Each Mass is a singular and unique act of worship. “...the Eucharistic table set for us is the table both of the Word of God and of the Body of the Lord.”
(CCC 1346)
We see this on the first Easter Sunday as Jesus shares with his disciples on the road to Emmaus. Luke shows us Jesus walking with and explaining the Scriptures to them (24:27) then sitting with them at table “he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. With that their eyes were opened and they recognized him, but he vanished from their sight.” (see Lk 24: 30-31)
We see the apostles and early church following the same pattern.
(Acts 2:42, 46, -80-90 A.D.) “They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of the bread and the prayers…Every day they devoted themselves to meeting together in the temple area and to breaking bread in their homes”
As early as the second century we have written witness of the Eucharistic celebration by St. Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch, and a disciple of the apostle St. John (in letters to various churches as he was on his way to Rome to be martyred 107 A.D.) St. Ignatius calls the Church “the place of sacrifice.”
Take care, then, to have but one Eucharist. For there is one flesh of our Lord Jesus Christ, and one cup to show the unity of His blood; one alter, as there is one bishop,
along with the priests and deacons, my fellow-servants.
(St. Ignatius, Letter to the Philadelphians)
Let that be deemed a proper Eucharist, which is administered either by the bishop or by
one to whom he has entrusted it.
(St. Ignatius, Letter to the Smyrnians)
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