神師撰文 Reflections > 黃昌雄執事 >

The Gifts:  Bread, Wine and Collection

The Gifts:  Bread, Wine and Collection

by Deacon Danny Wong

 

Many of us don't really know the hidden meaning of the Offering of the Gifts.  Here is the good explanation from the website of Frank O’Dea SSS at https://theeucharist.wordpress.com.

The gifts, bread and wine, are brought to the altar in procession preferably accompanied by a sacred hymn or song. It is the best if those who will receive communion during the mass take the bread and wine as an offering and part of the procession.

The gifts of bread and wine are brought from the far end of the church through the assembly to indicate these are gifts from the people. Most importantly, this indicates the people are making a gift of themselves to be transformed with the bread and wine. The meaning might not be well known to Catholics because of the subtleness of the message.  There could be improvements made to emphasize the importance of such procession, that the people are making a gift of themselves just as Christ gifted himself to the Father. Pope Benedict XVI takes this idea even further:


This humble and simple gesture is actually very significant: in the bread and wine that we bring to the altar, all creation is taken up by Christ the Redeemer to be transformed and presented to the Father. (Sacramentum Caritatis, 47, 2007)

The donation that is collected is often offered up at the same time to the altar.  Money collected and offered is used to assist the poor, to provide the upkeep of the local clergy and pay for the costs of parish infrastructure maintenance.  The bringing of gifts from the assembly – for the sake of the poor, for the use of the community, and for the sacramental table – is an important ritual and symbolic part of Christian gathering (David N. Power, Eucharistic Justice in Theological Studies, December 2006, Vol. 67, No.4, p.866).