Why did Christ say, “Do this in remembrance ( _anamnesis_ ) of Me” (Luke 22:19)?

St. Ephrem the Syrian says (quoting Christ): “I call it My Body, and it is truly so. The smallest part of It is capable of sanctifying thousands of souls, sufficient to grant life to those who partake of it.”¹⁵²⁷

The word ἀνάμνησις ( anamnēsis ) in Greek is not just a memorial or remembering something from the past that is absent from us now. Rather, it means repeating the event or the past action affecting the present in a very real sense. Anamnesis means recalling the crucified Christ who rose from the dead, or recalling His sacrifice not as a past event, but by offering a true and living sacrifice; an active remembrance.¹⁵²⁸

1524 Cf. Catena Aurea.

1525 St. John Chrysostom, Homilies on the First Epistle of St. Paul the Apostle to the Corinthians 27.5 (NPNF I/12:161) amended.

1526 St. John Chrysostom, Homilies on the First Epistle of St. Paul the Apostle to the Corinthians 24.3 (NPNF I/12:139).

1527 St. Jacob of Sarug, Memre 4 on the Passion .

1528 Jean Daniélou, The Bible and the Liturgy (Darton, Longman & Todd, 1956): pp. 136–137. Fr. Dix Gives many examples from the Old and New Testaments; see Dom Gregory Dix, The Shape of the Liturgy (Bloomsbury, 2005): p. 161.