Corpus Christi, June 18, 2017 - Homily - 1
Clarity is good. We love clarity. Often when we read scripture, and particularly many of Jesus’ parables, we’re often left wondering, “What the heck is he talking about?” We need an explanation, and that’s good, because it makes us think, and it really makes us internalize the message. But Jesus’ statements aren’t always immediately clear to us.
Not so in today’s gospel – Jesus is very clear. He says that he is the bread of life, and whoever eats his flesh and drinks his blood will live forever. Now the people around Jesus at the time were looking for clarity – they questioned this difficult teaching of Jesus, and looked for an explanation. But Jesus didn’t clarify his statement, because no clarification was needed – Jesus meant exactly what he said, and repeated the statement in even stronger terms. He didn’t say that he was ‘speaking symbolically’ – he said ‘unless you eat my flesh and drink my blood, you will have no life in you’.
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Today we celebrate in a particular way the great mystery of the Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. Each time we come together to celebrate the Mass, our Lord becomes truly present before us in the Eucharist. Jesus introduced this mystery of him being the true ‘Bread of Life’ in today’s gospel, and this great mystery of his teaching would become completely clear at the Last Supper when Jesus instituted the Eucharist.
The Church refers to the Eucharist that we celebrate at each Mass as the Source and Summit of the Christian life, and we will now take a little bit of time to reflect on this greatest mystery of our faith, to reflect on the Mass, and to reflect upon this greatest gift that our Lord gave us at the Last Supper, because it indeed is central to our Catholic faith.
Each and every time we celebrate the Eucharist, it’s not just a mere remembrance of a past event, it is rather a continual participation in Christ’s sacrifice. When we celebrate the Eucharist, we transcend time as it were, and become present once again at the foot of the cross. We make present in our day and time the redeeming sacrifice of Christ. He suffered and died only once, but through the great gift of the Eucharist, Jesus allows us to mystically experience again and again his saving actions on Calvary.
Which is why the Mass is so very important. When the priest says the words of consecration, we believe that the bread and wine cease to be mere earthly food, as it is miraculously transformed into the actual body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. It is this great gift Jesus humbles himself to become present to us hidden in the form of bread and wine, so that he could be physically present to us until the end of time.
And on this great feast day, we reflect on our Eucharistic Lord so as to not take Him for granted. When we come into the Church, we genuflect or bow to show our reverence to Christ present in the tabernacle. The priest and deacon upon approaching the sanctuary during the procession reverences the altar on which the great sacrifice of the Mass will take place, and of course when we kneel during the Eucharistic prayer, we are kneeling before the Lord of Lords and King of Kings made present during the consecration prayers.
And one great act of faith we can do to help us from becoming complacent to the great mysteries that unfold before us in the Mass, is to adopt the words of Doubting Thomas – when we witness the elevation of the host after the consecration prayers, and upon hearing the bells which draw our attention to it, a good practise is to pray the words of Thomas as he falls to his knees having doubted Christ’s resurrection, and with a quiet prayer in our hearts, say the affirming words, “My Lord, and my God.”
And finally, when we approach to receive our Lord, when the Minister of Communion makes the statement, “The Body of Christ”, we boldly affirm our belief with a confident ‘Amen!’ Although Jesus has been sacrificed once for all, the Church calls us to continually experience this sacrifice through our attentive and reverent participation at Mass, which mystically transports us back to the foot of the cross on Calvary.
This indeed is the Summit of our Christian life. When we worship our Lord in his Real Presence in the Eucharist, we are worshiping the very same Jesus Christ who walked this earth 2000 years ago, and on the other end of the spectrum, we are worshiping the very same glorified Christ who we will one day worship in his Heavenly Kingdom – there aren’t different ‘versions’ of Christ – there is only one Christ, and it is our firm Catholic belief that at every Mass we worship the One Christ present to us in the Eucharist.
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And although we participate in the Eucharist as the Summit of our faith at Mass through worship, we can’t forget that it is also the Source of our Christian Life. We as Christians are all part of the Body of Christ, and it is in the celebration of the Eucharist that we are most unified. It is through Holy Communion that we truly become One Body in Christ as indicated by St. Paul in our 2nd reading.
And further to that, being unified as one Body in Christ, having received our Lord in Holy Communion we become living tabernacles, and having been nourished by the Body and Blood of our Lord, we are sent out to bring Jesus to the world. That is why at the end of Mass we don’t just simply dismiss you, the priest or deacon rather commissions you such as ‘Go in peace, glorifying the Lord by your life!’ In other words, when you leave this Church, go out and be a witness of Christ to the world.
As we continue to celebrate the Eucharist this morning let’s look at the Mass with renewed fervour, recognizing in a convicted way the Lord’s Real Presence before us as we acclaim him “Our Lord and our God.” Let us be always transformed by The Body and Blood of our Lord which we receive at every Mass, which is indeed the Source and Summit of our Christian lives.