A Catholic tradition is to feast on lamb on Easter Sunday. Every year, on Holy Saturday, we buy a lamb in Rome and bring it to our parish in Rome ( www.fsspinurbe.blogspot.com ). Our chaplain then blesses the lamb and our other food stuffs from the Roman Ritual with the Easter Blessings of Food.
The Easter blessings of food owe their origin to the fact that these particular foods, namely, fleshmeat and milk products, including eggs, were forbidden in the Middle Ages during the Lenten fast and abstinence. When the feast of Easter brought the rigorous fast to an end, and these foods were again allowed at table, the people showed their joy and gratitude by first taking the food to church for a blessing. Moreover, they hoped that the Church's blessing on such edibles would prove a remedy for whatever harmful effects the body might have suffered from the long period of self-denial. Today the Easter blessings of food are still held in many churches in the U. S., especially in those of the Slavic peoples.
A. Blessing of Lamb
P: Our help is in the name of the Lord.All: Who made heaven and earth.P: The Lord be with you.All: May He also be with you.
Let us pray.
God, who by your servant Moses commanded your people in their deliverance from Egypt to kill a lamb as a type of our Lord Jesus Christ, and prescribed that its blood be used to sign the two door-posts of their homes; may it please you to bless + and sanctify + this creature-flesh which we, your servants, desire to eat in praise of you. We ask this in virtue of the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ, who lives and reigns with you forever and ever.
All: Amen.
It is sprinkled with holy water.
The Easter blessings of food owe their origin to the fact that these particular foods, namely, fleshmeat and milk products, including eggs, were forbidden in the Middle Ages during the Lenten fast and abstinence. When the feast of Easter brought the rigorous fast to an end, and these foods were again allowed at table, the people showed their joy and gratitude by first taking the food to church for a blessing. Moreover, they hoped that the Church's blessing on such edibles would prove a remedy for whatever harmful effects the body might have suffered from the long period of self-denial. Today the Easter blessings of food are still held in many churches in the U. S., especially in those of the Slavic peoples.
A. Blessing of Lamb
P: Our help is in the name of the Lord.All: Who made heaven and earth.P: The Lord be with you.All: May He also be with you.
Let us pray.
God, who by your servant Moses commanded your people in their deliverance from Egypt to kill a lamb as a type of our Lord Jesus Christ, and prescribed that its blood be used to sign the two door-posts of their homes; may it please you to bless + and sanctify + this creature-flesh which we, your servants, desire to eat in praise of you. We ask this in virtue of the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ, who lives and reigns with you forever and ever.
All: Amen.
It is sprinkled with holy water.
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