Holy Thursday Mass of the Lord’s Supper 2018
March 29, 2018
“The Great Amen”
Tonight we celebrate the “pebble in the pond.” From this Last Supper flows all that we do, have done, and will do as a Church. (All our foot washing, all our coming to know Jesus, all our praise of God.) This meal is our heart as Catholics. And there is one critical moment for each of us within this celebration I want you to particularly notice tonight… the GREAT AMEN… for this is our YES to all we have prayed in the Eucharistic Prayer. (Sing Amen)
Know tonight to what you are saying YES. In our Eucharistic Prayer, the priest (as Christ Himself) lifts our bread and wine to God the Father, calling down the Holy Spirit to change them into our Savior’s Body and Blood; then we pray for unity and peace; and finally we pray that our dead and ourselves will have an inheritance in Jesus - that we will enjoy heaven forever.
To all of this, each Sunday, we say YES. (We say AMEN.) But our YES also points to what is about to happen… we say YES to communion with Jesus Christ. We say YES to His life we are about to take into ourselves.
Imagine it… God’s life actually within you… to know what Mary knew when she said YES to Gabriel; an Amen to God’s life growing within her. She felt Jesus grow, stir, love… What must it have been like to have this Life grow within her? Imagine the miracle of life within…
Life in the Womb
Be still and know that within your temple of God lives a temple of God.
A heart beating, leg kicking, arm swinging life that awakens gradually within.
And the feeling of a loving presence inside unexpectedly unveils a new reality.
A reality that is unequaled because it is miracle.
A woman’s lifelong cherished memory – a baby’s movement within.
Unprompted and sometimes unexpected, life moves within,
and a woman’s soul is forever changed.
The baby’s movement - an assurance of an incomprehensible reality that you carry life.
The warmth of the life within produces outward radiance of anticipation.
Life with a soul, life with a heart, life full of life’s potentiality.
A father talks and the miracle reacts with a leap in the womb.
A sibling sings and a foot stretches out in return.
A grandmother places a hand over the life within and memories overflow.
A mother prays and the soul within just knows.
The trinitarian certainty of mother, infant and God - one in the womb.
And a woman’s connection with God is perfected.
Perfected in the human – divine connection of the continuous miracle of life.
Imagine Mary’s First Communion.Again the feeling of God’s Life growing within… the same Life we will receive from our altar… the same Life we will each know tonight.
So at this Mass (and every Mass forthwith) voice well your “Amen”, make it worthy of the title “Great.” And in the silence that follows your communion feeltheSaviorwithin.