April 27, 2008
Posted in Homilies
at 9:00 am
Homily for the Sixth Sunday of Easter
April 27, 2008
We all love Jesus, don’t we? So, we all keep His commandments, all the time, right? I wouldn’t presume to speak for anyone else, but personally, I occasionally fall a little short of this target.
When we think of the commandments, what first comes to mind for many of us? Thou shalt not… For example – Thou shalt not kill, thou shalt not commit adultery, thou shalt not steal, thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour. And certainly these and the rest of the Ten Commandments are very important. But how did Jesus answer when asked which is the great commandment? “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, this is the great and first commandment. And the second is like it, you shall love your neighbour as yourself”. If we follow these two commands, we will naturally follow the Ten Commandments.
There is a connection between our behaviour and our relationship with Christ. As Catholics, as Christians, we are called to live up to a certain standard. It should be our love of Christ that motivates us to attempt to attain this standard.
Sometimes, when a loved one asks us to do something, we may reply, somewhat jokingly, “your wish is my command!”. But behind the humour is the idea that we are happy to do as the person asks because we love them. So it is with Christ’s commands; ideally, we obey them out of love for God, rather than due to fear of punishment.
Our love for God is not something that we turn on and turn off when it suits us. We are Catholics and Christians 24 hours a day, seven days a week. This means that no matter what activity we are engaged in, we should always keep in mind God’s will for us.
In the Gospel, Jesus outlines a natural progression of events: our love for Jesus leads to faithful obedience; faithful obedience leads to Jesus’ asking the Father to send another Advocate. The sending and presence of this Advocate, the Spirit, is directly related to the love we have for Jesus, and our striving to obey Him.
Jesus refers to the Spirit as “the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive”. In certain parts of our culture, the truth cannot be received, or cannot be understood, for the same reason Jesus gave: it neither sees Him nor knows Him.
But…we do! And, as Jesus promised, He has not left us orphaned. He is still with us, present in the Church, present when we gather, present in His Word, and truly present alive in the Eucharist.
Now, let’s look at the first presence I mentioned, the Church. In today’s first reading, we are told that Philip went to Samaria and taught them about the Messiah, and that they received this teaching with great joy. The Church still teaches on many levels, in many ways, one of the most important being our Catholic schools. As we begin to celebrate Catholic Education Week, we need to recognize the role of our schools in forming our children in the faith. Someone will be speaking more about Catholic Education at the end of Mass. Pope Benedict, during his recent visit to the US, met with a group of Catholic Educators. In his speech to them, he had this to say:
Education is integral to the mission of the Church to proclaim the Good News. First and foremost every Catholic educational institution is a place to encounter the living God who in Jesus Christ reveals his transforming love and truth. This relationship elicits a desire to grow in the knowledge and understanding of Christ and his teaching. In this way those who meet him are drawn by the very power of the Gospel to lead a new life characterized by all that is beautiful, good, and true; a life of Christian witness nurtured and strengthened within the community of our Lord’s disciples, the Church.
Of course, the family is the primary place for our children’s faith to be nourished. Parents who practice the faith, and demonstrate their love of God in their actions throughout the day, give their children a solid foundation on which to build their lives. Then, our Catholic schools can provide an atmosphere in which the student’s daily life continues to be infused with the principles of our faith. If passing on our faith to our children is important, then Catholic education is a crucial element in that process.
It is up to all of us to make an effort to learn as much as we can about Christ, to get to know Him better – how can we love someone we don’t know very well? But remember, He already knows and loves us. “Christ does not begin to love His people when they begin to love and obey Him; their love and obedience to Him spring from His love for them, which was from everlasting”. When we live according to His commands, we ourselves witness to the fact that in His love, Jesus has not left us orphans, that we are in Him and He is in us.
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April 20, 2008
Posted in Homilies
at 9:00 am
Fifth Sunday of Easter, Year A, April 20th, 2008
Children, you are receiving two sacraments today: Confirmation and First Communion. Of the three persons in God, the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, we normally associate Confirmation with which person? (The Holy Spirit). And Holy Communion with which Person? ( Jesus). In both sacraments, God the Father is reaching out to embrace you with the two arms of the Son and the Holy Spirit, to draw you into his heart, into the family of love that is called the Holy Trinity.
We have here hidden behind this veil the person who is going to give the homily today. Yes, I will speak but he will give the homily because I will quote from him. Who is it? I will give you a hint. Right now (Saturday 4:30 he is meeting with young Catholics at a seminary in Yonkers, NY; 9:30 a.m. Sunday he is visiting Ground Zero and at 2:30 a Mass at Yankee Stadium). The Pope, right!
Our Pope is like a loving father (or grandfather) who is also a very good teacher. He wants to remind all Catholics and the whole world that “God is love” (the title of his first encyclical), and that the essence of Christianity is not law, but a relationship of love with the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
Listen to what he said about the meaning of worshiping God. I will give you three statements, a, b, and c, and ask you to guess which one is a quote from our Pope:
a) Worship means coming to Mass and saying all the prayers out loud
b) Worship means obeying the laws of the Church
c) “Worship . . . means that I am truly myself only when I form relationships” (God and the World, p. 111)
Which one do you think our Pope said – a, b, or c? (C, but it also includes a and b)
I quote him now from Columbia magazine (the April 2008 edition is the best introduction to the life and thought of our Pope that I have seen): “Christianity is more than and different from a moral code, from a series of requirements and laws . . . it is the gift of a friendship that lasts through life and death” (“Embracing the Whole World in Love” by John L. Allen Jr. in Columbia, April 2008, p. 8-9).
Jesus called his disciples “friends,” and God himself is a relationship of love between the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. In calling us to worship, he wants to embrace us and draw us into his heart, his life! God created us in his image to live in relationships of love, especially in the family. No one is an island. No one can live alone in his room, worshiping in front of the TV or computer day and night, and never come out! What’s he going to do when he gets hungry? Eat his own hand? You can’t eat your hand! We need food and life and love that comes to us from the outside, from God and others. No one can be fully human without relationships with other human beings, and with God (in part, through worship).
The center of Jesus whole life was his relationship with God, his Father and our Father. In today’s Gospel he says, “I am going to the Father,” (Jn 14:12) and he invites all of us, saying “Come worship the Father in spirit and in truth” (Jn 4:23).“Come to the Father” (“Offer yourself with me to the Father” Cantalamessa , Eucharist, p. 25). And for all those times we are afraid of giving our lives to God, and we lack trust in him, Jesus reminds us, “The Father himself loves you” (Jn 16:27); so “trust in God (the Father), and trust also in me” (Jn 14:1)
Children, may I ask you a question: do you trust in your parents? Of course you do. Now, let me get a good look at you . . . hmm . . . OK, I’m satisfied . . . none of you are starving. In El Salvador I have seen many starving children, not because their parents don’t love them, but simply because their parents are too poor to feed them. So your father and mother must be feeding you, right?
Elsewhere in the Gospel, Jesus asks parents, “which one of you would give your child a stone when he asks for bread, or a snake when he asks for a fish?” (Mt 7:9-10) Parents give you bread and fish (or hamburgers and hotdogs) because they love you. If parents feed you bread that perishes, giving life to your bodies for a short while, how much more will God our heavenly Father give to you, his children, bread that endures for eternal life (Jn 6:27), the bread come down from heaven, the Body and Blood of his Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, whom we receive in Holy Communion.
A few words about Confirmation. We heard in the first reading how the apostles “prayed and laid their hands” on the men chosen to be deacons. This gesture of the laying on of hands is an ancient symbol of passing on the Holy Spirit. The apostles had the authority to give the Holy Spirit to others, and so do their successors, like our Holy Father, Pope Benedict, who is a successor of St. Peter, the first Pope, and all bishops, who are also successors of the apostles. (For Confirmation, our bishop has given authority to the priests to confirm the children).
In Confirmation, we lay hands on you by stretching out our hands over you while asking for the coming of the Holy Spirit; then we anoint you will the oil of chrism blessed by Archbishop Prendergast at the Chrism Mass. In Confirmation, which you receive only once, the Holy Spirit changes your soul forever.
In Holy Communion, the Father gives us his Son Jesus, but also the Holy Spirit. Remember the apostles laid on hands as a sign of the coming of the Spirit. Notice at Mass how the priest (or bishop or Pope) sort of “lays on hands” over the gifts of bread and wine, so that the Holy Spirit will come upon them, making them the Body and Blood of Christ, which contains the Holy Spirit, so that when you eat the Body of Christ with faith, knowing you are receiving a Person and not a thing, then the Holy Spirit is released in you, like a sunburst of life and love. As one of the saints put it, when you eat this bread with faith, you eat Fire and Spirit (St. Ephrem in The Eucharist: God’s Gift for the Life of the World, p. 26).
Since this is your first Holy Communion, I thought I would share with you what our Pope has written about receiving Holy Communion. He reminds us that everyone who receives Communion must first worship Jesus who is truly present in the Host, in the Communion wafer which is his Body and Blood. We worship Jesus while we are kneeling at Mass when the priest says, “This is my Body” and lifts up the host for all to see.
For hundreds of years, Catholics used to show their faith in Jesus’ real presence by kneeling at the altar rail and receiving Communion on their tongue, which some people still do. Our Pope teaches that even when we receive Holy Communion in the hand, it can be a real act of worship. Quoting one of the Church Fathers, he writes, “ (those who receive communion) should make a throne of their hands, laying (one hand upon the other) to form a throne for the King, forming at the same time a cross.” A cross and a throne, down into which Jesus the King inclines himself. (God is Near Us, p. 70). So it is important – and I say this to everyone here – not to receive the host casually, with one hand, nor to grab the host like this (fingers of both hands closing in on host) – because then it seems as if you are somehow stealing God rather than humbly receiving him.
Pope Benedict also says that “the open, outstretched hand can thus become a sign of the way that a man offers himself to the Lord” (70). Isn’t that interesting? In each Mass we offer our lives to God first of all by attending Mass, then by actually praying while we are here, then through the offering of our gifts – money and bread and wine that are signs of the offering of our lives. The Pope adds that our open hands at Communion are also a sign that we are offering ourselves to God. It reminds us of what the first Pope, St. Peter, wrote in the second reading: that all Christians are a “holy priesthood” meant “to offer spiritual sacrifices to God through Jesus Christ” (1 Pet 2:5). “Through him, with him, in him, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, I offer my life to you, almighty Father.”
Our Pope is in NYC right now. Some people were hoping that he was also going to come to Canada in June for the International Eucharistic Congress in Quebec City. But he’s 81 years old (he just celebrated his birthday on April 16th). Give the guy a break! He’s also going to World Youth Day half-way around the world in July. So he can’t come to the International Eucharistic Congress, and neither can most of you, though I hope some of you will. But if you can’t come to the Eucharistic Congress, you can still come the Eucharist every Sunday, to truly be yourself – the person God created you to be – by entering a relationship with God through worship, and to respond to this gift of a friendship that lasts through life and death.
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April 13, 2008
Posted in Homilies
at 9:00 am
Fourth Sunday of Easter (Vocations Sunday), Year A, April 13th, 2008
Once upon a time (the fall of 1993 to be exact), there was a lost sheep wandering through the market of downtown Ottawa, from one “watering hole” to another, looking for love in all the wrong places. He knew about Jesus the Good and Beautiful Shepherd, but certainly didn’t follow him or listen to his voice! He also knew about the Catholic Church – Notre Dame Cathedral was a good place to park for free on a Friday or Saturday night when he went out drinking with his friends.
But little did he know that the woman to whom the Cathedral was dedicated – Our Lady – Mary, the Mother of God, was praying for him (most likely with tears), or that across the river at the convent of the Servants of Jesus and Mary, contemplative sisters were praying for the likes of him, along with Catholics in every parish in the diocese. Nor did he ever imagine that 9 years later, after having converted to Catholicism, that he would be ordained a Catholic priest in the same Cathedral, a lost sheep turned into a shepherd, and later sent to the remote lowlands of eastern Ontario to a village called Russell. “Russell, where’s that?”
The moral of the story? Prayers for vocations work – I am living proof! Continue to pray, pray, pray that Jesus the Good and Beautiful Shepherd will raise up many shepherds after his own heart to serve the people of Ottawa. (By the way, the diocese has been requesting that each parish include a prayer for vocations in our general intercessions every week. I think it’s a good idea.)
Jesus is calling men to the priesthood in Canada, in Ottawa, in our parish.
We hear in today’s Gospel that “he calls his own sheep by name . . . and (they) follow him because they know his voice” (Jn 10:3-4). These words apply generally to all Christians but also to those with a specific call within the Church. Jesus is calling, but is anyone listening?
Back in 1993 I wasn’t listening to Jesus because I was not a Catholic nor a practicing Christian. Perhaps the young men of our culture, diocese and parish may first need a deeper conversion to listen to Jesus – like those 3000 people in the first reading who were “cut to the heart” by the words of Peter, so they repented of their sins, received the Holy Spirit and “saved themselves from this corrupt generation” (Acts 2:37-40).
Yes, before young men can hear the voice of the Good and Beautiful Shepherd calling them to the priesthood, they must make a basic decision to become counter-cultural – to be devout and mature Roman Catholics – to save themselves from this corrupt generation. To the young men and women of our parish, I say: save yourselves from the busy-ness and restless activism of this generation, from the constant noise and distraction that prevents you from even hearing the voice of Jesus the Good and Beautiful Shepherd, from the workaholism, anxiety and materialism of this culture that chokes the Word of God in your souls before it has a chance to take root and bear fruit in a religious vocation or even a happy life-long marriage.
In today’s Gospel, Jesus announces, “I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly” (Jn 10:10). This corrupt generation has forgotten that God’s greatest gift is life. It’s no coincidence that families open to life tend to produce vocations. Unfortunately, so many families in this corrupt generation choose contraception and sterilization, and have so few children that no family wants to dedicate one of them to God. They place more value on material things than on human beings, and thus teach their children to grow up with a selfish mindsight, thinking, “well, my parents’ generation were not generous with their lives, so why should I be generous with mine?”
In his timeless and inspired pro-life encyclical The Gospel of Life, John Paul II called for a new generation that will adopt a new lifestyle, based on a correct scale of values: the primacy of being over having, of the person over things (#98).
Yes, who you are is more important that what you do or what you have! But the inverted values of this corrupt generation teaches the opposite and contributes to activism, busy-ness, workaholism, exhaustion, sickness, depression – you name it.
I remember the two years of my life when I was most sick: 1986-87 and 2004-5. In the first case, I was frequently ill with strep throat because I was “burning the candle at both ends” as my mother used to say; I was very busy with school, a job, a girlfriend, partying (I was prescribing myself an anti-depressant called Labatt’s Blue, which required high doses every Friday and Saturday night).
I was killing myself with the lifestyle I had chosen, which was normal by the standards of the world.
But even after my conversion, I discovered that there is still a danger of falling into the trap of self-centered activity, busy-ness, workaholism. I think that’s one reason I was sick with so many colds in 2004-5 as I adjusted to the demands of a new lifestyle as a pastor in the remote lowlands of eastern Ontario.
I mention all this because I am concerned about today’s younger generation that we are hoping will produce some vocations to priesthood and religious life. I am concerned that they are mimicking the worst habits of this corrupt generation – this obsession with constant, frenetic activity, busy-ness, work. To the younger generation I say: you are supposed to be rebels, not conformists! Don’t follow the example of this corrupt generation! Be counter-cultural! Re-discover the primacy of being over having and doing, of the person over things! Take some time off work to find out who you are as a human being. Because who you are is good and true and beautiful. Then, only then, when you slow down a bit, recollect yourself and enter into your heart: only then will you hear the still, small voice of God, the voice of Jesus the Good and Beautiful Shepherd calling you by name.
How I wish I could show you the beautiful face of Jesus. If only you knew him you, you would love him, listen to him, and follow him. Today’s Gospel ends with verse 10. In the very next line, Jesus announces, “I am the good shepherd.” The word used by the Holy Spirit in this text is “kalos” which is more accurately translated as “beautiful, noble, wonderful.” Jesus is the beautiful shepherd, who draws and attracts all people to himself (Jn 12:32) in part through his beauty. Notice that Christ never said, “when I am lifted up from the earth, I will attract all women to myself.” No. He used inclusive language; he said, “all people including men.”
To the men of our parish, especially young men who may be called to the priesthood: discover the beauty of Christ, which extends far beyond his body or his masculinity, and includes the beauty of his divine nature, his human nature, full of grace and truth, his moral conduct, his human actions, his words. Yes, the noble words of the good shepherd are so beautiful that those guards, those manly men, once sent to arrest Jesus, were awestruck by him saying, “no one has ever spoken like this man” (Jn 7:46); “He has the words of eternal life” (Jn 6:68). Learn to listen to the voice of Christ and contemplate his life and you will be drawn by his beauty.
I listened to a Catholic CD recently entitled “From Drug Dealer to Catholic Priest,” the personal testimony of Fr. Don Calloway. He was suddenly and miraculously converted through the intercession of Mary the Mother of God. In our times, I believe that Jesus has given to his Mother a special mission to convert sinners and to call men to the priesthood, to draw men through her Immaculate beauty to the holy, perfect, glorious and resplendent beauty of her Son.
Yes, I believe she prayed for me with tears all those years I was wondering a lost sheep through the streets of Ottawa. And I believe she stood by me and rejoiced that day in Notre-Dame cathedral, when I and my brothers prostrated ourselves on the floor as unworthy sinners, and each one was raised up an alter Christus, an other Christ, a priest of the most High God. In the conclusion of his talk, Fr. Calloway encourages people to persevere in praying for vocations, saying that the bum on the street could be your next pastor! How true indeed.
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April 6, 2008
Posted in Homilies
at 9:00 am
Third Sunday of Easter, Year A, April 6, 2008
It’s springtime, and all creation is crying out “Christ is risen!” The risen Christ walks with us “on the way,” on our journey through life; he speaks to us in the Scriptures, and gives us himself in the “breaking of the bread,” – in the Eucharist. Yet so many of us Christians are like these unhappy disciples on their way to Emmaus: “they stood still, looking sad (skuthropoi – gloomy, dejected)” (Lk 24:17). Why are they so sad? “We had hoped” that Jesus was going to redeem us (Lk 24:21). But now he is dead, so what’s the point in hoping?
As the risen Lord walks with us on our way through life, he sees into our hearts – all the sadness and gloominess, the pessimism and the lack of hope. And he lovingly rebukes us, as he did the disciples on the road to Emmaus: “Oh, how foolish you are, and how slow of heart to believe” the good news that Christ is risen; he has redeemed the world! So why do we remain sad despite knowing that he lives?
St. Luke writes that the eyes of the disciples “were kept” (ekratounto) from recognizing Jesus (Lk 24:16). The same word is used in the first reading: “God raised up (Jesus), having freed him from death, because it was impossible for him to be held/kept (krateisthai) in its power” (Acts 2:24). It is possible that this same power – the power of death – kept the disciples from recognizing Jesus.
Jesus Christ has conquered the power of sin and death and hell. But when we Christians give in to sadness and gloominess, pessimism and lack of hope, it seems that we are still held/kept by the power of death, as if the Resurrection of Christ has made no difference in our lives. Maybe that’s why almost 3 million Canadians will experience serious depression throughout their lives (Ottawa Citizen, April 3, 2008, A13). They must not know that Christ is alive and that he loves them!
It was perfectly logical for Cleopas and his friend to lose hope and be depressed. After all Jesus was dead, and everyone knows it is impossible for a man to rise from the dead. When we look at the world with the eyes of death, with eyes that are kept from recognizing Jesus, we see many logical reasons for despair. On a global level, we think of wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere . . . And think of all the broken relationships strewn all around us. One of my best friends is separating from his wife . . . my cousin recently got in a huge fight with his wife. There seem to be so many logical reasons for sadness, gloominess, pessimism and lack of hope.
We need that same conversion that the disciples on the way to Emmaus experienced: a change from being “slow of heart” to a “burning heart,” a change from sadness and loss of hope, thinking that Jesus is dead, to being filled with happiness and hope, knowing that Jesus is alive, that he loves me, he speaks to me, he feeds me, he lives in me. Alleluia! Easter is meant to change us. Our sufferings do not disappear, but we change!
In Lent, we coped with our sufferings with grim determination by fasting and praying with Jesus in the desert, by carrying our cross with Jesus, who “set his face to go to Jerusalem” (Lk 9:51) to suffer and die. But now that it is Easter and Christ has risen from the dead, we must no longer “set our face” but open our hearts – so that hearts that are slow to believe can be transformed into hearts that are burning.
Take a cue from creation. Very soon everything will be opening up to new life in spring. The ground hogs will be coming out of hibernation to open their eyes to the light. The tulips and daffodils will soon be opening their petals to the sun. I even saw a group of robins the other day who had just flown in from Florida. They weren’t being pessimistic saying, “We had hoped that the snow would have melted by now; we’re probably going to starve to death!” No! They were happy and singing . . . alleluias!
Look in front of the altar – the desert of Lent has become the garden of Easter – the garden of Eden. Haven’t you noticed? Come out of your hibernation! Wake up and smell the flowers! All creation cries out, “Jesus has risen from the dead!” to awaken your faith, to strengthen your hope! The Easter candle is burning, so that your hearts will be burning within you as Jesus speaks to you.
We must open our hearts to being surprised by God, surprised by joy – when we are least expecting it – as Cleopas and his companion were surprised by Jesus. I had such an experience the first night of my visit to the Seminary in Toronto. As I was walking into the chapel, I heard a voice above me, “Tim McCauley!” I look up, and in the stairwell was Mounir El-Rassi. We had begun our studies together in 1996, but he had left the Seminary and I lost touch with him. Later he changed his mind and came back, and will hopefully be ordained next year. I met Jesus in many very fine young men (whom I had never met before) who are studying for the priesthood from dioceses throughout Canada. (We have four from Ottawa but God is calling a lot more).
There are some very good people in this world, that we have yet to meet. Maybe we will meet them today or tomorrow or next week! So much to look forward to! If we have eyes to see and ears to hear, Jesus is always surprising us and appearing to us on our way through life, and sending us people to encourage and console us, to lift us up.
The world is a safe and beautiful place. How can I say this? Because Jesus, the Lamb of God, has taken away the sin of the world; he has risen from the dead and saved the world! We Christians are not trying to be naive optimists. No. Our hope is well-grounded on the Resurrection of Christ from the dead. Yes, despite all the remaining sin in the world, all our future failures and all the people who will hurt us, the world redeemed by Christ is a safe and beautiful place, and in the end you can trust in God and you can also trust in other people.
The fact that we are gathered here today in the Church is proof that people are trustworthy. Jesus entrusted the foundation of his Church to 12 men –11 out of 12 proved worthy of trust – that’s a very high percentage! And the Church spread throughout the world and is still standing today. Jesus continues to trust in his disciples – to trust in you! So you should trust each other. And always remember . . . people can change – for the better! But you must persevere in hope and never walk away.
And we must also train ourselves to be a “stranger” to the pessimism of the world. Cleopas asked Jesus, “are you the only stranger in Jerusalem who does not know the things that have taken place there in these days?” (Lk 24: ). Of course Jesus knew what they were talking about, but throughout his life, Jesus was a “stranger” to gloominess, pessimism, lack of hope.
We must be careful about the bad news we continually ingest and propagate – ingest from the morning paper, the radio, the TV, and propagate in our gossip and worldly conversation. “Did you hear about so-and-so? . . . and that 2 year-old boy who died in the fire, that 28 year-old man murdered in Gatineau, that woman who was a victim of marriage fraud, duped by her African husband and left with a broken heart (all news items from the past week) . . . it’s such a terrible world we live in . . . and look how badly the Senators are playing – I’m so depressed!”
“What are you discussing with each other as you walk along” through life (Lk 24:17). During this Easter season, it is good to examine our conversation: do we spread the spirit of death by our pessimism? Or do we share the spirit of the risen Christ who has conquered death? Do we open our hearts to hear Jesus speaking to us through the Scriptures? Do we open our eyes to recognize Jesus in the breaking of the bread, and in each other, to recognize the goodness of God in creation and in the many small gifts of everyday life?
After the disciples recognized Jesus in the breaking of the bread, they got up at once and returned to Jerusalem where they heard more good news, “The Lord has risen indeed, and he has appeared to Simon!” We “return to Jerusalem” by constantly returning to the community of believers, by returning to the Church, where Jesus is present especially in the tabernacle, in the broken bread that is his Body. Tell your friends who struggle with hopelessness and depression not to walk away. Tell them to come back to the holy city Jerusalem where they will meet the risen Christ in the breaking of the bread. The more we recognize the permanent presence of Jesus here, in the Church, in the Eucharist, in the tabernacle, the more we will recognize him on a daily basis on our pilgrimage through life.
The earliest Scripture scholars noticed that the structure of today’s Gospel story is the structure of the Mass itself. Jesus explained the Scriptures to the disciples while their hearts burned within them, then he was made known to them in the breaking of the bread. Each Mass begins with the liturgy of the Word, in which Jesus speaks to us and the preachers are supposed to explain how all the Scriptures relate to Christ (we should do much more of this). The Scriptures and the homily are meant to prepare our hearts and minds to recognize and worthily receive Christ in the breaking of the bread, in Holy Communion.
Especially as our country prepares for the International Eucharistic Congress, let us all strive to re-discover our amazement and gratitude for the gift of the Eucharist. Let us repeat the words of the Gospel acclamation: “Lord Jesus, make your word plain to us; make our hearts burn with love when you speak,” as well as the words under the title of our weekly bulletin: “Eucharistic Heart of Jesus, burning with love for us, set our hearts on fire with love for you!”
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