My dearest children today you experience a great joy. That joy is that at Mass we behold Jesus present with us under the appearances of bread and wine. We know this to be Christ who is present with us Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity. Today you will receive Him for the very first time run the Most Holy Eucharist. This is truly a great joy.
For the rest us we should join with these children in experiencing such a joy. For we too behold the Lord present with us in the Most Holy Eucharist. We too have the opportunity to receive Him under the appearances of bread and wine if we so allow our life to be oriented unto His. This is truly a great joy for us as for these children.
In our Gospel the Lord makes known to us, “I am the vine, you are the branches. Whoever remains in me and I in him will bear much fruit, because without me you can do nothing.” Here we are being invited to enter into communion with Him. We must remember that our life should live untied to Him instead of lived independent from Him.
So often we are found willing to sacrifice attendance at Mass in favor of some worldly pursuit. So often we flock towards an event, but are content with pushing the Eucharist to the side. In other words we allow ourself to forget that Christ is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. That He invites us to enter into communion with Him and is truly present with us in the Eucharist.
It is the Second Vatican Council that proclaims that the Eucharist should be the source and summit of our life. Does our life revolve around Him or does it revolve around something else? Again, Christ is “the vine” and we “are the branches.” What would happen to a branch if it is removed from the tree? It will not continue to live. We are in need of Christ and we need to make Him a priority in our life.
This priority is not only for us, but is for the whole family. Parents bring your children to Mass. Teach them how to pray and how to enter into relationship with the Lord. If the home cannot be a refuge of prayer and faith what are we doing for our children (for their salvation, for our salvation)? As the Catechism speaks concerning prayer, “Prayer is the life of the new heart. It ought to animate us at every moment. But we tend to forget him who is our life and our all.”
We cannot forget Him who is our life and our all because He is the vine and we are the branches. Let us remain united to this vine always thus entering into deeper communion with Him. It is for this reason that we rejoice this evening with our children who will have the opportunity to receive the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of Christ for the first time.
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