MASS, The. According to the teaching of the Catholic Church, the Eucharist is the Sac rament which contains the body and blood, soul and divinity, of Jesus Christ under the appearances of bread and wine. At the Last Supper (see LORD'S SUPPER), the night before He died, Christ, in the presence of the 12 apostles, instituted the Eucharist (q.v.) by tak ing bread, giving thanks, blessing the bread, breaking it, and giving it to the apostles, saying, *Take ye and eat. This is my body," and then by taking the cup of wine, giving thanks, bless ing the wine, and giving it to them, saying, *Drink ye all of this. This is my blood which shall be shed for the remission of sins. Do this for a commemoration of me." The Church teaches that, when Christ said "This is my body," the substance of the bread was, by His almighty power, changed into the sub stance of His body, and that, when He said "This is my blood," the substance of the wine was similarly changed into the substance of His blood, while the appearances of bread and wine remained. The Church further teaches that the change of bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ, called Transubstan tiation (q.v.), continues to be made by Jesus through the ministry of His priests, to whom through the apostles and their successors, He gave this miraculous power when He said, "Do this for a commemoration of me." The priests exercise this power of Transubstantiation through the words of consecration in the Mass. What, then, is the Mass? The Mass is the solemn memory, with a narrative, of Christ's passion and death. It is the perpetual sacrifice of the New Covenant. In the catechism it is described as the unbloody sacrifice of the body and blood of Christ. It is, specifically, a sacrifice of adoration, thanksgiving, propitia tion, and impetration. As, in the offering of this sacrifice, certain words and actions in fixed form are used, the Mass may be defined as the aggregate of prayers and ceremonies which constitute the service of the Eucharist in the Latin, that is, the Roman and Galilean, rites.
This service was known at first by many names: Evxaptaria, gratiarnm actio, thanks giving; Aerrovpyla, liturgy, rite; yaw:coop& oblatio, offering; iariare aprov, fractio panis, breaking of bread; tatptaeav diurvav, ccena Domini, the Lord's supper; aamovia, communio, communion; aritvafr, meeting; solemnia; dominica solemnia; dominica passio; spirituale ac cceleste sacramentum• Dominicum; passio; sacrificium. Aetrovpyia still survives in the Eastern Church, and "holy liturgy" corre sponds exactly to the word Mass, This latter term has become the recognized and almost exclusive technical name for the liturgy of the West. Its derivation is even yet not quite cer tain ; but it is generally said to be a late Latin verbal noun for mcssio (climissio), from the verb mittere, to send, send away. Primarily, missa was used in the sense of "dismissal') with reference to the concluding part of the service, and then, by a gradual process well known to linguists as well as to students of liturgy, it was extended to the whole rite. The first time we know for certain that it was employed in its present sense was in the 4th century, about 385 or 386, in a letter of Saint Ambrose to his sister, in which occurs the state ment, tnissam facere cwpi (=I begin to say Mass). A 2d century instance of the use of the word missa in this sense is of doubtful authenticity. From the 4th century onward it becomes more and more frequent, until in the 'Sacramentarium Leonianum' (Leonine Sacra mentary), of the 5th or 6th century, it is under stood throughout (Item alia missa), and in the 'Liber Sacramentorum Romans: Ecclesim," usually known as "The Gelasian Sacramentary,p of the 6th or 7th century, it is constantly expressed. Thereafter, while Eucharist remains the normal name for the sacrament, Missa, or one of its derivatives in other languages like Mass in English or Messe in French, has been the regular title given to the Eucharistic sacrifice in the Roman and Gallican rites.