Lesson Twenty-Fourth of the Baltimore Catechism No. 2 continues the discussion of the Holy Eucharist by looking at the context in which the Eucharist takes place: the sacrifice of the Mass.
In the Mass, the sacrifice of the Cross is made present to us again. The priest acts in the person of Christ, offering His Body and Blood as Christ Himself did on Calvary. While this is the same sacrifice, there is a difference: Christ cannot die again but lives and reigns forever.
The questions are numbered consecutively with Lesson Twenty-Third. For more information and links to other resources, click on each question below.
A. The bread and wine are changed into the body and blood of Christ at the Consecration in the Mass.
A. The Mass is the unbloody sacrifice of the body and blood of Christ.
A. A sacrifice is the offering of an object by a priest to God alone, and the consuming of it to acknowledge that He is the Creator and Lord of all things.
A. The Mass is the same sacrifice as that of the Cross.
A. The Mass is the same sacrifice as that of the Cross because the offering and the priest are the same--Christ our Blessed Lord; and the ends for which the sacrifice of the Mass is offered are the same as those of the sacrifice of the Cross.
A. The ends for which the sacrifice of the Cross was offered were: 1st, To honor and glorify God; 2d, To thank Him for all the graces bestowed on the whole world; 3d, To satisfy God's justice for the sins of men; 4th, To obtain all graces and blessings.
A. Yes; the manner in which the sacrifice is offered is different. On the Cross Christ really shed His blood and was really slain; in the Mass there is no real shedding of blood nor real death, because Christ can die no more; but the sacrifice of the Mass, through the separate consecration of the bread and the wine, represents His death on the Cross.
A. We should assist at Mass with great interior recollection and piety and with every outward mark of respect and devotion.
A. The best manner of hearing Mass is to offer it to God with the priest for the same purpose for which it is said, to meditate on Christ's sufferings and death, and to go to Holy Communion.