This year the 46th International Eucharistic Congress will be held in Wroclaw, Poland. For the first time in the history of Eucharistic Congresses, this Congress will emphasize the theme of Freedom as reflected in the Eucharist. The choice of Wroclaw in Poland was to point up the fact that the nations of Eastern Europe "during the last decades have experienced the tragic negation of personal and social freedom. Thus, the Eucharistic mystery will highlight not only the positive experience of both the historical and social aspects of freedom but also the supernatural quality of the freedom with which Christ has set us free."

Two factors are involved in this objective: 1) The re-defining of "freedom." In the mind of the Roman Catholic curia, the meaning of "freedom" does not mean "liberty" as it is understood in America. American liberty as understood and defined by the Constitution is in the mind of Rome, "unbridled liberalism." 2) Much is implied in the words,"supernatural quality," as the Mass is perceived to be.

The Pontifical Committee which has the oversight of International Eucharistic Congresses prepared a document which they released November 13, 1996. This document set forth the relationship between the Eucharist and freedom as the Committee perceives it. Inasmuch as the Eucharist is "at the center of the Church's faith and life" and has been declared to be the "ultimate sign and seal" of church unity by a Roman Cardinal, close attention needs to be given to this International Congress. A section of the document also addresses the question of Sunday as "the day of the Church."

In this special issue of WWN, we have given the teachings of the Roman Church on the two sacraments involved, one in preparation for, and the other involved in the Congress itself. We have used an authority recognized by the Church. Lest one should think that Rome has altered its theological stance with the passing of time, we have also included a recent statement by John Paul II on the subject - "Ministerial Priesthood - the Gift of Redemption" - as he reflected on the 50th anniversary of his ordination to the priesthood.

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The 46th International Eucharistic Congress will be celebrated in Wroclaw, Poland this year. The theme chosen is "The Eucharist and Freedom." The Pontifical Committee for International Eucharisitic Congresses issued a document on November 13, 1996 outlining the objective for the Congress. The document read that the Congress will focus "on presenting and celebrating the mystery of the Eucharist in the light of a concept of far-reaching anthropological, social and salvific significance: freedom."

This document reveals the subtlety of the new face of Rome, and gives force to the warning that "so closely will the counterfeit resemble the true, that it will be impossible to distinguish between them except by the Holy Scriptures." (The Great Controversy, p.593) For example, this document enlarges on the use of the word, "freedom." It reads:

This word, "freedom" expresses the great quest of humanity, the desire of all people. Freedom is an expression of that spark of truth and life with which humanity was created in the image and likeness of God. Freedom both signifies humanity's noblest expression and is also fraught with its greatest risk: "God willed that man should be ' left in the hand of his own counsel ', so that he might of his own accord seek his Creator and freely attain his full and blessed perfection by cleaving to Him." [Quotation from the new Catechism of the Catholic Church]

How much different is this than the following concepts?

Every human being, created in the image of God, is endowed with a power akin to that of the Creator, - individuality, the power to think and to do. ...

Higher than the highest human thought can reach is God's ideal for His children. Godliness - godlikeness - is the goal to be reached. (Education, pp.17,18)

The document continues:

Freedom is God's gift made to humanity in creation, and even more in redemption. It is, indeed, to the mystery of redemption that Paul is referring when he says: "For freedom Christ has set us free." (Gal 5:1) Precisely because freedom is a fragile and endangered gift, it has been "redeemed" from sin and is "saved" by the gift of the Holy Spirit, in whom we have become children of God, freed from the slavery of sin so as to cry out together, "Abba! Father !" (cf. Gal 4:4-6) The same Spirit enables us to turn to others as our brothers and sisters in the freedom and evangelical fraternity of the children of our Father. [ Ecumenism? ]

For this reason, so that we may remain free, Christ himself willed that the mystery of redemption and our liberation - His and our Passover should be sacramentally presented to us in the Eucharist at all times and in all places until His glorious and definitive return, when "freed from the corruption of sin and death, we shall sing the glory of the Father with every creature."

It is obvious from this introduction that the Roman Catholic concept of "freedom" is interlocked with their perception of the Eucharist. It will be of value to us at this point to review how the Roman Church views the Eucharist, and what they believe happens in the celebration of the Mass.

The document itself states - "The Eucharist is at the center of the Church's faith and life." The Catechism of the Catholic Church reads - "In the blessed Eucharist is contained the whole spiritual good of the Church, namely Christ himself, our Pasch." (#1324) "In brief, the Eucharist is the sum and summary of our faith: ' Our way of thinking is attuned to the Eucharist, and the Eucharist in turn confirms our way of thinking." ' (#1327) In the same section, it gives an insight as to why the Church of Rome has designated this "sacrament" as the "ultimate sign and seal" of church unity. (EPS 91.02.74) The Catechism declares - "The Eucharist is the efficacious sign and sublime cause of that communion in the divine life and that unity of the People of God by which the Church is kept in being." (#1325; emphasis supplied)

Briefly the position is: No Eucharist, no Church; No Eucharist, no "Divine life" (power). The "power" involved in the Eucharist is little perceived. In the book, His Holiness, the authors commenting on the first mass celebrated by Karol Wojtyla wrote:

His former teacher, Father Kazimierz Figlewicz served as manuductor, the elder confrere who guides a new priest during the celebration, steadying him as, for the first time, he experiences the tremendous power involved in the transformation of bread and wine into the Body and Blood of Christ. (p.70)

There can be no question that such an experience of power galvanizes a priesthood and thus a whole Church around a central concept involving the Eucharist.

It should not be forgotten that the final issue as expressed in the Three Angels Messages is worship. Either one responds to the message of the First Angel and worships "Him" who created all things, or "the beast" who claims to create "god" for men to worship. (Rev. 14:7, 9) A thousand "Sunday laws" could be legislated regulating the work place, yet so long as no man would be compelled to worship on that day, no mark can be inferred. The only thing that such laws could accomplish would be the interference with man's observance of the command, "Six days shalt thou labor, and do all thy work." (Ex. 20:9)

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Not only is there "power" involved with the Eucharist, but there is "blasphemy against God... and His tabernacle." (Lev.13:6) Whether one interprets the word, "tabernacle" a literal sense, or in the symbolical usage as found in Rev. 21:3, the focus of the blasphemy is on the mediatorial ministry of Jesus Christ beginning with the incarnation and continuing through the crucifixion. The priest himself usurps the mediatorial ministry of the resurrected Lord.

Let us review what the Church of Rome actually believes the Eucharist to be, and what they perceive the priest actually accomplishes in its celebration.

First, how does the Roman Church perceive the priest? The sainted doctor of the Church, Alphonsus de Ligouri in his approved work, Dignity and Duties of the Priest, quoting a "saint" of the Church declares the priest to be "a divine man." "For us," he writes, "it is enough to know, that Jesus Christ has said that we should treat his priests as we would his own person: He that heareth you, heareth me; he that despiseth you despiseth me. He cites another "saint," Mary of Oignies, who kissed the ground on which a priest walked. (p.24) This presumed dignity arises from the Roman perception of "the exalted nature of his offices." The chief of those offices is manifest in the celebration of the Mass. Alphonsus de Ligouri wrote:

The entire Church cannot give to God as much honor, nor obtain so many graces, as a single priest by celebrating a single Mass; for the greatest honor that the whole Church without priests could give to God would consist in offering to him in sacrifice the lives of all men. But of what value are the lives of all men compared with the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, which is a sacrifice of infinite value? What are all men before God but a little dust? ... Thus by the celebration of a single Mass, in which he offers Jesus Christ in sacrifice, a priest gives greater honor to the Lord, that if all men by dying for God offered to him the sacrifice of their lives. By a single Mass, he gives greater honor to God than all the angels and saints, with the Blessed Virgin Mary, have given or shall give to him; for their worship cannot be of infinite value, like that which the priest celebrating on the altar offers to God.

Moreover, in the holy Mass, the priest offers to God an adequate thanksgiving for all the graces bestowed even on the Blessed in Paradise; but such a thanksgiving all the saints together are incapable of offering to him. Hence it is, that on this account also the priestly dignity is superior to all celestial dignities. (p.25)

In the next section - "The Grandeur of the Priestly Power" - de Ligouri wrote:

With regard to the power of priests over the real body of Jesus Christ, it is of faith that when they pronounce the words of consecration the Incarnate Word has obliged himself to obey and to come into their hands under the sacramental species. ... We find that in the obedience to the words of his priests - Hoc est Corpus Meum - God himself descends on the altar, that he comes wherever they call him, and as often as they call him, and places himself in their hands, even though they should be his enemies. And after having come, he remains, entirely at their disposal; they move him as they please, from one place to another; they may if they wish, shut him up in the tabernacle, or expose him on the altar; or carry him outside the church; they may if they choose eat his flesh, and give him for the food of others. "Oh how great is their power," says St. Laurence Justinian, speaking of priests. "A word falls from their lips and the body of Christ is there substantially formed from the matter of bread, and the Incarnate Word descended from heaven, is found really present on the table of the altar! Never did divine goodness give such power to the angels. The angels abide by the order of God, but the priests take him in their hands, distribute him to the faithful, and partake of him as food for themselves." (pp.26-27)

Further:

St. Barnardine of Sienna has written: "Holy Virgin, excuse me, for I speak not against thee: the Lord has raised the priesthood above thee." The saint assigns the reason of the superiority of the priesthood over Mary; she conceived Jesus Christ only once; but by consecrating the Eucharist, the priest, as it were, conceives him as often as he wishes, so that if the person of the Redeemer, had not yet been in the world, the priest by pronouncing the words of consecration, would produce the great person of the Man-God. "0 wonderful dignity of the priests," cries out St. Augustine; "in their hands, as in the womb of the Blessed Virgin, the Son of God becomes incarnate." Hence the priests are called the parents of Jesus Christ: such is the title St. Bernard gives them, for they are the active cause by which he is made to exist really in the consecrated Host.

Thus the priest may, in a certain manner; be called the creator of his Creator, since by saying the words of consecration, he creates, as it were, Jesus in the sacrament, by giving him a sacramental existence, and producing him as a victim to be offered to the eternal Father. As in creating the world it was sufficient for God to have said, Let it be made, and it was created ... so it is sufficient for the priest to say, "Hoc est corpus meum," and behold the bread is no longer bread, but the body of Jesus Christ. "The power of the priest," says St. Bernardine of Sienna, "is the power of the divine person; for the transubstantiation of the bread requires as much power as the creation of the world." And St. Augustine has written, "0 venerable sanctity of the hands! 0 happy function of the priest! He that created me (if I may say so) gave me the power to create him; and he that created without me is himself created by me!" As the Word of God created heaven and earth, so, says St. Jerome, the words of the priest create Jesus Christ. "At a sign from God there came forth from nothing both the sublime vault of the heavens and the vast extent

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of the earth; but no less great is the power that manifests itself in the mysterious words of the priest." The dignity of the priest is so great, that he even blesses Jesus Christ on the altar as a victim to be offered to the eternal Father. In the sacrifice of the Mass, writes Father Mansi, Jesus Christ is the principal offerer and victim; as minister, he blesses the priest, but as victim, the priest blesses him. (pp.32-33)

[Observe the use of the word, "power" in the above paragraphs, and compare it with the statement taken from the book, His Holiness, quoted on page 2, col. 2. Then note II Thessalonians 2:8-9. The Greek word translated, "working" in the KJV is, energeian, from which our English word, "energy" is derived. Farrar Fenton translates the verse: "This outlaw's arrival will be accompanied by the energy of Satan with all powers, and signs, and terrors of falsehood."]

Returning to the document, The Eucharist and Freedom, the first section comments on "The Gift of Freedom in a Time of Crisis," It suggests that such "a crisis of true freedom is being experienced in the developed nations which have a long tradition of democracy." The questions are then asked: "What action must be taken to enable the Church, meditating on the Eucharist, to restore a true sense of freedom?" and "How can it be the basis of a society whose citizens and Christians, as well as the nations and peoples of the world, who are called to be one single family, may live together in fraternal solidarity?"

Briefly noting "the brutality of Stalinist oppression," and "the tyranny of Nazism" as these forces effected freedom, the document focuses on "the risk of freedom in contemporary culture." This "freedom" is termed, "unbridled liberalism," and is used to encompass "the lifestyle created today ... based on a notion of freedom that is almost absolute, lacking the moderation which the dignity of redeemed humanity demands for true freedom." Recognizing that "the humanistic currents of the Enlightenment shaped the notion of human rights, the interpretation of these rights without reference to the perspective of natural law failed to recognize the dignity of the human person as a person. This resulted in liberal and subjective trends which are based on certain individualistic claims regarding how to define and decide the nature of truth, justice and morality."

The document then goes to the core of the problem as perceived by Rome. It reads - God did not "entrust to a liberal state the task of reflecting the divine. Human beings, in fact, as persons, bear within themselves the image of the personal God, an image reinstated by the Redeemer's grace. They are, however, born not already free - as liberal thought affirms - but with the capacity of becoming free and assured by the promise of liberating salvation." Here the lines are being blurred. True it is, the state was never given the task of causing its citizens to reflect any spiritual, in contrast to moral, aspect of God's kingdom, neither is the state to enforce any particular aspect of what a Church may perceive to be truth. The document states clearly what Rome perceives and is seeking to carry out. It reads, and note carefully the basis of truth:

The problem of freedom in the world today concerns the relationship between freedom and truth - that relationship perceived by conscience formed according to the revelation of the Gospel and the Church's teaching. John Paul II states: "only the freedom which submits to the Truth leads the human person to his true good. The good of the person is to be in the Truth and to do the Truth." (Emphasis supplied)

To this statement of the Pope, out of context, we could consent. Jesus said, "Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free." (John 8:32) He also stated in prayer to God - "Thy word is truth." (John 17:17) The document left no doubt as to whose word, they were referring. It reads - "All the false interpretations of freedom, so often denounced by the Church's magesterium [the Pope] in our time, find expression in a crisis of true freedom in the life of individuals, families and society."

Within the document are expressed some lofty concepts in regard to the Cross and the Resurrection as these experiences of Christ relate to freedom. Quoting from the encyclical, Veritatis Splendor, the document reads

The crucified Christ reveals the authentic meaning of freedom; He lives it fully in the total gift of himself and calls His disciples to share in His freedom. Contemplation of Jesus Crucified is thus the high road which the Church must tread every day if she wishes to understand the full meaning of freedom: the gift of self in the service of God and one's brethren. Communion with the crucified and risen Lord is the never-ending source from which the Church draws unceasingly in order to live in freedom, to give of herself and to serve ... Jesus, then, is the living, personal summation of perfect freedom in total obedience to the will of God. His crucified flesh fully reveals the unbreakable bond between freedom and truth, just as His Resurrection from the dead is the supreme exaltation of the fruitfulness and saving power of a freedom lived out in truth.

The Eucharist is defined as "the sacrament of love." Quoting again from an encyclical of John Paul II, the comment is given - "Man cannot live without love. He remains a being that is incomprehensible for himself, his life is senseless, if love is not revealed to him, if he does not encounter love, if he does not experience it and make it his own, if he does not participate intimately in it." How is man to have this love? By being "nourished by the Eucharistic Bread"! The document declares - "We need to experience the indissoluble relationship between sharing in the Eucharistic Liturgy and the authentic freedom of God's children. We celebrate and bear witness to the freedom with which Christ has set us free by being nour-

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ished by the Word of the Gospel and the Eucharistic Bread."

In the document, the Eucharist is defined as "the new Passover" and so it is. (I Cor. 5:7) It is described as "the sacrifice of the New Covenant." Its celebration "constitutes the people of the New Covenant; it makes present the risen Lord and unites all who share in the one bread and the one chalice into one single body in Christ in the Holy Spirit." This perception by Rome as "the true meaning of the Eucharist" dare not be overlooked. This is why it was declared to be the "ultimate sign and seal" of church unity by Cardinal Edward Cassidy, president of the Vatican Council for promoting Christian Unity. In the Handbook for Today's Catholic a section discusses "How to Receive Communion." It reads:

When the minister raises the eucharistic bread or wine, this is an invitation for the communicant to make an Act of Faith, to express his or her belief in the Eucharist ... A clear and meaningful "Amen" is your response to this invitation. In this way you profess your belief in the presence of Christ in the eucharistic bread and wine as well as his Body, the Church. (emphasis supplied)

The document suggests a relationship between this 46th International Eucharistic Congress and the Church's celebration of the Great Jubilee of the Year 2000. This event in 1997 "offers a great opportunity for constantly 'proclaiming' the true meaning of the Eucharist. It also expresses the task of ongoing re-evangelization of the Christian community on the basis of Eucharist, which is the synthesis of Word and sacrament. Christ's teaching turns us towards communion with Him. What is proclaimed becomes reality. There is a change in the form of proclamation. Evangelization becomes the proclamation of God's present action, creating through the Eucharist the greatest event of the ecclesial community. The community is called together and fashioned by the Word as it relates to the sacrament and especially to the Word made flesh in the Eucharist."

The document states that "Christian freedom begins by acknowledging our need for forgiveness. This is the only way to come to authentic Christian transformation." Then the power of the priest is again introduced. "Everything begins and is celebrated in the mystery and ministry of reconciliation, that is, in the Sacrament of Penance. Without this there is no true conversion sealed by the mediation of the Church, which in Christ's name pronounces the word of reconciliation, calls for reconciliation with God, bestows His grace, remits sin and frees from guilt."

This facet of Rome's blasphemy needs to also be clearly understood. Again we turn to the sainted doctor of Romanism, Alphonsus de Liguori. He wrote:

With regard to the mystic body of Christ, that is, all the faithful, the priest has the power of the keys, or the power of delivering sinners from hell, of making them worthy of paradise, and changing them from the slaves of Satan into the children of God. And God himself is obliged to abide by the judgment of the priests, and either not to pardon or to pardon, according as they refuse or give absolution, provided the penitent is capable of it. "Such is," says St. Maximus of Turin, "this judiciary power ascribed to Peter that its decision carried with it the decision of God." The sentence of the priest precedes and God subscribes to it. (p.27)

Cardinal Hugo represents the Lord addressing the following words to a priest who absolves a sinner: "I have created heaven and earth, but I leave to you a better and nobler creation; make out of this soul that is in sin a new soul, that is, make out of the slave of Satan, that the soul is, a child of God. I have made the earth to bring forth all kinds of fruit, but to thee I confide a more beautiful creation, namely, that the soul should bring forth fruits of salvation. The soul without grace is a withered tree that can no longer produce fruit, but receiving the divine grace, through the ministry of a priest, it brings forth fruits of eternal life. (pp.34-35)

The document suggests that "the preparation for the Eucharistic Congress should heighten an awareness of the true freedom through this Sacrament of Penance." It also suggests:

This occasion of the Congress, while we look towards Christ, "the awaited of the nations and their Liberator," who is the Eucharistic Sun of truth and grace and whose rays light up the geography and history of humanity, this Eucharistic Congress should inspire a great prayer of intercession so that the freedom, attained at so high a price, may be enduring and become deeply rooted in all nations.

Think this suggestion through carefully. While the context is a call to prayer for "freedom" for "all nations," consider what it is saying: - that the anticipated "Liberator" is "the Eucharistic Sun." The Scriptures tell us plainly, as noted previously, that the power behind the Eucharist is the "energy of Satan." He it is, who has symbolised himself in

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"the geography and history of humanity" as the Sun!

The ultimate dimension of the truth about the Eucharist is its mystery: the saving presence of Christ under the appearances of bread and wine. For the Lord willed to be permanently present in His Church as Emmanuel, God with us. ... The Eucharist as the mystery of presence invites us to adoration. Pope John Paul II has written about the intrinsic relationship between freedom and adoration: "True worshipers of God must worship him ' in spirit and truth' (Jn. 4:23): in this worship they become free. Worship of God and a relationship with truth are revealed in Jesus Christ as the deepest foundation of freedom."

It should be coming through clearly what the confrontation of the near future will involve. Rather than the cry of the American heritage - "Give me liberty or give me death" - the demand will be - "Take our freedom, or we will give you death."

Into this picture is introduced Sunday. The document reads:

One characteristic sign of the Christian life is under strong attack today from contemporary culture. We are referring to Sunday, the Lord's day and the day of the Church. This holiday is coming to be seen more and more as something secular and recreational, while the Christian meaning of Sunday is becoming excluded from the public sphere. In face of the alternative of a weekend dedicated solely to relaxation and amusement, the Christian community should reaffirm the sacred significance of Sunday as an occasion for freedom to adore God and to make his presence manifest in the midst of our society.

The context of this pronouncement needs to be carefully considered. First, Sunday is termed "the day of the Church." But the objective of Rome is just one Church. In that one church, there is according to their theology an ever presence of God in the Eucharist. The new Catechism of the Catholic Church associates these two factors together. It reads - "The Sunday celebration of the Lord's Day and his Eucharist is at the heart of the Church's life. 'Sunday is the day on which the paschal mystery is celebrated in the light of apostolic tradition and is to be observed as the foremost holy day of obligation in the universal Church."' (#2177, p.582)

The factor is "worship" not merely a Sunday Law. There can be ever so many "Sunday Laws" on the books, and even enforced, but merely the closing down of the work place on Sunday will not be the mark of the beast. The emphasis by various voices in the Community of Adventism on Sunday Laws suites the purpose of the enemy well. It diverts the attention from the real issue at stake - "worship." This is the emphasis in the prophecies of Revelation. Observe:

They worshipped the dragon which gave power unto the beast: and they worshipped the beast ... (Rev. 13:4)

If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark ... (Rev. 14:9)

Certain things need to be observed in the whole document. The word, "liberty" is not used. In its place is the word, "freedom" with the observation, "a crisis of true freedom is being experienced in the developed nations which have a long tradition of democracy." The "Enlightenment" out of which our present concept of "liberty" developed is acknowledged in the document but in a negative way indicating that it constitutes a risk to freedom in contemporary culture. It speaks of "the public sphere" where "the Christian meaning of Sunday" is being excluded. While "liberty" holds the separation of church and state, the Roman Catholic use of "freedom" blurs the distinction. All of the present trends in our modern society which pose a threat to Rome's objectives are stated to be "unbridled liberalism." This harks back to Leo XIII and his antipathy for the form of government developed in the United States. (See Facts of Faith) Leo XIII gave to Louis Veuillot, the title of "Lay Father of the Church." From him, he gained much of his anti-democratic perceptions. It was Veuillot who wrote the book, The Liberal Illusion in which is the following:

When the time comes and men realize that the social edifice must be rebuilt according to eternal standards, be it tomorrow, or be it centuries from now, the Catholics will arrange things to suit said standards. Undeterred by those who prefer to abide in death, they will re-establish certain laws of life. They will restore Jesus to His place on high, and he shall be no longer insulted. They will raise their children to know God and to honor their parents.

These words are echoed in present day objectives voiced by the "Religious Right" and Conservative Catholic journals as well as the encyclicals of John Paul II. The issue is "the social edifice." But this is not all which Veuillot envisioned. He continued:

They (the Catholics) will make obligatory the religious observance of Sunday on behalf of the whole of society and for its own good, revoking the permit for free-thinkers and Jews to celebrate, incognito, Monday or Saturday on their own account. Respect will not be refused to the Creator nor repose denied the creature simply for the sake of humoring certain maniacs, whose phrenetic condition causes them stupidly and insolently to block the will of the whole people. ... In a word, Catholic society will be Catholic, and the dissenters whom it will tolerate will know its charity, but they will not be allowed to disrupt its unity.

Noting the words used by Veuillot, it is the "religious observance" of Sunday which is emphasized. The goal will also include "revoking the permit" to celebrate (worship)

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on Saturday or another day. Again, I would emphasize that the issue is much more than merely a "Sunday Law." At the present time, the Roman hierarchy is caught between a policy of not only dominance of the Christian world, but the desire to rule the whole world, and this involves the Islamic sector as well as the Jewish, which means both Saturday and Friday enter the equation. At the moment this document places the Eucharist as the central emphasis for the restructuring of the social edifice. However, both this document and the new Catechism of the Catholic Church note that "the day of the Church" is the time for its celebration.

The concluding section of the document contains two comments which are very revealing. Note:

In considering the value of human activity in the light of the paschal mystery, the Second Vatican Council emphasized the meaning of that freedom which will only be complete when all humanity will be presented to the Father as an acceptable offering. While we are on our way towards the future, the Church gives us this assurance: "A pledge of this hope, sustenance for this journey, our Lord left us in that sacrament of faith in which natural elements cultivated by men are turned into his glorious Body and Blood, the supper of fraternal communion, the foretaste of the heavenly banquet."

Was it not "the natural elements cultivated by men" which Cain brought as his offering? (Gen. 4:3) Will God today accept an "offering of Cain" any more than He did at the dawn of civilization? A bloodless offering brings no remission from sin. (Heb. 9:22) The offering of Abel signified that one, once for all time, Sacrifice on Calvary. (See Hebrews 9: 28; apax - one time, "used of what is so done as to be of perpetual validity and never need repetition, once for all." Thayer)

The closing section of the document introduces Mary. It reads:

In the program of the Eucharistic Congress, although not explicit, there is the implicit conviction that our incorporation in Christ becomes possible through the maternal mediation of Mary, the Mother of the Son of God. ... For she is clearly at all times in communion with God and in solidarity with the people of God. ... John Paul II invites us to contemplate the one who is "totally dependent on God and completely directed towards Him, and at the side of her Son, she is the most perfect image of freedom and the liberation of humanity and of the universe."

Already now we entrust to her maternal intercession the Celebration of the 46th International Eucharistic Congress in Wroclaw. May there be abundant fruit springing from the Eucharist so that humanity and all nations enlightened and nourished by Christ, the Light of the world and the Bread come down from heaven may enjoy the true freedom for which he, the Redeemer of humanity, has set us free.

(All quoted references not otherwise noted are from "The Pope Speaks", March-April, 1997, pp.97-116)

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Often when one reads the official pronouncements of the Roman Church from centuries past, he is inclined to comment, "This is not the current position of Rome. Surely they do not believe in that "hocus pocus" stuff now." In the same issue of The Pope Speaks were John Paul II's reflections "marking the 50th anniversary of his ordination" to the priesthood. He said:

The Eucharist perpetuates this sacrifice (of Christ) in the life of the Church. "My flesh is food indeed," Jesus says, "and my blood is drink indeed." (Jn 6:55) His bloody sacrifice is accomplished in an unbloody manner under the appearances of bread and wine, in fulfilment of the very ancient figure of Melchizedek, King of Salem, "priest of God Most High" who, after blessing Abraham, victorious over an enemy coalition, "brought out bread and wine." (Gen. 14:18) ...

Fifty years have passed, my jubulirian brothers. The words of the Letter to the Hebrews apply to us all: "For every high priest chosen from among men is appointed to act on behalf of men in relation to God, to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins." (Heb 5:1) [p.94]

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