Mass (Catholic Church)

The Mass or Eucharist is the central act of divine worship in the Catholic Church, which describes it as "the source and summit of the Christian life". In formal contexts, it is sometimes called the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.

Many of the Catholic Church's other sacraments are celebrated in the framework of the Eucharist. The term "Mass" is generally used only of Latin Church celebrations of the Eucharist, while the Eastern Orthodox Church, Oriental Orthodox Church, and the various Eastern Catholic Churches use terms such as "Divine Liturgy", "Holy Qurbana", and "Badarak", in accordance with each one's tradition.

The term "Mass" is derived from the Late Latin word missa (dismissal), a word used in the concluding formula of Mass in Latin: "Ite, missa est" ("Go; it is the dismissal"). In antiquity, missa simply meant "dismissal". In Christian usage, however, it gradually took on a deeper meaning. The word "dismissal" has come to imply a mission.

For information on the theology of the Eucharist and on the Eucharistic liturgy of other Christian denominations, see "Mass (liturgy)", "Eucharist" and "Eucharistic theology". For information on the history and of development of the Mass see Eucharist and Origin of the Eucharist.

The Council of Trent reaffirmed traditional Christian teaching that the Mass is the same Sacrifice of Calvary offered in an unbloody manner: "The victim is one and the same: the same now offers through the ministry of priests, who then offered himself on the cross; only the manner of offering is different ... And since in this divine sacrifice which is celebrated in the Mass, the same Christ who offered himself once in a bloody manner on the altar of the cross is contained and offered in an unbloody manner... this sacrifice is truly propitiatory." The Council declared that Jesus instituted the Mass at his Last Supper: "He offered up to God the Father His own body and blood under the species of bread and wine; and, under the symbols of those same things, He delivered (His own body and blood) to be received by His apostles, whom He then constituted priests of the New Testament; and by those words, Do this in commemoration of me, He commanded them and their successors in the priesthood, to offer (them); even as the Catholic Church has always understood and taught."

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