The Cross and the Eucharist in Early Christianity: A Theological and Liturgical Investigation

Description

The Cross was present at the Eucharist in early Christianity as an idea, a gesture, and an object. Over time, these different actualizations of the quintessential symbol of Christianity have generated important questions about their meaning and function, among them: is the Eucharist a meal and/or a sacrifice? Can the sign of the Cross illuminate the absence of a Roman epiclesis? Is it pertinent -historically and theologically - to use an altar Cross? In this study, Daniel Cardo explores the relation between the Cross and the Eucharist. Offering a thorough and fresh reading of patristic and Roman liturgical texts, he identifies their emphases and common themes on the Cross and the Eucharist, and demonstrates their significance for the liturgical debates of recent decades.

Daniel Cardo is Adjunct Assistant Professor of Patristics, Sacraments, and Homiletics at St John Vianney Theological Seminary, Denver and Visiting Professor of Theology at the Augustine Institute in Denver, Colorado. He is author of La fe en el pensamiento de Joseph Ratzinger (2013).

'It has always been a remarkable feature of Christianity that it is in love with the cross. In love with an instrument of torture - how can it be? Cardo's deep study answers the question ... This book is one of the few fine examples of lex orandi grounding theological understanding. It undertakes an analysis of textual primary sources in order to offer insights in the field of sacramental theology ... The scholar will appreciate the thorough footnotes, but of even more value for every reader is the fact that this book works on our symbolic imagination as well as on our historical faculties. From the richness of liturgical actions and texts, Cardo offers us the cross as a hermeneutical key for the Eucharist for our spiritual enrichment.' David W. Fagerberg, University of Notre Dame, Indiana