Eucharist is the center
of our life as Catholics. This is the
Biblical Faith par excellence, as we can tell from the theme of God’s power to
feed us and nourish our life of Faith with an abundance of food – both earthly
and heavenly – that is present throughout the Scriptures. Catholics often misunderstand the simple fact
that our life of prayer and worship is more than Bible-based. It is the very place where our Bible came
into being.
The Bible is not a book
that came down from Heaven to guide the life of believers from the
outside. Rather, it is the Book of all
the Books that were acknowledged by the Church through use and through
preservation by a living use that continues down to this very day, ever since
the time of the Apostles. When the Church
wanted to establish the canonical list of Books in the Bible, she only had to
look at the individual churches throughout the world to discover what served to
build up the Faith, what was in correspondence to the lived “rule of Faith.” Similarly, the Eucharist and the other
Sacraments of our Faith are found in a living experience.
In the Gospel today, Jesus
shows us by His actions that He is the Bread of Life, the One Who feeds the
multitude. In our celebration of the
Eucharist, we meet the same Lord Jesus in Person in the Most Holy Sacrament of
the Altar. Our acknowledgment of this is
pure “Bible in action.” When we
recognize Jesus in the Eucharist, we find ourselves among those who are fed and
nourished by the One Who was to come into the world.
At Mass these past
several weeks, we have been expressing our Faith in the Real Presence of Jesus
in the Eucharist in a renewal of practices that are familiar, having our altar
servers kneel with the congregation for the Eucharistic Prayer and ring the
bells for the Epiclesis and the moment of adoration that follows the Consecration. It has been noted that there is a deeper
silence and a greater sense of reverence in response to these changes in our
recent custom.
All are reminded that the
proper way to acknowledge the Presence of the Lord in the tabernacle and when
the Monstrance is on the altar is to genuflect, that is to kneel on one knee –
the right knee – in front of Him. We do
this each time we cross in front of the sanctuary outside of the celebration of
the Mass.
Preparation for reception
of Holy Communion includes Confession if one is conscious of serious (mortal)
sins, fasting for at least an hour before the time of receiving, and a
disposition of heart and mind that “discerns the Body,” as St. Paul puts it. See I Corinthians 11:28ff for an invitation to
examine our conscience and to the consequences of an “unworthy Communion.” This is a very serious matter!
We can also prepare for
the reception of Eucharist at Mass by making a visit to Him outside of Mass,
either in the tabernacle or when the Host is placed in the monstrance on the
altar. At St. Timothy, we have an opportunity
for this every Wednesday from the 9 a.m. Mass until 6:30 p.m. Come to spend time in His Presence! The Good Shepherd is calling you by name.
May we open our hearts
to Jesus, our Eucharistic Lord, and make our Faith in this Sacrament known to
the world by everything we say and do.
The Lord feeds us so that we may nourish our brothers and sisters and so
that we may bring them to Him.
No comments:
Post a Comment