Generally, Protestants do not regard Communion as a sacrifice. It is viewed as a memorial and a reminder but the idea of sacrifice and of it being offered is completely foreign to their way of thinking. Was this the way the Early Christians believed? Or as in so many other things, did the Protestants somewhere along the way lose the tradition and heritage that had been passed on to them from their forebears?
In St. Justin Maryr’s Dialogue with Trypho, he speaks to the Jewish people in the person of Trypho about the sacrificial nature of the Eucharist.
“And the offering of fine flour, sirs,” I said, “which was prescribed to be presented on behalf of those purified from leprosy, was a type of the bread of the Eucharist, the celebration of which our Lord Jesus Christ prescribed, in remembrance of the suffering which He endured on behalf of those who are purified in soul from all iniquity, in order that we may at the same time thank God for having created the world, with all things therein, for the sake of man, and for delivering us from the evil in which we were, and for utterly overthrowing principalities and powers by Him who suffered according to His will. Hence God speaks by the mouth of Malachi, one of the twelve [prophets], as I said before, about the sacrifices at that time presented by you: ‘I have no pleasure in you, saith the Lord; and I will not accept your sacrifices at your hands: for, from the rising of the sun unto the going down of the same, My name has been glorified among the Gentiles, and in every place incense is offered to My name, and a pure offering: for My name is great among the Gentiles, saith the Lord: but ye profane it.’ [So] He then speaks of those Gentiles, namely us, who in every place offer sacrifices to Him, i.e., the bread of the Eucharist, and also the cup of the Eucharist, affirming both that we glorify His name, and that you profane [it]." [ANF 1: 215, ch. XLI]
One finds this Malachi passage utilized repeatedly by the Early writers to demonstrate that the pure sacrifice of the Eucharist was predicted in the Old Testament. Another passage from the Dialogue hits on the same basic theme.
“Accordingly, God, anticipating all the sacrifices which we offer through this name, and which Jesus the Christ enjoined us to offer, i.e., in the Eucharist of the bread and the cup, and which are presented by Christians in all places throughout the world, bears witness that they are well-pleasing to Him. But He utterly rejects those presented by you and by those priests of yours, saying, ‘And I will not accept your sacrifices at your hands; for from the rising of the sun to its setting my name is glorified among the Gentiles (He says); but ye profane it." [ANF 1: 257, ch. CXVII]
In St. Irenaeus of Lyon’s Against Heresies, we find a very similar passage about Communion.
Again, giving directions to His disciples to offer to God the first-fruits of His own, created things—not as if He stood in need of them, but that they might be themselves neither unfruitful nor ungrateful—He took that created thing, bread, and gave thanks, and said, “This is My body.” And the cup likewise, which is part of that creation to which we belong, He confessed to be His blood, and taught the new oblation of the new covenant; which the Church receiving from the apostles, offers to God throughout all the world, to Him who gives us as the means of subsistence the first-fruits of His own gifts in the New Testament, concerning which Malachi, among the twelve prophets, thus spoke beforehand: “I have no pleasure in you, saith the Lord Omnipotent, and I will not accept sacrifice at your hands. For from the rising of the sun, unto the going down [of the same], My name is glorified among the Gentiles, and in every place incense is offered to My name, and a pure sacrifice; for great is My name among the Gentiles, saith the Lord Omnipotent;”—indicating in the plainest manner, by these words, that the former people [the Jews] shall indeed cease to make offerings to God, but that in every place sacrifice shall be offered to Him, and that a pure one; and His name is glorified among the Gentiles. [ANF 1: 484, book IV, ch. XVII]
And from the fragments of the lost writings of Ireaneus:
And therefore the oblation of the Eucharist is not a carnal one, but a spiritual; and in this respect it is pure. For we make an oblation to God of the bread and the cup of blessing, giving Him thanks in that He has commanded the earth to bring forth these fruits for our nourishment. And then, when we have perfected the oblation, we invoke the Holy Spirit, that He may exhibit this sacrifice, both the bread the body of Christ, and the cup the blood of Christ, in order that the receivers of these antitypes may obtain remission of sins and life eternal. [ANF 1: 574, fragment XXXVII]
Saint Cyprian in his letter Cæcilius, on the Sacrament of the Cup of the Lord presents us with the idea that the priest who offers in the Church “offers a true and full sacrifice.”
[H]ow much rather is it forbidden to infringe such important ones, so great, so pertaining to the very sacrament of our Lord’s passion and our own redemption, or to change it by human tradition into anything else than what was divinely appointed! For if Jesus Christ, our Lord and God, is Himself the chief priest of God the Father, and has first offered Himself a sacrifice to the Father, and has commanded this to be done in commemoration of Himself, certainly that priest truly discharges the office of Christ, who imitates that which Christ did; and he then offers a true and full sacrifice in the Church to God the Father, when he proceeds to offer it according to what he sees Christ Himself to have offered. [ANF 5: 362, Epistle LXII, sect. XV]
These passages give us pretty clear picture of the Early Church’s belief that the Eucharist was truly and really a sacrifice to God. While it was viewed in this way, it is not to be construed that it was an addition to the sacrifice Christ made on Calvary. It was actually a part of the one sacrifice which Christ offers to the Heavenly Father.
Given these facts, it is odd that so many rail against Catholics who speak of the “holy sacrifice of the Mass.” This language is not outside the kind of language that the Early Church used. In fact it is much closer to the Early Church way of thinking than merely speaking of it as a “memorial meal.”
