Gospels complement each other

August 20, 2006 -- 20th Sunday in Ordinary Time

By Fr. Michael Stubbs

	Fr. Mike Stubbs

When I cook a stew or put together a casserole, I will often vary the ingredients according to their availability or my taste. For example, I might add an extra carrot because I like them. On the other hand, if I were to bake a cake, I would meticulously follow the recipe. Otherwise, I would be courting disaster.

Sometimes, we imagine that the sacraments of the church flow from the writings of the New Testament in a way similar to dishes resulting from a recipe. Without those New Testament writings to give us the directions, we would never have had the sacraments. But that is not the case.

When we look at the history of the church, it is apparent that the early Christians began celebrating the sacraments from the get-go. They gathered to celebrate the Eucharist on a weekly basis. They baptized new converts to the faith. These activites took place long before any of the New Testament was written. The first such writing, Paul's first letter to the Thessalonians, dates to about 51 A.D. That means that the early Christians had already been celebrating the sacraments for 20 years.

Those early Christians did not look to the New Testament for guidance. It was the other way around. Their celebration of the sacraments, their beliefs and attitudes towards them, helped to shape the New Testament writings.

Sunday's gospel reading provides us a good example of this. We hear a section of the Bread of Life discourse. This long speech by Jesus gives us significant insights into the meaning of the Eucharist. This discourse occurs only in the gospel of John and constitutes the primary teaching of that gospel on the Eucharist.

In contrast, the synoptic gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke provide their primary teaching on the Eucharist through their accounts of the Last Supper, where Jesus institutes that sacrament. While John also supplies us with an account of the Last Supper, it lacks any mention of the Eucharist.

Scholars argue over why John's Last Supper overlooks the Eucharist. Did he have access to the other three gospels, and consequently believe that it would have been redundant for him to also include an account of the Eucharist's institution?

When the four gospels and Paul's first letter to the Corinthians are compared to one another, some differences emerge concerning their treatment of the Eucharist. These differences of emphasis do not represent contradictions in belief, but rather, reflect the various directions early Christian communities took in their journey of faith.

For example, John's gospel describes the purpose of the Eucharist as "for the life of the world." The Eucharist ensures that whoever participates in it "will have life." On the other hand, Paul's first letter to the Corinthians has Jesus direct the disciples "do this in memory of me." This suggests the main purpose of the Eucharist as a means to perpetutate the memory of Jesus' sacrifice on the cross. The emphasis shifts from life-giving meal to sacrifice. Matthew's gospel takes this a step further. He indicates the purpose of the Eucharist as "for the remission of sin."

We should note that these purposes, while different, are not contradictory. They complement each other. We include them all in our understanding of the Eucharist.

(Fr. Stubbs, a priest of the Archdiocese of Kansas City, Kansas, has a master's degree in theology from Harvard.)