Revisiting the Sacrifice of the Mass

William Weedon, S.S.P.

Pastor, St. Paul Lutheran Church

Hamel, IL USA

If ever there were a doctrine that Lutherans historically have felt is irredeemable, it is the sacrifice of the mass. As this is specifically rejected in the Lutheran Symbols, it is described as follows:

“In the third place, the sacrament was not instituted to provide a sacrifice for sin – for the sacrifice has already occurred – but to awaken our faith and comfort our consciences….the Mass is not a sacrifice for others, living or dead, to take away their sins…” AC XXIV:30-34.

“In point of fact there has been only one atoning sacrifice in the world, namely, the death of Christ, as the Letter to the Hebrews teaches…” Ap XXIV:22

“There is also a sacrifice, since one and the same action can have several purposes. Once a conscience has been uplifted by faith and realizes its freedom from terror, then it fervently gives thanks for the benefits of Christ and for his suffering. It uses the ceremony itself as praise to God, as a way of demonstrating its gratitude, and as a witness of its high esteem for the gifts of God. In this way the ceremony becomes a sacrifice of praise.” Ap XXIV:74

“For it held that the Mass (even when performed by a rotten scoundrel) delivers people from sin both here in this life and beyond in purgatory, even though the Lamb of God alone should and must do this, as mentioned above. Nothing is to be conceded or compromised in this article.” SA II:2:1

Among the condemned and contrary teachings rejected by the Formula is the following:

“The papal sacrifice of the Mass for the sins of the living and the dead.” (Ep. VII:2)

We must be clear, however, on what specifically is being rejected in these portions of our Symbols: it is the notion that the priest in some manner enters into the one sacrifice offered by Christ upon Golgotha and can apply it to those for whom he offers it in an especially efficacious way. Thus, two things are specifically abominated by Lutherans regarding the sacrifice of the mass: 1) the notion that we sinful human beings can participate in the salvific self-oblation of the Lamb of God; 2) that in the Mass the self-offering of the Lamb of God can be “ex opere operato” applied to those who do not even participate at the Holy Table.

It is quite interesting, in this regard, to study how the Lutheran dogmaticians could speak of sacrifice in relation to the Supper. Johann Gerhard, for instance, has written:

“In the celebration of the Eucharist ‘we proclaim the Lord’s death’ (1 Cor. 11:26) and pray that God would be merciful to us on account of that holy and immaculate sacrifice completed on the cross and on account of that holy Victim which is certainly present in the Eucharist…. That he would in kindness receive and grant a place to the rational and spiritual oblation of our prayer….It is clear that the sacrifice takes place in heaven, not on earth, inasmuch as the death and passion of God’s beloved Son is offered to God the Father by way of commemoration… In the Christian sacrifice there is no victim except the real and substantial body of Christ, and in the same way there is no true priest except Christ Himself. Hence, this sacrifice once offered on the cross takes place continually in an unseen fashion in heaven by way of commemoration, when Christ offers to His Father on our behalf His sufferings of the past, especially when we are applying ourselves to the sacred mysteries, and this is the ‘unbloody sacrifice’ which is carried out in heaven.” (Confessio Catholica, vol II, par II, arti xiv, cap. I, ekthesis 6, 1200-1201, 1204. Translated by A.C. Piepkorn in The Church, p. 135.)

The most curious words there are “the death and passion of God’s beloved Son is offered to God the Father by way of commemoration.” We get a glimpse of what Gerhard means here by studying his marvelous Meditations on Divine Mercy (translated by Matthew Harrison, CPH 2003. This connection was first pointed out to me by Fr. David Saar.). This little volume on Christian prayer begins with offering several examples of confession, and toward the conclusion of each such prayer we find such petitions as:

“I place before You the holy conception of Your Son in place of my foul, unclean nature.” (p. 33)

“For the disobedience of my youth, I offer to You, holy Father, the obedience of Your Son. I offer to You the perfect innocence of the one who became obedient to You, even to death, even death on a cross.” (p. 35)

“For these sins that I commit every day of my life, I offer to You, O holy Father, the precious blood of Your Son, which was poured out on the altar of the cross.” (p. 37)

“For this and all my sins and failures, I offer to You, my God, the faultless and perfect obedience of Your Son, who, in the days of His flesh, loved You perfectly with His whole heart and depended completely on You.” (p. 39)

“For these and all my sins and failures, I offer to You, most holy Father, the perfect obedience of Your Son, who loved all people with perfect love.” (p. 41)

What is the sense of the word “offer” here? It obviously does not mean “I sacrifice.” There is in the strict sense absolutely no immolation here. It clearly means: “I hold up to You, I remind You of, I ask Your mercy because of.” Notice here that the petitioner absolutely does NOT enter into the action which is Christ’s alone, but he rather makes that sacrifice of the Lord the very basis of the plea for forgiveness and mercy.

The question then arises whether or not it is possible to speak in any analogous way of the Supper? May we say without violating the concerns of the Lutheran Symbols that we quite literally “offer” the Body and Blood of the Savior which atoned the sin of the world upon the Cross to the Father in heaven, that we “hold it up before Him,” that we “remind Him of this Body and Blood” as the basis of our plea for mercy and for peace. Gerhard’s words in Confessio Catholica certainly seem to indicate such a possibility.

Nor does Gerhard stand alone among the Lutheran dogmaticians in speaking this way. As both A. C. Piepkorn and John R. Stephenson have noted, David Hollaz has also written:

If we view the matter from the material standpoint, the sacrifice in the Eucharist is numerically the same as the sacrifice that took place on the cross; put otherwise, one can say that the things itself and the substance is the same in each case, the victim or oblation is the same. If we view the matter formally, from the standpoint of the act of sacrifice, then even though the victim is numerically the same, the action is not; that is, the immolation in the Eucharist is different from the immolation carried out on the cross. For on the cross an offering was made by means of the passion and death of an immolated living thing, without which there can be no sacrifice in the narrow sense, but in the Eucharist the oblation takes place through the prayers and through the commemoration of the death or sacrifice offered on the cross. (Examen theologicum acroamaticum, II, 620 Translated by A.C. Piepkorn in The Church, p. 135.)

Notice his language: “the sacrifice in the Eucharist,” the “oblation.” But also notice the difference between this and the way Rome has been popularly understood! Precisely in the Eucharist, the sacrifice (used as noun, as Dr. Richard Stuckwisch has perceptively pointed out) is the same as the cross. WHAT is there is identical – for in the Eucharist what is present is nothing less than the Body that was nailed to the tree and the Blood that ran down upon the cursed earth to cleanse it! But what is specifically denied is that it is immolated in the same manner as on the Cross. For on the Cross, the immolation is of living being; whereas in the Eucharist, the oblation is a commemoration accomplished through prayer, recalling and holding up to the Father, that one sacrifice once and for all time made.

Much could also be cleared up if we recall that the very nature of sacrifice is at root simply “self-giving.” We tend to hear it as “destruction, death” and so associate the Lord’s sacrifice with the cross itself. This, however, is only partially correct. As Alexander Schmemann has written:

In its essence sacrifice is linked not with sin and evil but with love: it is the self-revelation and self-realization of love. There is no love without sacrifice, for love, being the giving of one’s self to another, the placing of one’s life in another, the perfect obedience to another, is sacrifice. If in “this world” sacrifice is actually and inevitably linked to suffering, it is not in accordance with its own essence but in accordance with the essence of “this world,” which lies in evil, whose essence lies in the falling away from love. (The Eucharist, pp. 207, 208)

When the sacrifice of the Eucharist is thought of in this light it becomes clear that what we are “holding up” or “reminding” the Father of is the total self-giving of our Lord which culminated in Calvary, but which embraces the very essence of His being as He goes on giving Himself to us in His holy Body and Blood in the Eucharist, that His life might ever be our life.

Thus, even as we remind the Father of that One Life of the One Man who gave Himself wholly to the Father and so wholly to all others, and we plead for all mercy, for all peace, for all forgiveness solely on the basis of that Life, at the same time we rejoice that He has given this His life not only for our lives, but indeed to be our Life!

With these thoughts it might be possible to rethink what I cannot but feel is an area that Lutherans are in desperate need of revisiting: namely, our reaction to the language of the sacrifice of the Mass. There is indeed a very profound sense in which the whole Church gathers to constantly offer before the Father, to hold up before Him, to commemorate the One Oblation which was once offered, and which Oblation is precisely made present by Christ Himself for us in the gift of His Body and Blood in order to BE our life, our justification, our redemption. When we point to it and beg the manifold mercies of the Father we are not elbowing our way into Christ’s sacrifice (for we couldn’t be any more “in” it than we already are!), but using Christ’s sacrifice as the great gift it is: the reconciliation of God and humanity. Is not this what all Lutherans sing:

May Thy Body, Lord,

Born of Mary,

That our sins and sorrows did carry,

and Thy Blood

For us plead

In all trial, fear and need!

O Lord, have mercy!”