The Procession with Bread and Wine

The procession which members of the gathered community bring to the altar is not an added extra to the liturgy; it is constitutive of it.  It is an important part of the whole playing out of the liturgy of the Mass.

We bring bread and wine, that is, we bring those things upon which we are dependent for our life; they keep us alive and without them we would die.  Not only that but they enter into our very bodies; they enter into the very constitution of ourselves.  So in bringing them forward we are symbolically bringing ourselves forward.  We bring things which will become part of us.  And so in bringing them forward we are bringing ourselves forward.

We are acknowledging that we cannot keep ourselves alive but are dependent on these gifts of the good God to keep us alive.  At the same time, we are bringing bread and wine forward in the knowledge they will become the means by which we will receive the new life that Christ’s death and resurrection gains for us.  They will become authentic bread and wine which will give us not just the life we know now which is subject to death, but the life that Christ gives us which is not subject to death.

In this action of bringing forward bread and wine, those who do this represent the whole community of which they are part.

This action reaches its completion when the community comes forward again to receive that same bread and wine which has become the means of participation in Christ’s death and resurrection and of his risen presence.  This is the reason why the whole congregation should receive communion in the bread and wine brought forward at the Offertory and consecrated at that Mass in which they are participating.  Receiving communion from hosts kept in the Tabernacle should only occur when circumstances demand it.

This is an important issue in helping us to renew our sense that the Mass is the action of the whole community which is led by the priest.  We are all fulfilling the command of the Lord to do this in his memory.

By Frank O’Loughlin