Last Supper
glossary_termThe last meal, a Passover supper, which Jesus ate with his disciples the night before he died. Jesus' passing over to his Father by his death and Resurrection, the new Passover, is anticipated in the Last Supper and celebrated in the Eucharist, which fulfills the Jewish Passover and anticipates the final Passover of the Church in the glory of the kingdom. Hence the Eucharist is called "the Lord's Supper"
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Passages ranked by relevance to Last Supper, from most closely related outward.
Jesus gave the supreme expression of his free offering of himself at the meal shared with the twelve Apostles "on the night he was betrayed". 429 On the eve of his Passion, while still free, Jesus transformed this Last Supper with the apostles into the memorial of his voluntary offering to the Father for the salvation of men: "This is my body which is given for you." "This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins." 430
The Eucharist that Christ institutes at that moment will be the memorial of his sacrifice. 431 Jesus includes the apostles in his own offering and bids them perpetuate it. 432 By doing so, the Lord institutes his apostles as priests of the New Covenant: "For their sakes I sanctify myself, so that they also may be sanctified in truth." 433
The Lord's Supper, because of its connection with the supper which the Lord took with his disciples on the eve of his Passion and because it anticipates the wedding feast of the Lamb in the heavenly Jerusalem. 141 The Breaking of Bread, because Jesus used this rite, part of a Jewish meat when as master of the table he blessed and distributed the bread, 142 above all at the Last Supper. 143 It is by this action that his disciples will recognize him after his Resurrection, 144 and it is this expression that the first Christians will use to designate their Eucharistic assemblies; 145 by doing so they signified that all who eat the one broken bread, Christ, enter into communion with him and form but one body in him. 146 The Eucharistic assembly (synaxis), because the Eucharist is celebrated amid the assembly of the faithful, the visible expression of the Church. 147
By celebrating the Last Supper with his apostles in the course of the Passover meal, Jesus gave the Jewish Passover its definitive meaning. Jesus' passing over to his father by his death and Resurrection, the new Passover, is anticipated in the Supper and celebrated in the Eucharist, which fulfills the Jewish Passover and anticipates the final Passover of the Church in the glory of the kingdom.