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Dear Father Angelo,

I would like to ask you a question for which I have received apparently conflicting answers.

Is it correct to say that the evangelists “wrote Jesus”, or is it more correct “they wrote about Jesus”? I would lean towards the second possibility, given that there is certainly the Word of God in the Gospels, but not the real presence (and in fact we venerate the Word but do not adore it, as we instead do with the Eucharist, or even know that it does not the Logos of John’s prologue can be understood as “speech”, but which must be understood as “action”).

But the CCC at number 103 says: “For this reason, the Church has always venerated the Scriptures, as she venerates the Lord’s Body. She never ceased to present to the faithful the Bread of life, taken from the table of God’s Word of God and Christ’s Body”.

The explanation I give myself is that yes we venerate the Word as (therefore analogously to) the very Body of the Lord, but we cannot say that the Word is God, nor that there is a real presence, nor can we adore it.

Is this correct? Is there anything to add regarding this relationship between Word and presence?

Thank you.

Francesco

Priest’s answer

Dear Francesco,

1. it is true that the Church venerates the divine Scriptures in the same way as it venerates the body of Christ.

The Holy Scriptures are in fact the word of God. In the Scriptures it is God who speaks to us. Through them he communicates to us his life, his feelings and his teachings.

This expression is taken from the Second Vatican Council in the dogmatic constitution Dei Verbum, n. 21, on divine revelation.

2. In the council discussions some fathers expressed the fear that the strong parallelism between the word of God and the Eucharist would end up reducing the Eucharist to a pure symbol (see A. Grillmeier, in La Révélation Divine, tome II, p. 439).

The council instead wanted to underline the very close link between the Word and the Eucharist.

The Holy Scripture and the Eucharist are the only bread of life that is communicated to men. The sixth chapter of the Gospel of St. John highlights this very strongly.

3. For this reason the council wanted to give the right emphasis to the Word of God in the Eucharistic celebration.

In fact, what is the Eucharist? It is the word of God in his announcement of salvation (the passion and death of Jesus) brought to its fulfillment because it is made nourishment of souls not only through listening, but by making Jesus Christ himself present on the altar in 

his passion and death. And this to communicate himself to men in order to transform them into himself in the most sublime act of charity and make them all one in him.

4. Here we see the intimate connection between word and sacrament. Word and Sacrament recall each other in their most intimate constitution. They include each other.

The Sacrament would be emptied if it were not accompanied by the word that nourishes and strengthens.

Eucharistic adoration itself as an act of worship cannot be separated from the Word because the life of Jesus exposed in the Gospels is entirely present and active in the Eucharist.

What the council said about the Eucharist in relation to the sacraments, that is, that the Eucharist is the culmination, the point of arrival of the celebration of all the sacraments, also applies to the word of God which in ancient times was also called Sacramentum Verbi, the sacrament of the Word. In fact, although it is not one of the seven sacraments, it not only means something sacred but communicates the life of God in those who receive it with an open and pure heart.

5. The concern of some fathers at the council was therefore legitimate.

But this danger was avoided by remembering on the one hand the very close link between the Word and the Eucharist and on the other by saying that the Eucharist is the culmination of all the sacraments, it is the point of arrival of the announcement of the word of God.

6. Coming to answer your final question, is it more correct to say that the Holy Scriptures “write Jesus” or “write about Jesus” it should be noted that Jesus himself solved the problem when he said: “For if you had believed Moses, you would have believed me, because he wrote about me.” (Jn 5:46).

He didn’t say: “he wrote about me”, but he “wrote about me”.

And with this he implies that the Scriptures are ultimately ordered to him, encountered in the Eucharist, the sacrament that transforms us into him.

7. You rightly point out that when it is said that the Church venerates the Scriptures as the same body of the Lord it is not said that the Church adores the divine Scriptures in the same way in which she adores the body of Christ, because in the word of the Lord that “it is living and effective” (Heb 4,12) and “can build you up and give you the inheritance among all who are consecrated” (Acts 20,32) a virtue of Christ is communicated, while in the Eucharist there is truly and not only by symbol the very body, blood, soul and divinity of Our Lord.

I thank you for the question, I bless you and I remember you not simply in reading the word of God but in prayer and in the celebration of Mass.

Father Angelo