Dear Father: At Mass, I witnessed one of the assisting priests telling the gentleman near me that the man had to say “amen” before he could receive Holy Communion. Then, at the end of Mass, the priest gave us all what seemed like a lecture, telling us that we are supposed to say “amen” when we receive Holy Communion. I’ve never heard of this practice before. I checked with my friends, and they said they had never heard of it, either. What’s up with this priest? – F.E
Dear F.E.: While the priest may have used the wrong tone in giving his instruction (perhaps he was having a bad-hair day!), he was correct about the importance of the “amen” at Holy Communion. When a priest (or other minister of Holy Communion) holds up the consecrated Host and says, “The Body of Christ” – or when the Precious Blood is distributed with the statement, “The Blood of Christ” – the recipient is supposed to respond with “Amen.”
The word, seemingly of Hebrew origin, means “so be it” or “I believe.” It seems that the early Christians, formed by their Jewish roots, used the “Amen” in response to the prayers offered aloud by the bishop or priest. Of course, we still do this today for most of the prayers at Mass. But the “Amen” at Holy Communion always carried a special weight. We learn this from the writings of the fathers of the Church.
Some who are familiar with the Mass of 1962 know that the “Amen” was pronounced by the priest as he distributed Holy Communion. For each recipient, he said this prayer in Latin: “May the Body of our Lord Jesus Christ guard your soul unto eternal life. Amen.”
The priest made the sign of the cross with the Host in front of the recipient during that prayer. After the Second Vatican Council, one of the changes at Mass was the shortening of this prayer to “The Body of Christ.” Notice that besides the condensing of the priest’s prayer, he also no longer said the “Amen.”
St. Augustine, one of the greatest doctors of the ancient Church, taught specifically about saying “Amen” in one of his sermons. He said: “If you are the body and members of Christ, then it is your sacrament that is placed on the table of the Lord; it is your sacrament that you receive. To that which you are you respond ‘Amen’ (‘yes, it is true!’), and by responding to it you assent to it. For you hear the words, ‘the Body of Christ’ and respond ‘Amen.’ Be then a member of the Body of Christ that your ‘Amen’ may be true.”
Our “Amen” is important because that one word means so much, particularly at Holy Communion. First, it is our assent of faith that we believe Jesus Christ is present in the Host we receive, Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity. We assert that we believe we are about to receive the Real Presence of Christ.
Second, the “Amen” is an act of adoration and worship because we are saying “yes” to Christ Himself, “yes” to His love, “yes” to His desire that we be made one with Him and He with us. We humble ourselves by the “Amen” in a sort of verbal prostration before God.
Third, we are declaring that what we receive, the Body of Christ, is what we become by receiving It. That is, we are saying “yes” to being transformed from the inside out.
Our transformation is twofold. First, we are divinized. To take the words of St. Augustine once again, when we eat natural food, it becomes a part of us and is changed into our bodies. But when we eat this supernatural food, we are changed into what we consume.
We are more intimately one with Christ than any human relationship could make happen. The saints teach us that our soul is made one with Christ’s soul, our mind with His mind, our heart with His heart.
Also, we are made more fully members of the mystical body of Christ, the Church. Our “Amen” is our declaration that we want to more fully belong to Christ and His Body, that we want to be and are made one with all our baptized brothers and sisters, that is, the Church.
Thus, our “Amen” is also an implicit statement that we desire to lay aside all that prevents union with the Church, including our enmities toward others as well as our weakness in believing and living all that the Church teaches as the Body of Christ.
The space in this column is limited, however, I want to say a bit more and will finish my answer to you in my next article. Until then, pray for your priest(s), including me, and don’t forget to say “Amen”!