.’ The hermit said, ‘Unless I can be convinced by the thing itself I will not listen to this.’ Then the monks said to him, ‘Let us pray to God all week about this mystery, and we believe that He will reveal the truth to us.’ The hermit agreed to this with great joy, and each went to his cell. Then the hermit prayed, saying, ‘O Lord, you know that it is not out of wickedness that I do not believe, so in order that I may not go astray through ignorance, reveal to me, Lord Jesus Christ, the truth of this mystery.’ The other two brothers prayed to God and said, ‘Lord Jesus Christ, give this hermit understanding about this mystery, and we believe that he will not be lost.’ God heard the prayer of the two monks. When the week was over they came to the church, and the three of them sat down by themselves on one seat, the hermit between the other two. The eyes of their understanding were opened, and when the time of the mysteries arrived, and the bread was laid upon the holy table, there appeared to the three of them as it were a child on the table. Then the priest stretched out his hand to break the bread, and behold the angel of the Lord came down from heaven with a knife in his hand, and he killed the child and pressed out his blood into the cup. When the priest broke off from the bread small pieces, the hermit went forward to receive communion and a piece of living flesh smeared and dripping with blood was given to him. Now when he saw this he was afraid and he cried out loudly, saying, ‘Lord, I believe that the bread is Your Body, and that the cup is Your Blood.’ At once the flesh that was in his hand became bread, and he took it and gave thanks to God. The brothers said to him, ‘God knows the nature of men, and that we are unable to eat living flesh, and so He turneth His Body into bread, and His Blood into wine for those who receive Him in faith.’ Then they gave thanks to God for the hermit, because He had not let Satan destroy him, and the three of them went back to their cells joyfully.

You speak of 'sagging faith', however. That is quite another matter: In the last resort faith is an act of will, inspired by love. Our love may be chilled and our will eroded by the spectacle of the shortcomings, folly, and even sins of the Church and its ministers, but I do not think that one who has once had faith goes back over the line for these reasons (least of all anyone with any historical knowledge). 'Scandal' at most is an occasion of temptation – as indecency is to lust, which it does not make but arouses. It is convenient because it tends to turn our eyes away from ourselves and our own faults to find a scape-goat. But the act of will of faith is not a single moment of final decision : it is a permanent indefinitely repeated act > state which must go on – so we pray for 'final perseverance'. The temptation to 'unbelief (which really means rejection of Our Lord and His claims) is always there within us. Pan of us longs to find an excuse for it outside us. The stronger the inner temptation the more readily and severely shall we be 'scandalized' by others. I think I am as sensitive as you (or any other Christian) to the 'scandals', both of clergy and laity. I have suffered grievously in my life from stupid, tired, dimmed, and even bad priests; but I now know enough about myself to be aware that I should not leave the Church (which for me would mean leaving the allegiance of Our Lord) for any such reasons: I should leave because I did not believe, and should not believe any more, even if I had never met any one in orders who was not both wise and saintly...

The only cure for sagging of fainting faith is Communion. Though always Itself, perfect and complete and inviolate, the Blessed Sacrament does not operate completely and once for all in any of us. Like the act of Faith it must be continuous and grow by exercise. Frequency is of the highest effect. Seven times a week is more nourishing than seven times at intervals. Also I can recommend this as an exercise (alas! only too easy to find opportunity for): make your communion in circumstances that affront your taste. Choose a snuffling or gabbling priest or a proud and vulgar friar; and a church full of the usual bourgeois crowd, ill-behaved children – from those who yell to those products of Catholic schools who the moment the tabernacle is opened sit back and yawn – open necked and dirty youths, women in trousers and often with hair both unkempt and uncovered. Go to Communion with them (and pray for them). It will be just the same (or better than that) as a mass said beautifully by a visibly holy man, and shared by a few devout and decorous people. (It could not be worse than the mess of the feeding of the Five Thousand – after which [Our] Lord propounded the feeding that was to come.)