A lesson how to receive the Holy Communion
April 19, 2023 - Wednesday, Second Week of Easter
Psalm 34:2-9
We have reflected on Psalm 34 already few times and so today I would like to focus on the Christian appropriation of this psalm to our Eucharistic liturgy. Since the ancient tradition of the Church, still preserved in the Orthodox Church, this psalm has accompanied the faithful while receiving the Holy Communion. Such reading has been influenced by the verse: “Taste and see how good the LORD is” (Ps 34:9). Thus, the entire psalm has been understood as teaching about how to receive properly the Body and Blood of Christ.
The Church is teaching that we are called to communion with God (see CCC, 27). This communion happens through prayer, reading the Bible, liturgical celebrations and it culminates in the Eucharist. Why? Because as the Church teaches “In the most blessed sacrament of the Eucharist "the body and blood, together with the soul and divinity, of our Lord Jesus Christ and, therefore, the whole Christ is truly, really, and substantially contained" (CCC, 1374). So how should we receive Christ fully present in this most blessed sacrament?
The early Church Fathers read that psalm in Greek and the slight differences in the wording helped them to draw a lesson for the faithful. The Holy Communion should be received with gentle or lowly spirit (see Ps 34:3). In verse 5, the Hebrew text speaks about the Lord delivering the poor from all his fears but in the Greek text, instead of fears, we have that the Lord delivers us from “all [our] sojourning”. As people of faith, we do not have here a fixed abode. Together with our ancestors, we look forward to the heavenly city Jerusalem as our destination (see Heb. 11:10; Phil 3:20). The Eucharist is the Bread of Life that sustains us on this perilous journey. Thus, we should realise that without this Bread of Life, we cannot make it (see John 6:53).
The Eucharist should be received with reverence or “the fear of God” (see Ps 34:8). In my culture, there was once a special reverence for daily bread. Not even a small crumb could be thrown away. How much more should we revere the Bread of Life that came down from heaven to give us everlasting life? This reverence, this “fear of the Lord”, however, needs to be taught (see Ps 34:12). It is encapsulated in a short sentence: “Shun evil and do good” (Ps 34:15). Thus, those who fear the Lord, those who want to receive Jesus Christ truly present in the Eucharist should avoid committing sins and practice virtues instead. Our lips should be clean, free from deceit and malicious talk, and our hearts should pursue peace instead of quarrelling.
Jesus said that whoever eats his body and drinks his blood “has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day” (John 6:54). That is the final point of the lesson in receiving the Holy Communion that we should appropriate in our life. At the end of his poem the psalmist states that “the Lord will redeem the souls of His servants” (Ps 34:23). We receive Christ’s Body and Blood with the hope of everlasting life.