More thoughts on the Eucharist

 

Third Week of Easter

John 6:52–59

Friends, in today’s Gospel, Jesus declares that “unless you eat the Flesh of the Son of Man and drink his Blood, you do not have life within you.” The talk that Jesus gave concerning the sacrament of his body and blood was quite literally revolting. It is a rather remarkable understatement when John writes, “The Jews quarreled among themselves, saying, ‘How can this man give us his Flesh to eat?’” So what does Jesus do when confronted with this objection? One would think that he would offer a metaphorical or symbolic interpretation of his words. Instead, he intensifies what he had said. How do we appropriate this shocking talk? We honor these unnerving words of Jesus, resisting all attempts to explain them away. We affirm the doctrine of “real presence.” Vatican II re-expressed the traditional Catholic belief when it taught that, though Jesus is present to us in any number of ways—in the proclamation of the Gospel, in the gathering of two or three in his name, in the poor and suffering—he is nevertheless present in a qualitatively different way in the Eucharist.  Bishop Robert Barron

Thoughts on the Eucharist

 

Third Sunday of Easter

Luke 24:13–35

Friends, in today’s Gospel, Jesus joins two disciples on the road to Emmaus, but they do not recognize him. In the course of their conversation, he opens the Scriptures to them, disclosing the great biblical patterns that make sense of the “things” they have witnessed. The interpretive key is none other than his own suffering and death, his willingness to go to the limits of godforsakenness in order to save those who had wandered from the divine love.           And through this process they begin to understand the Bible in its totality, and their hearts burn within them. The two disciples press him to stay with them as they draw near the town of Emmaus. Jesus sits down with them, takes bread, says the blessing, breaks it, and gives it to them—and in that moment they recognize him.          The ultimate means by which we understand Jesus Christ is not the Scriptures but the Eucharist, for the Eucharist is Christ himself, personally and actively present. The embodiment of the paschal mystery, the Eucharist is Jesus’s love for the world unto death, his journey into godforsakenness in order to save the most desperate of sinners, his heart broken open in compassion. Bishop Robert Barron

Thoughts on water

 

Second Week of Easter

John 6:16–21

Friends, in today’s Gospel, Jesus demonstrates his authority over nature by walking on the sea. Water is, throughout the Scriptures, a symbol of danger and chaos. At the very beginning of time, when all was a formless waste, the Spirit of the Lord hovered over the surface of the waters. This signals God’s lordship over all of the powers of darkness and disorder. In the Old Testament, the Israelites are escaping from Egypt, and they confront the waters of the Red Sea. Through the prayer of Moses, they are able to walk through the midst of the waves.  Now in the New Testament, this same symbolism can be found. In all four of the Gospels, there is a version of this story of Jesus mastering the waves. The boat, with Peter and the other disciples, is evocative of the Church, the followers of Jesus. It moves through the waters as the Church will move through time. All types of storms—chaos, corruption, stupidity, danger, persecution—will inevitably arise. But Jesus comes walking on the sea. This is meant to affirm his divinity: Just as the Spirit of God hovered over the waters at the beginning, so Jesus hovers over them now.  Bishop Robert Barron

Thoughts on reading

 

           Years ago an older priest friend of mine taught me an important lesson about reading. Father Austin Garvey, for many years the pastor of St. Patrick’s Church, Soho Square, London, was a  constant, avid reader, who devoured books. However, they were frequently the same books. At first, I thought this rather odd, but upon rereading favorites, I have become a firm believer in the practice. Every year Father Garvey reread most of Dickens and P.G. Wodehouse; every year he reread all of Raymond Chandler. He also read new books, but more often went back to what he knew and what he loved, having an encyclopedic knowledge of his favorites.

           Maybe you do more rereading than new reading, returning to favorite stories you are drawn to again and again.  Perhaps you tell favorite anecdotes again and again. Maybe you watch favorite movies over and over.

           Our Church has a number of wonderful stories preserved in the Sacred Scriptures that we also return to again and again: the infancy narratives of Christ’s birth, the parables of the Prodigal Son and the Lost Sheep, the post-Resurrection appearance on the Road to Emmaus.

           The story of the Road to Emmaus is, perhaps, the best loved Resurrection appearance. It’s a good story: engaging, well structured, clearly thematic, inspiring. Because of its narrative perfection, some scholars have called it the “greatest short story ever told.”  We can relate to it. We become part of it because we, like those two disciples, are frequently blind to God in our world, concerned mainly with our own worries.

           At every Mass we can enter that story in a special way. What happened to those two disciples, happens to us:

• We hear the Scriptures, which are usually explained in the homily.

           [Of course, during some sermons our hearts do not burn within us!]

• We break the bread. We celebrate the Eucharist.
• We realize the presence of the Lord.

           The Road to Emmaus is the road to “meeting Christ at Mass,” and like the disciples, recognizing Him in the Breaking of Bread. So, whatever the name of the road in front of our parish church, the street is meant to be our Road to Emmaus that has brought us to meet Jesus Christ. That street can also become our address: we live on the Road to Emmaus if we hear the Scriptures, take them to heart, and receive the Most Holy Sacrament, in which Our Lord is truly present. Perhaps even our hearts will then burn within us as we realize His presence.

           Many of us may have favorite stories we enjoy returning to again and again.

But may we not simply reread that last chapter of Luke’s Gospel. Rather, may pray for the grace to live the best story of all: frequently meeting Christ at Mass; frequently recognizing Him on our Road to Emmaus.

Fr. Don Saunders, SJ

Thoughts on eternal life

 

Second Week of Easter

John 3:31–36

Friends, today’s Gospel promises eternal life to those who believe in the Son of God. In almost every religion, the life of faith has something to do with a creature’s relationship to the Creator; nearly all religions speak of the creature’s dependency upon God, of his subjection to the divine providence, and of his need for grace and forgiveness. Christianity, too, articulates these basic relationships, but it pushes beyond them because it speaks of the incarnation and the gifts associated with it. We hear in the third chapter of John’s Gospel that “God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life.” This well-known verse summarizes the Christian faith and gives expression to its distinctiveness, for it speaks of the possibility that a creature might share in God’s own life.  The purpose of the sending of the Son was to gather the human race into the divine life—the rhythm of the Trinitarian love—so that we might relate to God not merely as creatures but as friends. You see, love becomes complete only when there is another who can receive fully what the lover wants to give. Bishop Robert Barron

Thoughts on Devine Mercy Sunday

 

Whoever lived through the twentieth century would have witnessed World War I and World War II, the Great Depression, the Cold War, the rise of communism, the decline of faith, the legalization of abortion, numerous genocides, and a host of other tragedies.  It thus stands as one of the darkest centuries in all of human history.  We should not be surprised then to hear that Heaven did not leave us without guidance or hope. In 1917, Our Lady appeared to the visionaries in Fatima.  She warned them of the impending travesties which would take place if the world did not repent and take refuge in her Immaculate Heart.  In this way, she gave us the warning, the cure of praying the Rosary and faithfully undertaking penances, and promised the triumph of her Immaculate Heart and Christ’s Sacred Heart. Additionally, in the first half of the same century, our Lord Jesus Christ appeared numerous times to St. Faustina Kowalska.

Throughout these visions, our Lord graced her with the Chaplet of Divine Mercy and the Divine Mercy image.  Christ knew that the world would be in desperate need of His mercy, and rather than leaving us to despair, He gave us the unshakeable promise of His love. If we heed Our Lady’s advice and turn to the Lord through prayer and penance, if we die to ourselves, then we may also enjoy the glory and victory of Christ’s resurrection.  It is by being washed in the blood of Our Savior which He so generously poured out for us that we can be cleansed from the sin and disorder which plagues our hearts and this world.  He is our only hope, but He is a most sure and beautiful hope! For this reason, the Church has decided that we should end the Octave of Easter today by joyfully celebrating Divine Mercy.  Let us then hopefully join our hearts in this prayer: “Eternal God, in whom mercy is endless and the treasury of compassion — inexhaustible, look kindly upon us and increase Your mercy in us, that in difficult moments we might not despair nor become despondent, but with great confidence submit ourselves to Your holy will, which is Love and Mercy itself. Amen.” In the Hearts of Jesus and Mary, Christopher P. Wendt International Director Confraternity of Our Lady of Fatima

More thoughts on Doubting Thomas

 

Second Sunday of Easter (Divine Mercy Sunday)

John 20:19–31

Friends, in today’s Gospel, Thomas says that he will not believe in the Lord’s resurrection unless he puts his finger in Jesus’s nailmarks and his hand in Jesus’s side. Thomas is a saint especially suitable for our time. Modernity has been marked by two great qualities: skepticism and empiricism, the very qualities we can discern in Thomas. And when the risen Jesus reappears, he invites the doubter to look, see, and touch. But then that devastating line: “Have you come to believe because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed.” If we stubbornly said—even in the area of science—that we will accept only what we can clearly see and touch and control, we wouldn’t know much about reality. This helps us to better understand Jesus’s words to Thomas. It is not that we who have not seen and have believed are settling for a poor substitute for vision. No; we are being described as blessed, more blessed than Thomas. God is doing all sorts of things that we cannot see, measure, control, fully understand. But it is an informed faith that allows one to fall in love with such a God. Bishop Robert Barron