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The bread and the wine not only signify the willing sacrifice of the Lord for the sins of the whole world, a perception shared with most Protestant churches, but they are considered signs of the covenant, in Hebrew, ''Otot haBrit''. Like the Signs of the Covenant in the Old Testament, they are primarily for the eyes of God.  This differs from the approach of the Protestant churches of the Baptist and Holiness traditions which understand the Lord's Supper to be merely "pedagogic", that is, a reminder to the people of what Christ has done for us on the cross, and a call for them to evaluate their lives in view of Christ's great sacrifice on the cross.  

The bread and the wine not only signify the willing sacrifice of the Lord for the sins of the whole world, a perception shared with most Protestant churches, but they are considered signs of the covenant, in Hebrew, ''Otot haBrit''. Like the Signs of the Covenant in the Old Testament, they are primarily for the eyes of God.  This differs from the approach of the Protestant churches of the Baptist and Holiness traditions which understand the Lord's Supper to be merely "pedagogic", that is, a reminder to the people of what Christ has done for us on the cross, and a call for them to evaluate their lives in view of Christ's great sacrifice on the cross.  

According to Catholic teaching, the people of the Lord are lifting up the signs of the Covenant to heaven itself. Heaven (God) looks down and sees the signs, sees the faith of the people that are under the sign, sees them taking refuge in what the signs represent, so that the people are found safe under the wings of God's grace and mercy. The signs of the New Covenant are thus analogous to the Old Covenant signs that God looked upon—the blood of the lamb at the first Passover which was placed by the people who believed, which was seen by the angel, and so the people were spared; the circumcision of the Israelites at eight days of age, which Moses neglected to do for his own son, and was spared only because of the faithful love and determination of his wife who did the job for him; and the rainbow in the skies, which, when God would look at, he would remember His promise to spare the earth from more destruction by water as in the days of Noah. These are all echoes of the Jewish "Remembrance" prayers from the time of Jesus and thus provide the setting for the celebration of the Eucharist.

According to Catholic teaching, the people of the Lord are lifting up the signs of the Covenant to heaven itself. [[Sign]]s are different from [[symbol]]s. A sign is a visible evidence of a present reality, as smoke is a sign of fire, while a symbol is merely a conventionalized representation of an idea, as a stop sign represents a law governing traffic regulation for safety. Heaven (God) looks down and sees the signs, sees the faith of the people that are under the sign, sees them taking refuge in what the signs represent, so that the people are found safe under the wings of God's grace and mercy. The signs of the New Covenant are thus analogous to the Old Covenant signs that God looked upon—the blood of the lamb at the first Passover which was placed by the people who believed, which was seen by the angel, and so the people were spared; the circumcision of the Israelites at eight days of age, which Moses neglected to do for his own son, and was spared only because of the faithful love and determination of his wife who did the job for him; and the rainbow in the skies, which, when God would look at, he would remember His promise to spare the earth from more destruction by water as in the days of Noah. These are all echoes of the Jewish "Remembrance" prayers from the time of Jesus and thus provide the setting for the celebration of the Eucharist.

Aside from the setting up of the sign of the New Covenant, there is the other of the two-fold understandings of what takes place at the Catholic Eucharist:

Aside from the setting up of the sign of the New Covenant, there is the other of the two-fold understandings of what takes place at the Catholic Eucharist: