Homily 20th Sunday of OT Year B Eph 5:15-20; Jn 6:51-58
Sisters and brothers, what you just heard proclaimed from the lips of Jesus is an
incredible revelation ... a revelation of not only who He is in his own right, but of
who He wants to be for us: the Bread of Life, who feeds us, for eternity. This
profound teaching, this mysterious truth, lies at the core of our faith; it is a foundational pillar, of what it means to be a Catholic Christian disciple, for God.
“I am the living bread that came down from heaven; whoever eats this bread will
live forever; and the bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the world.
Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood you do not have
life within you. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and
I will raise him on the last day.”
So there it is in plain English: the secret to life in this world, and the secret to life
in the next. That’s why this sacrament, the celebration of the Eucharist, the Holy
Sacrifice of the Mass, the Supper of the Lord, was rightly called the source and
summit of the Christian life, by the fathers of the second Vatican Council.
This is the place where Jesus prepares, breaks, and shares the living bread that
is He. This is the only place where we can feed on him in the way, of which he
speaks in the gospel today. This is the only place where we can secure the life
He offers; where we can ensure we remain in Him, and He in us.
So it’s the source of the Christian life because it’s food for the Christian life: it
provides the spiritual nutrients and energy that we need to be faithful Christian
disciples. Those things are provided primarily in Communion, but not only there.
We are energized and nourished by Christ through the proclamation of his
Word. We are energized and nourished by his presence among us, the gathered
community of believers, when we sing and pray and profess our faith together,
thereby expressing our communion with each other in Him..
To exempt ourselves from this worship and praise, from this meal and its table
“conversation,” would be to subject ourselves to spiritual starvation. We simply
cannot survive without the bread that is offered here. It is to the health of our
souls, what air, food and water are, to the health of our bodies.
Rev. Michael G. Cambi
8/16/2015
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This is the summit of our Christian life because it is the highest form of prayer, it is
the most powerful way we can worship, praise, and thank our God, this side of
heaven. How is that so?
Well, the most profound act of love ever known is made present here. We come
face to face with that which promises our salvation. And before we receive Him
in communion, we’re called to another kind of union with Him ... to offer our
own act of love, by uniting the sacrifice of our lives, through the living symbols
of bread and wine, to His sacrifice on the cross.
This is another dimension of how we remain in Him and He in us. He gathers our
sacrifices and unites them to Himself, makes up for what they lack and perfects
them, so that in Him, we too might glorify the Father, in humble obedience to His
will, by handing over everything we are, everything we hope to be.
Now the negative corollary to these truths is, that if we don’t make this the
source and summit of our lives, then to some degree, we do not have life within
us ... or to put it more positively, we do not have the fullness of life that the Lord
wants to instill deep within us, that we might know his peace and joy now, and
the perfection of those gifts eternally.
The good news is that the Lord knows how difficult it can be to keep Him at the
center, to remain focused and fervent in our faith. Even His apostles struggled
along these lines, and now, more than 2000 years later, the world’s distractions and
temptations are arguably more distracting and tempting than they’ve ever been.
And so in His mercy and love God bestows upon us booster shots of sorts, to
sustain our faith, to overcome our doubts and fears, our faults and failings. Now
and then He gives us miracles of various kinds: miracles around Marian
apparitions; miracles around the stigmata, the wounds of Christ; miraculous
healings of the ill and injured; and miracles around the Eucharist.
I heard about the powerful Eucharistic miracle Fr. Lloyd shared with you last
weekend. Very briefly, for those of you who weren’t here, it involved a host found
on the floor of a church after Mass. The priest put it in water to dissolve it so he
could pour the solution into the earth.
But the host didn’t dissolve as he expected. Instead it became what appeared to
be a mass of bloody, fleshy pulp. Ultimately, it was scientifically tested and
shown to be the heart tissue of a man from the Middle East.
Rev. Michael G. Cambi
8/16/2015
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Many of you were profoundly moved and inspired, some being brought to tears,
and at least one of you claiming you would never receive communion in the same
way again. I think that’s wonderful, and that is indeed the purpose of the miracles,
by which God graces us from time to time.
The challenge for us is to not let the inspiration fade as time goes by, but to keep
it foremost in our consciousness, so that when we’re tempted to let worldly
pursuits or pleasures; selfishness, or laziness, or pride; trump our fidelity and
commitment to the Lord, we can effectively resist, by recalling that the heart of
Jesus bleeds for us every day.
In a real sense, the unbounded love of Christ bleeds from, pours out of, his Sacred
Heart, and yearns for union with us. He yearns for our worship and love; he yearns
for our grateful reception of the great gift he offers: His Body, Blood, Soul and
Divinity, that we might remain in Him and He in us.
And more than just preventing us from wavering in our faith, or just helping us
to maintain our faith, the miracle that is the Bread of Life should inspire us to
grow in our faith. It should be the food that fuels our desire to develop deeper
intimacy with the Lord.
There can be no movement in any relationship without a willingness to change
from those involved. The time, effort and energy required, often involve sacrifices
to strengthen the bonds between them. Since God is the fullness of perfection in
every conceivable way, the change and sacrifice must come from us. He’s always
there waiting ... we have to make time and space for Him.
Going back to the analogy of the body ... eating well is only part of a healthy,
balanced life. The right amounts of the right foods are essential, but a body also
needs rest and refreshment, exercise, stress relief, and to refrain from harmful
activities and substances.
Likewise, the flesh and blood of the Lord is the true food and true drink essential to
our spiritual health. But there are other important parts of the regimen for a
healthy soul: things like prayer, penance, and fasting; studying and sharing our
faith; following God’s will and keeping His commandments; serving those in need
among the least of His people.
Rev. Michael G. Cambi
8/16/2015
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With that in mind, I now encourage you to take advantage of three upcoming
opportunities, directly related to this source and summit of our lives.
We have our second round of book club dinners coming up next month. Sign up
sheets are out today and we need to know who’ll join us by Tuesday August 25 to
get the books here on time. That book is The Seven Secrets of the Eucharist.
Beginning with the first Tuesday in October, we’ll have a six part study program
on the Eucharist, by Fr. Robert Barron, similar to the one we did for the New
Evangelization. It’s called “Eucharist: Sacred Meal, Sacrifice, Real Presence.”
Third, we regularly offer a form of devotional prayer that is most intimately
connected to what we do here every weekend, and that is Adoration of the Blessed
Sacrament. These holy hours happen on first Fridays of the month, and also on
Tuesdays when I lead devotional prayer.
But we’re looking to expand the devotion both in terms of increasing the number
of participants, and to include with some regularity, 24 hour periods of
adoration. // The “In Focus” section of my most recent OSV Newsweekly was
all about Eucharistic adoration, and I want to share with you what some folks
had to say about their experiences of the devotion.
Pope Benedict once wrote, “The Eucharist is the event at the center of absolutely
everything.” Reflecting on that one priest added, “Everything depends on the
Eucharist: life, happiness, history, the created universe, for all things have been
made ‘through Him, with Him, and in Him’. So if you have a need, a problem, a
concern – take it to Jesus, and you will find Him in adoration of the Eucharist.”
A man shared what another priest once told him, “Eucharistic adoration is
spiritual radiation therapy. When we’re in the presence of Jesus in the Blessed
Sacrament, our very being – our very soul and every cell of our body – is
bombarded by the holy presence of our Lord. It’s rather like sitting in front of a
block of plutonium, but the results are infinitely better!”
A man from our own diocese wrote, “Love can provide us with a kind of knowledge that is different from intellectual knowledge. Anyone who has fallen in love
can attest to this. It is the same with Jesus in the Eucharist. We must come to
know Him through love, and when we spend time with him there in adoration, then
we learn what great love He has for us.”
Rev. Michael G. Cambi
8/16/2015
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And finally, a well-known Catholic writer shares, “In later years I tried to ‘write’
through adoration, to ‘make it productive’ ... but I came to understand that I was
being invited into the quiet: the ‘peace beyond all understanding’. Now, I kneel
before the Lord ... and then I simply sit back. I look at the Master, and the
Master looks at me. It is absolute beauty.”
Brothers and sisters: Watch carefully how you live, not as foolish persons but as
wise, making the most of every opportunity. Do not continue in ignorance, but try
to understand what is the will of the Lord. Be filled with the Spirit ... singing and
playing to the Lord in your hearts, giving thanks always, and for everything, in the
name of our Lord Jesus Christ, to God the Father.
Rev. Michael G. Cambi
8/16/2015
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