A-Z of the Mass: Qurbana

Because of the predominance of the Latin Church, and its use of the Roman Rite, which is, of course, the rite of the Pope, the Bishop of Rome, it is very easy for us to forget that several other Churches, with different liturgical traditions, are in communion with the Pope, and so form part of the Catholic Church. In fact, there are 22 distinct Eastern Catholic Churches, the majority of which belong to the Byzantine liturgical tradition; besides this, and the Syriac tradition already mentioned (which has two branches, Eastern and Western), there are also Armenian, Coptic, and Ethiopian Catholics.

Behind the many outward differences, however, we can see a common structure to all Eucharistic liturgies, which may be outlined very broadly as the gathering of the community; the Liturgy of the Word focused on readings from Scripture and culminating in the Gospel; the Liturgy of the Eucharist, at the heart of which is the Eucharistic Prayer, during which the elements are consecrated; the Communion rites, during which priest and people receive Holy Communion; and thanksgiving and dismissal at the end.

This, of course, is unsurprising, because, despite all the apparent differences, any celebration of the Eucharist, whether it be called Mass, Divine Liturgy, or Holy Qurbana, whatever the particularities of the rite used, is a celebration of the central sacrament of our Christian life, in which Christ’s Body and Blood, offered to the Father once for all upon the Cross, are made present for us, and we, the Christian faithful, are invited, in Holy Communion, to be united with that Sacrifice. This central truth, which is conveyed in different ways in the different Eucharistic liturgies, according to the different cultures in which they originated, is what unites Catholics of whatever rite, all over the world: ‘we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread’ (1 Cor 10: 17).

Gregory Pearson OP