Chapter 14 appears to contain an
implicit reference to the Eucharist as a “sacrifice” (14:1-3). This language is
drawn from Mal 1:11, which is cited in the Didache as follows: “In every place
and time offer me a pure sacrifice, for I am a great king, says the Lord, and
my name is marvelous among the nations” (14:3). Because the sacrifice must be
pure, it should be preceded by a confession of sins while unreconciled persons
in conflict are not to participate (14:1-2). But this fact cannot be taken as especially
significant vis-à-vis the question of the Real Presence of Christ’s body
and blood in the bread and wine of the meal. One could not argue, for example,
that the description of the Eucharist as a sacrifice implies its mysterious ontological
identification with the event of Jesus’s self-offering on the cross. That is
because there are many ways of understanding sacrifice.
The New Testament proposes that the
whole life of a Christian be a sacrifice: “Present your bodies as a living
sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God” (12:1). Paul calls the gifts sent to him
by the Philippian church to be “a fragrant sacrifice, a sacrifice acceptable
and pleasing to God” (Phil 4:18). First Peter calls the churches to let
themselves be “built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood,” and to
offer “spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ” (1 Pet
2:5). And Hebrews exhorts to offering to God “a sacrifice of praise, . . . the
fruit of lips that confesses his name” (Heb 13:15). Clement of Alexandria will
even later say of the gnostic Christian that
his whole life is a holy festival. His
sacrifices are prayers, and praises, and readings in the Scriptures before
meals, and psalms and hymns during meals and before bed, and prayers also again
during night. By these he unites himself to the divine choir, from continual
recollection, engaged in contemplation which has everlasting remembrance. (Stromateis
7.7)
Christian activities are thus called “sacrifices”
because they are actions undertaken with God in mind. They are intended to
express devotion to him and to be pleasing in his sight. This means that
everything the Christian does is or can be a sacrifice in the sense of being
something done for God. This includes the memorial celebration of the Eucharist
itself.
One might complain that such an
understanding of Christian life as sacrifice undermines the sufficiency of
Christ’s sacrifice on the cross. But Andrew McGowan writes that “sacrifices had
other purposes than the forgiveness of sins.” (McGowan, Ancient Christian
Worship, 32) Chrisitan life or activity as sacrifice is not in competition
with the sacrifice of Jesus. Jesus’s sacrifice served the purpose of atoning
for sin and making peace with God, whereas the sacrifice of Christian life
complements and responds to this by offering of gratitude and obedience to God
for the accomplishment of salvation by Christ’s sacrifice. The two sacrifices
are of a different sort and thus not in competition with one another. (Steven
Nemes, Eating Christ’s Flesh: A Case for Memorialism [Eugene, Oreg.: Cascade
Books, 2023], 102-3)
