"Amen, amen, I say to you unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life within you." These words found within our Gospel tell us nothing about the Eucharist being a mere symbol, but instead they point towards the reality that the Eucharist is truly the Body and the Blood of Christ. What is contained in the bread and the wine through the words of institution that are given by the priest is truly Christ's Body and Blood. The Eucharist should become the central point of our life because through our reception of such a wondrous gift we are able to usher the presence of Christ into our life. From the words of the Second Vatican Council: "The Eucharist is the source and the summit of our faith." These words display the importance that the Eucharist should play in our life. The Eucharist should not just be important momentarily while we are in this Church, but instead the Eucharist should be held in high importance each and every single day of our life.
One thing that you will see within the Catholic Church is devotion to the Most Holy Eucharist. You will not see this same devotion be given in Ecclesial communities of other faith traditions because they do not hold the same teaching on the Eucharist that we do. We instead agree with the words that Christ gives to us within the scriptures and we join them to the tradition of the early Church which has always seen the Eucharist as truly being the Body and Blood of Christ. Because the Church understands what we receive not to be only bread and wine, but instead the Body and Blood of Christ traditions of devotion have grown out of the reception of the Eucharist. We have the practice of Eucharistic Adoration because it gives one the opportunity to spend time with Christ in a most intimate way. Today, for example, we will have a Eucharistic Procession which will be made in order to draw attention to Christ who is truly present in the Eucharist and to usher this same devotion to Him into the world.
What is found within the Eucharist is truly the most beautiful thing that we can ever encounter. If we can rediscover the beauty that is found within the Eucharist, we will not run away from it, but instead we will be drawn towards it. Our world is drawn towards beauty, but the beauty that it finds is often empty and without meaning. We place so much stock in how someone or something looks and we are led to believe that this is the beauty that we are in search of. People spend so much time being concerned about makeup, cologne, perfume, or the choice clothing that they are led to believe that things such as these signal to us the reality of true beauty. Therefore when we look at others or ourself we are led to believe that we are beholding what is beauty. In actuality beauty is contained within the Eucharist! Within the Eucharist we join with Moses and those who were gathered in the desert to behold the beauty of the manna that came down from Heaven in order to feed our hunger.
The Eucharist is truly the meaning of beauty because this is not mere bread which will pass away, but instead it is truly God made flesh. What we will receive here, if worthy, will be most beautiful because it will be Christ's Body and Blood. In the Eucharist we find beauty because here we will find God Himself who became flesh and died upon the cross in atonement for our sins. Beauty is not a mere decoration that we can receive or put on, but instead beauty is a reflection of God. If we desire to truly become beautiful, and thus a reflection of God, we would model our life around this most beautiful of sacraments. Our soul desires to discover beauty because it desires to discover God. In the Eucharist we have the ability to discover God in a most intimate way and the challenge to depart from here to continue to model our life around this most intimate encounter. So much out there attempts to sell us upon a false sense of beauty, but with the Eucharist we are given a true glimpse into what beauty really is.
When we receive the Eucharist this day we are inviting the beauty of God to enter into our life. Hopefully we do only allow the beauty of God to enter into our life for a mere moment, but may we allow God to continue to dwell with us always. We take so much time to pattern our life after our wants and our desires, but often forget to place the Eucharist at this place of prominence. May we truly foster in our homes Eucharistic devotion allowing our home to become a manifestation of God' s great beauty. At the conclusion of this Mass we will be told to "go in peace" not that we are now given the chance to leave and forget what we have received. Instead we are to go in peace to enter into the world, as we will do with our Eucharistic Procession, to bring the beauty of Christ that we have received into the world. We can only bring this beauty into the world if we make the Eucharist a priority in our life, and thus model ourselves after the beauty that is found within the Eucharist, because the Eucharist is truly a reflection of God's great love for each of us.
No comments:
Post a Comment