What goes through your mind when you step up to receive communion and hear the words, “Body of Christ” or “Blood of Christ?” Do you take those words literally or do you think instead that piece of bread is only a symbol of Jesus’ body?
Today’s feast is meant to help us treasure the wonderful sacrament that Christ left us in the Eucharist as a reminder of the covenant we have entered into. St. John Paul II noted, “The Eucharist is the Church’s most precious possession in her journey through history.”
Until the reformation, Christians literally believed Jesus. “This is my body…this is my blood of the covenant, which will be shed for many.” They never presumed Jesus to be speaking symbolically. That is what now sets us apart from most other Christians. During the Protestant reformation in the 16th century many Christians began to question and then reject the mystery of the Eucharist as the Body and Blood of Christ. They accepted much of the Bible literally but this teaching of Jesus they found hard to swallow.
Like most Catholics, I have no qualms believing what Jesus said at the Last Supper. Granted, what was bread and wine when the Mass begins still looks and taste like bread and wine when we receive communion but they have become for us the real presence of Jesus Christ. We call this change transubstantiation.
Those who choose not to take Jesus’ words literally are putting limits on what God can do. If God can create all that exists from the smallest atom to the largest star out of nothing, I don’t doubt that God can change the substance of bread and wine into the body and blood of his Son. In his miracles, Jesus showed that he could change the substance of ordinary foods, like water into wine, which he did in Cana.
Many Catholics have lived and died for the Eucharist. I will never forget an incident from the life of Archbishop Oscar Romero of San Salvador, who was recently beatified. Under the threat of gunfire by soldiers standing by, he entered a church, which had been desecrated to remove the Blessed Sacrament. When a soldier began firing into the sanctuary, Archbishop Romero dropped to his knees to retrieve what hosts he had spilled rather than flee for his life.
When Catholics leave the Church and say, “Good-bye, I am going to another church where the music is better, the seats are more comfortable, the people are friendlier and the preaching is better,” I wonder how they can leave the real presence of Jesus in the Eucharist for anything less. I suppose that they don’t believe that Jesus is present in the Eucharist and maybe never did. If we are really grounded in the truth of the Eucharist, then we believe that we are blessed to have the Lord literally and physically present to us whenever we receive communion in a state of grace.
The Church has always taught that when we commit a grave sin, we need to go to confession before we can again savor the graces of this awesome sacrament. Otherwise, we won’t experience all that the Eucharist can offer us. That may be one reason why some Catholics feel nothing when they take communion. Unless we repent when we must, communion cannot provide an intimate sharing of the presence of Christ.
When asked, “Why did you return to the Catholic Church?” the most common answer I hear is, “I couldn’t stay away from the Eucharist; I missed receiving Jesus in Holy Communion.” They recognized that even if the worship was similar in other churches, the real presence of Jesus was missing. The power to transform the gifts of bread and wine into the body and blood of Jesus Christ has been passed on unbroken from apostolic times by bishops to their priests.
Granted, it takes an incredible faith to believe that Jesus is truly present in the Holy Eucharist. This faith is God’s gift to us, which we are invited to freely and fully embrace. Only faith can help anyone believe that Jesus is truly present in the consecrated bread and wine that is offered to us.
Do you value the opportunity to receive Holy Communion and feel that Jesus is coming into your heart? Or have you grown casual and less reverent about receiving Eucharist? What goes through your mind as you receive communion or after you return to your seat? Are you in awe of this divine encounter and using this quiet time to “dialogue” with Jesus or are you instead fumbling through the bulletin or gazing around the church waiting for Mass to end? Your answer to these questions reveals what the Mass means to you.
Some Catholics think of attending Mass only as fulfilling a legal requirement, which it does, but I urge you to think beyond that and see the Mass also as an expression of love between Christ and you. The Eucharist is the source and summit of our faith. It is God’s special gift of himself to us so that we can be spiritually nourished. St. Augustine says that God can give us no greater gift of himself.
Today’s Collect states that one of the fruits of the Eucharist is to feel within us the fruit of Christ’s redemption. We don’t receive communion as a participation badge or reward. We receive communion because we wish to be redeemed from our sins and live within Christ’s kingdom. When we receive communion we reaffirm our Covenant with God to live the message of the gospel, which is summed up in our parish mission statement: to love, teach, pray and serve.