Gaudentius of Brescia: This is the flesh of the Lamb; this is His blood Thursday, Apr 28 2016

One man has died for all, and now in every church in the mystery of bread and wine he heals those for whom he is offered in sacrifice, giving life to those who believe and holiness to those who consecrate the offering.

This is the flesh of the Lamb; this is his blood. The bread that came down from heaven declared: The bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the world.

It is significant, too, that his blood should be given to us in the form of wine, for his own words in the gospel, I am the true vine, imply clearly enough that whenever wine is offered as a representation of Christ’s passion, it is offered as his blood.

This means that it was of Christ that the blessed patriarch Jacob prophesied when he said: He will wash his tunic in wine and his cloak in the blood of the grape. The tunic was our flesh, which Christ was to put on like a garment and which he was to wash in his own blood.

Creator and Lord of all things, whatever their nature, he brought forth bread from the earth and changed it into his own body. Not only had he the power to do this, but he had promised it; and, as he had changed water into wine, he also changed wine into his own blood.

It is the Lord’s passover, Scripture tells us, that is, the Lord’s passing. We are no longer to look upon the bread and wine as earthly substances. They have become heavenly, because Christ has passed into them and changed them into his body and blood.

What you receive is the body of him who is the heavenly bread, and the blood of him who is the sacred vine; for when he offered his disciples the consecrated bread and wine, he said: This is my body, this is my blood. We have put our trust in him. I urge you to have faith in him; truth can never deceive.

When Christ told the crowds that they must eat his flesh and drink his blood, they were horrified and began to murmur among themselves: This teaching is too hard; who can be expected to listen to it?

As I have already told you, thoughts such as these must be banished. The Lord himself used heavenly fire to drive them away by going on to declare: It is the spirit that gives life; the flesh is of no avail. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life.

Gaudentius of Brescia (d. 410): Sermon 2, from the Office of Readings, Thursday in the fifth week of Easter @ Universalis.

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Gaudentius of Brescia: “Whither shall I Go from Thy Spirit?” Sunday, May 12 2013

Whither shall I go from thy spirit? Or whither shall I flee from thy face? If I ascend into heaven, thou art there; if I descend into hell, thou art present.  If I take my wings early in the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea (Ps. 138).

But the Holy Spirit was not in heaven only; He was not absent from earth; and neither would the Son so ascend into heaven as to forsake the earth; neither did the Father alone possess the throne of Heaven, whither the Son is said to return, and whence the Holy Ghost is said to come.

For the most blessed prophet makes this acknowledgement to the Father…. If I take wings in the morning, he says, etc. … What manner then of wings has he? The soul of the believer takes to itself wings of faith, so that raised above earthly things, and dwelling wholly in the spirit, it can comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth, and length, and height, and depth of the knowledge of God (Eph. 3:18, 19).

[…] Whither shall I go, he says, from Thy Spirit?  From Thy Paraclete, that is, Whose fulness the Apostles receiving made known through the mouth of Peter the fulfilment of the divine promise, proclaiming: This is what was spoken of by the prophet Joel: and in the last days I shall pour out my Spirit upon all flesh (Acts 2:16, 17). And whither shall I flee from thy face?

From the Son, therefore, Who is the Face of the Father; since the Father is seen in the Son, according to the words of Our Lord and Saviour Himself, Who when Philip besought Him:

Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us, so answered…: Philip, he that seeth me seeth the Father also. How sayest thou, Shew us the Father? Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? (John 14:9).

Neither must the Holy Spirit be regarded as separated from the Father, Whose Spirit He is, nor the Son be believed to be separated from Him Whose Face He is, and Right Hand, and Power, and Wisdom.

He does not say: “If I ascend into heaven Thy Spirit is there, or Thy Face and Thy Spirit are there”, but Thou, He says, art present; and with Thy Son and with the Holy Ghost; for one and the same everywhere and forever is the divinity of the ever adorable Trinity.

But so that a clear faith and separate belief in the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost might be given to those who believe, it is accordingly written that the Father sends both the Son and the Holy Ghost; since neither He Who sends nor He Who is sent can be believed to be God, if there is a place where He is, and a place where He is not.

Gaudentius of Brescia (d. 410): Sermon 20, translated by M.F. Toale, D.D. @ Lectionary Central.

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