On the Eucharist

On the Eucharist – the Living Sacrifice

The Real Presence

The following is a true story. In another country, there was a workman employed to fix some repairs in a Catholic Church. Up on the scaffolding, he would see the little red Sanctuary Lamp and the tabernacle on the altar. He simply could not get away from the feeling: “There’s someone there!” He began to visit the church even after his project was completed. Not so very long after that, he became a Catholic.

Visitors to Catholic churches very often remark how striking it is that there are people in the church, sitting or standing, and seemingly doing nothing much at all. Just being there. God is here in the Blessed Eucharist in a way that He is nowhere else.

The Catholic Faith – Spiritual yet Material and Earthly

Some people are surprised at how earthy the Catholic Faith really is. Some of the old Pagan religions were nothing more than an excuse for indulging our earthly natures: when the Ancient Greeks sacrificed to the gods, maybe a bullock or a heifer, they didn’t actually sacrifice too much of the animal! They sacrificed a few pounds of meat, then had a huge feast, with drinking, athletic contests, and enjoying each other’s company physically. The Roman Orgies are famous. Yet let us not be unfair to these pagans – they genuinely thought they were pleasing the gods, so long as they kept up the ritual sacrifices. Then on the other hand there were very strict pagan religions, plus breakaway Christian heresies, that taught the flesh was something sinful and to be rejected. They went in for extreme penances, strict fasting and lifelong abstinences, and even encouraged suicide. They declared that any liason between man and woman was sinful. Only the Spirit was good. Some Buddhist monks walk around with their eyes closed, so that they will not be polluted with the sight of the lowly world.

When Christ came, He brought an entirely new idea into the world. He raised the homely things of the Earth up to the Supernatural Plane. The Catholic has Feasts as well as Fasts. the Pioneer does not abstain from alcohol because it is bad, but because it is good: it is a worthy sacrifice to bring Grace to those too weak to avoid its abuse. The priest and nun do not live celibate lives because marriage is in any way evil, but only because there is a still higher way.

Those outside the Catholic Faith have, from the very beginning, been shocked at what we really believe about this. The Ancient Romans called us cannibals. Interestingly enough, a Protestant friend of mine not long ago used the very same words. At least it shown that we have the same Faith as at the Beginnign of the church. All this came from Christ Himself.

“I could eat you!”

Most mothers know the feeling that makes them say to their child, “I could eat you!” Do they mean, they want to harm the child? Of course not! They mean, they want to be as close, in love, as it is possible to get: to experience the Beloved in every way. And this is how Our Saviour has presented Himself to us.

Human sacrifice

There is another thing that most ancient religions practised: human sacrifice. I think we find it so hard to imagine because God the Father has said: “No! that’s not what I want!” In the Old Testament, God twice says to His chosen People through the prophets, in sorrow and reproach: ‘Ye have passed your children through the fires of Moloch, a thing I never asked, nor did it enter into My Mind’. Whatever was that impulse that led human beings to believe that they must give up the best of their community in this way? Was there some intuition? God the Son said, “Any sacrificing that is necessary, I will do it Myself”. God the Father said, “This is My Beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased”.

Our Most Intimate Moments

In the heart of the Mass, we are being ourselves as utterly as we will ever come. This is our private moment with God: God made Man, and we are the living Body of Christ.

‘Proper’ food

Every kind of animal has its proper food. We are eternally immortal souls in the bodies of animals. Our own proper food is the Body of Christ Himself.

We must encourage our children to prepare well, not to be afraid of confession, to take seriously the little fast before Mass, to stay awhile talking to God who is within us.

In the Lord’s Prayer

In the Lord’s prayer as we have it in the New Testament, when Our Lord says, “Give us this day our daily bread”, strangely enough, the words in the original Greek language mean more like “give us this day our supernatural bread” (ton arton ton epioȗsion) …

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