When learning a new language, one of the first aspects to know is how to bid farewell to someone. Often, the words used are short but charged with meaning: goodbye, au revoir, ciao, adios, adieu, weraba, etc. The meaning is deepened with non-verbal gestures that are equally short but charged. It could be a handshake, a hug, a kiss, or some sort of sign. There is a whole culture involved. Perhaps, you can recall how this took place in your family – when you were leaving to start a journey, a vocation, etc.
To share with you from my own experience, when bidding farewell at home, we hug on the right shoulder, then the left shoulder. In the US, often people hug on one shoulder, and that is it. As a new arrival from Uganda, I was surprised when, after hugging on the first side, the person left. For them, the farewell hug was finished. For me, it was halfway finished.
If you ever spend time with a group of youngsters who are close friends, you would be amazed at how they bid farewell to one another. Oftentimes, the gestures are unique to them. In a way, they symbolize the group of friends and distinguish it from other groups in the neighborhood.
Knowing that his hour had come, Jesus bids farewell to his friends, his followers, with expressions and gestures by which they would be identified and distinguished. These gestures are a summation of Jesus’ life and mission. They are a convergence of what his life was about.
On the evening of the Last Supper, which we celebrate tonight, he took off his outer garment and took a towel. He washed the feet of his followers and told them to do to each other as he had done for them. Thereafter, he took bread, said a blessing, and then he gave it to his followers, saying to them. “This is my body. Do this to remember me.” Then he did the same thing to the cup. And he told them, “This is my blood. Do this to remember me.”
In this manner, Jesus turned what would have been a gesture of farewell into a means of his everlasting presence with his followers. From that day onwards, washing each other’s feet – a metaphor which symbolizes self-sacrifice in the service of one another, and the Eucharist, became marks that distinguished Jesus’ followers, expressions of loving to the end as Jesus has done.
Henceforth, the disciples gathered in their homes and shared bread and wine after saying the words Jesus had commanded them. The bread they shared was not just a symbol of Jesus' presence but the actual presence of Christ among them. We continue to do the same today. This is why we celebrate the Eucharist daily. It is the living memorial our Lord has left us. More still, for this reason, Christ gave us the holy priesthood to perpetuate his memorial and wash our hearts.
The truth about the Eucharistic identity of the disciples is not in doubt. Historians do indeed narrate instances when the disciples were accused and prosecuted for cannibalism because they talked about eating the flesh of a human being.
As we shall hear in readings following Easter, the followers of Jesus recognized their risen Lord, who now had a transformed, glorious body at the breaking of bread. This was the symbolic means of recognizing his real presence among them, and you and I continue to participate in the sacred encounter with the Lord in the blessed Eucharist.
Dear brothers and sisters, as Jesus indicates firmly during the Last Supper, it is not enough to simply admire him, his words and his actions. Jesus seeks followers and not admirers. He wants those who are his friends not just to stop at admiring his actions, but to follow his example and do the same for one another. So, we must go from admiring to making our own Jesus' language and culture. As a well-known song goes, “We are called from worship into service.” What is this going to look like in your life going forward? How is your daily worship in which Christ serves you his body and blood, in which he washes your heart, going to be a springboard for you to serve a similar meal to others?