SUMMARY

1. Preface, Sanctus and Benedictus: we are now coming nearer to God’s Throne and join in the angels’ song, “Holy, holy, holy”.

2. Consecration: the priest, acting as Our Lord’s personal representative, does what Our Lord himself did at the Last Supper.  The priest takes the bread and wine and offers Our Lord in his Risen and Ascended Body and Blood to God, and the Bread and Wine then become what is offered, as Our Lord promised they would, “This is my Body, this is my Blood”; so that the forms of bread and wine on the altar and Our Lord’s Ascended Body in Heaven become one.  At the same time Our Lord brings us to his Father’s Throne and presents us as his people whom he died to save and God welcomes us with his Son.

References

1. ©The Archbishops’ Council (2000) Common Worship.  The Order for the celebration of Holy Communion also called the Eucharist and the Lord's Supper, Order One.  Available from:
http://www.cofe.anglican.org/worship/liturgy/commonworship/texts/hc/orderone.html  (Accessed 25 August 2010) (Internet).

2. Dix, G. (1945) The shape of the liturgy, Westminster: Dacre Press.

3. ©The Archbishops’ Council (2000) Common Worship.  The Order for the celebration of Holy Communion also called the Eucharist and the Lord's Supper, Order One.  Available from:
http://www.cofe.anglican.org/worship/liturgy/commonworship/texts/hc/orderone.html  (Accessed 25 August 2010) (Internet).

4. ©The Archbishops’ Council (2000) Common Worship.  The Order for the celebration of Holy Communion also called the Eucharist and the Lord's Supper, Order One.  Available from:
http://www.cofe.anglican.org/worship/liturgy/commonworship/texts/hc/orderone.html  (Accessed 25 August 2010) (Internet).