On the evening of his arrest Jesus had a meal with His disciples. During it He took bread and gave thanks, then He broke it and handed it to them. As He did so, He identified himself with the broken bread: “This is my body, which is for you.” Later He took a cup and again identified Himself with the wine, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood.” And then He urged the disciples to do again what He had done in remembrance of Him (1 Cor xi, 23-25). To break bread and share the cup were familiar actions, but to identify Himself with the bread and wine must have been bewildering.

We know what happened next. After the meal they went to the garden called Gethsemane and there Jesus was arrested and taken into custody. Within hours He had been tortured and condemned to die, led out and crucified. His ministry lay in ruins. His followers fled. The men closest to Him were terrified and gathered together behind locked doors.

Then on the third day, Mary Magdalene and some other women went to His tomb to anoint His body, only to find that the tomb was empty. The different gospels relate what happened in different ways, but in brief the women then brought to the disciples the news that Jesus had been raised from the dead. After that, for a privileged period of time, those disciples saw Him, not resuscitated, with a second death still to endure, but having passed through death, beyond death, to new life. They were able to enjoy His presence. But that privileged time did not last. Perhaps it was no more than a single day (Luke xxiv, 51), or perhaps it went on even for 40 days (Acts i, 3,8). Then that experience of his presence with them came to an end.

Shortly afterwards, however, on the day of Pentecost, when the disciples were gathered together, something else happened, experienced as wind and fire and the gift of tongues. The disciples were said to be “filled with the Holy Spirit” (Acts ii, 1-4). And filled with that Spirit, their own ministry began. They went out to bear witness to what they believed: that Jesus who had proclaimed God’s saving love and preached repentance, and had been crucified, had also been raised to new life. And they invited those who heard them to share their belief.

The Spirit who inspired the disciples is not simply to be identified with Jesus. It was not the Spirit who was crucified. But this Spirit is nonetheless the Spirit of Jesus. The Spirit did not come down on the disciples as a kind of substitute because Jesus was absent, but rather to make Him present in a new way. Jesus, who had been present to them in a privileged way after He had been raised, was present still through the Holy Spirit.

The presence of Jesus at His rising from the dead and through the Spirit which Christians have been celebrating in recent weeks, is also celebrated as an abiding presence in these days at the feast of Corpus Christi, the feast of the Lord’s body and blood, which recalls that last supper in the upper room. We celebrate Eucharist throughout the year; we commemorate its institution on Maundy Thursday; but at this feast in particular we recall that in this sacrament the Lord is still really present with us.

Different Christian traditions may understand that presence in different ways. In the past controversy has sometimes been intense; but very few, when they celebrate, believe that really the Lord is absent. It may be enough for now to recall that Jesus identified the broken bread with His body which was to suffer for us, and the wine with His blood which was to be shed for us, and that He invited the disciples to eat and drink, to break bread and share the cup in remembrance of Him. We need not be so bewildered.

It is good to give presents, a tie or a bracelet, but food is a gift of a different kind. When we share food, we give life. When we eat this bread and drink this cup, we share Christ’s life. In the Eucharist He feeds and sustains us.

Monsignor Roderick Strange is Rector of the Pontifical Beda College, Rome