One of the false
statements made against Catholics over and over again is that Catholics do not
develop a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. I really can’t think of
anything more false or...whatever! Not only do we speak directly to the Lord in
our prayer life, the deepest treasure of our faith is our personal meeting with
Christ every time we receive the Holy Communion[1].
And it is precisely
to remind us of the value we place on this personal contact with the Lord that
the Church gives us this beautiful Feast of the Body and Blood of the Lord, Corpus Christi. When we receive the Holy
Communion, we receive the real presence
of Jesus Christ. This is our
treasure. There is nothing we value more in our spiritual lives than our
union with Christ in the Eucharist. It is in the Mass that we recreate the paschal mystery of the
Last Supper, Death and Resurrection of the Lord. Every Mass is a battle for the
Kingdom which we participate in through our determination to live the Eucharist
we receive, our determination to be Christ like.
And then, if we
are truly Eucharistic, we bring Him to others. For to the degree that we bring
the Presence of the Lord to others, to that degree we exercise our Catholic
identity. As simple as that, so when
priests, religious and you, laity, throughout the world care for the suffering,
when we reach out to the hurting people of our own society, then we are living
our Catholicism, we are living the Eucharist. We love Jesus so much that we
want to make His Presence a reality for others. The question at this point is how many people we invited to participate
in the Eucharist? How many people we
invited to Sunday Mass? Do we want to contaminate
others the love of Jesus in the Eucharist?
Today is a day
when Catholics throughout the world will follow the Eucharist in a procession. Our
procession today at the end of this mass will be a wonderful action. We will
follow the Eucharistic Presence, and at the same time our procession will means
standing up for the unpopular way of Jesus Christ.
My brother, my
sister, to receive the Eucharist is to live the Life of Jesus Christ. We enter
into the New Covenant with the Lord on a regular basis whenever we receive
communion. So, do we Catholics cultivate a personal relationship with the Lord?
Of course! Our personal relationship with Jesus Christ is real, living and
Eucharistic, however we can always
do more, and we can always grow in love for the Eucharist. My desire as pastor
of this community is that we are a very Eucharistic community, a community that
has its center here, near the altar, and then, with a heart full of Jesus,
helping others.
Let us continue
with the celebration of the Eucharist, and let us prepare our hearts, minds and
bodies for the procession at the end of the mass, but more than that let us
give thanks for the great gift of the Eucharist; we can borrow the beautiful
words of St. Thomas Aquinas: I do not see
the wounds as Thomas did, But I confess that you are my God. Make me believe
more and more in you, Hope in you, and love you[2] ■
[1] Sunday 10th
June, 2012, the Body and Blood of Christ. Readings: Exodus 24:3-8. I will
take the cup of salvation, and call on the name of the Lord—Ps 115(116):12-13,
15-18. Hebrews 9:11-15. Mark 14:12-16, 22-26.
[2] Hymn to the
Holy Eucharist, written by St. Thomas Aquinas. Unlike the other hymns by St.
Thomas, it was not originally composed for the feast of Corpus Christi. Until the liturgical revision after the Second
Vatican Council, it was among the optional prayers in the Missal and the
Breviary for recitation by the priest after Mass. There are some twenty-five
English translations, of which one popular version begins, "Lord and God,
devoutly you I now adore; Hidden under symbols, bread and wine no more."
You can find a good translation here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adoro_te_devote and the music
here: http://youtu.be/n0_vznxcNZ8
