First Friday Holy Hour - February 2025 - Christ is the same yesterday, today, forever

Since the conclusion of the Christmas season, the ordinary first readings from weekday Mass have been taken from the letter to the Hebrews. The letter was written to Christian converts from Judaism. For embracing Christ, they had been expelled from their synagogues, shunned by their families, and now also experienced persecution for being Christian in the Roman Empire. 

The letter seeks to embolden those who were wavering in their faith or tempted to return to their old way of life. 

Much of Hebrews focuses on deep theological truths that serve to embolden the Jewish Christians—how Jesus is our eternal High Priest, the fulfillment of the Old Covenant, and the one true mediator between God and man. 

Today’s passage comes from the final chapter of the letter, and pivots from theological excursus to practical morality, showing that true faith is not just a matter of theological understanding but must be lived out through brotherly love, hospitality, compassion, sexual purity, detachment from material goods, and trust in God’s providence.

The passage concludes with the powerful affirmation: “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.” This declaration ties back to the earlier chapters of Hebrews, which emphasize: Christ’s eternal priesthood and the unchanging nature of God’s promise.

And in doing so, this passage bridges the doctrinal and practical. After spending so much time explaining who Christ is and what He has accomplished, but this passage reminds us that knowing Christ should change how we live.

Similarly, as we gather for Eucharistic adoration, adoring Christ for his sacrificial self-giving for us, we recall that we are called to go forth and live out that love—showing hospitality, caring for the suffering, embracing purity, and trusting in His providence.

"Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever." He is our foundation, our strength, our constant companion. In the stillness of this Holy Hour, let us ask Him to transform us, that we, like Him, may love more deeply, to serve more generously, to live more faithfully. May this time set our hearts afire with the desire to make His presence known in the world, so that through us, others may come to know the One who never forsakes or abandons His people, for the glory of God and the salvation of souls.

First Friday Holy Hour - January 2025 - The Most Holy Name of Jesus

 As we gather in the stillness of this evening, we come to adore in the Eucharist, the same Jesus whose Holy Name we have honored throughout this day—He who was named on the eighth day, in fulfillment of the law and in anticipation of our salvation.

In the Eucharist, we encounter Him personally, intimately. Christ is truly here, body, blood, soul, and divinity, just as He was in the manger, just as He was on the Cross, just as He will be in glory at the end of time. And before Him, we echo the words of St. Paul: “At the Name of Jesus every knee should bend… and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”

This morning I shared how liturgically, the Holy Name of Jesus is reverenced by the priest, every time the name of Jesus is mentioned, the priest is instructed to give a slight bow of the head. Well, now in his presence, we do not simply bow, we kneel, for he is truly here.

Throughout the centuries, the name of Jesus has been used for prayer. Both in our public prayer, liturgically, and also in our private prayer. The Catechism of the Catholic Church explains, “The invocation of the holy name of Jesus is the simplest way of praying always”

This insight highlights that prayer does not always require long or elaborate formulas. At its heart, prayer is a loving communion with God, and sometimes the simplest forms of prayer are the most powerful.

Simply to recite the name of Jesus, gently and slowly can be a powerful mode of prayer. Repeating the Holy Name in our hearts fosters an interior silence and calm that opens us to God’s presence. And that is a prayer that can be prayed in the car, in line at the grocery or doctor’s office, or when we have to spend time with someone who really gets under our skin. Jesus. Jesus.

 In the midst of anxiety, stress, or temptation, simply reciting Jesus’ name recollects us and reminds us of His mercy, power, and abiding love.

This evening, before the Blessed Sacrament, I invite you to spend some time simply gazing at the Eucharist and reciting the name of Jesus.

To quote again St. Bernardine of Siena, that great preacher of the Holy Name—St. Bernadine said, “Glorious name, gracious name, name of love and of power! Through you sins are forgiven, through you enemies are vanquished, through you the sick are freed from their illness, through you those suffering in trials are made strong and cheerful. You bring honor to those who believe, you teach those who preach, you give strength to the toiler, you sustain the weary” for the glory of God and the salvation of souls.

First Friday Holy Hour - July 2024 - The invitation to follow Christ in mercy and sacrifice

 

Like St. Matthew in the Gospel today, the Lord has given us an invitation: “follow me”. And that invitation has led us here, to the Lord’s Eucharistic presence.

With those two simple words, “Follow me”, Jesus transformed Matthew’s life. And Matthew? He responded without hesitation, leaving behind his old life to follow Christ.

Leaving something behind in order to follow Christ always leads to the transformations God wants for us. 

In the Eucharist, we see the same Jesus who dined with tax collectors and sinners. He continues to invite us – sinners though we are – to His heavenly banquet. Just as He transformed bread and wine into His body and blood, He seeks to transform our lives through the Eucharist—in our adoration of the Eucharist and of course our reception of the Eucharist at mass.

The Pharisees questioned why Jesus ate with sinners. Yet here we are, sinners ourselves. As Jesus said, "Those who are well do not need a physician, but the sick do." In the Eucharist, we find our divine physician, healing our souls and nourishing us for our journey of faith.

Christ's words, "I desire mercy, not sacrifice," take on profound meaning in light of the Eucharist in which Jesus offers Himself as both the mercy we receive and the sacrifice that saves us. He invites us not because of our worthiness, but because of His limitless love and mercy.

As we adore Christ in the Blessed Sacrament, let us reflect:

How is Christ calling us to follow Him more closely through our devotion to the Eucharist?

What must we leave behind to respond more fully to His invitation?

To whom are we being challenged to extend the same mercy to others that Christ extends to us?

How is God calling me to sacrifice more fully my time, talent, and treasure for the mission of the Church?

May this time of adoration deepen our love for the Eucharist and strengthen our resolve to follow Christ. Let us allow the transformative power of His presence to change us, just as it changed Matthew, so that we may become living witnesses of His love and mercy in the world for the glory of God and the salvation of souls.

July 2023 - First Friday Holy Hour - Adoring the Precious Blood of Jesus

 

The month of July is traditionally devoted to the Most Precious Blood of Jesus.

And as we kneel before the Blessed Sacrament exposed in the monstrance, let us remember that we adore both the Lord’s Body and His Blood, for the Blessed Sacrament contains the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ. Devotion to the Holy Eucharist is devotion to the Blood of Christ.

One of the oldest Christian documents, outside of sacred scripture, from the first century of the Christian era, by Pope St. Clement I, dated about 96 A.D. says: “Let us fix our gaze on the Blood of Christ and realize how truly precious It is, seeing that it was poured out for our salvation and brought the grace of conversion to the whole world.”

The blood of Christ is truly worthy of our adoration, for St. Peter says, “You were not redeemed with corruptible things, as gold or silver… but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb unspotted and undefiled.”

In 1960, Pope St. John XXIII wrote an apostolic letter on devotion to the Precious blood. He writes: “Unlimited is the effectiveness of the God- Man’s Blood - just as unlimited as the love that impelled him to pour it out for us, first at his circumcision eight days after birth, and more profusely later on in his agony in the garden, in his scourging and crowning with thorns, in his climb to Calvary and crucifixion, and finally from out of that great wide wound in his side which symbolizes the divine Blood cascading down into all the Church’s sacraments. Such surpassing love suggests, nay demands, that everyone reborn in the torrents of that Blood adore it with grateful love… God wants all men to be saved, for he has willed that they should all be ransomed by the Blood of his only-begotten Son; he calls them all to be members of the one Mystical Body whose head is Christ. If only men would be more responsive to these promptings of his grace, how much the bonds of brotherly love among individuals and peoples and nations would be strengthened.”

We gather here this evening, prompted by God’s grace to adore the Lord’s Body and Blood. May what we do here this evening strengthen those bonds of love among Christians and work toward the conversion of many to belief in Christ whose blood was poured out for sinners, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

First Friday Holy Hour - June 2023 - Love of the Sacred Heart of Jesus

 

The month of June is traditionally dedicated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. The reason June is dedicated to the Sacred Heart is primarily because during this month we celebrate the Feast of the Sacred Heart on the Friday after Corpus Christi. This year that will be June 16. Is it a coincidence that June is also the middle of the calendar year, or the heart of the calendar year.

But during this month with seek to deepen our devotion to the Sacred Heart—the heart of intense love for us.

During this month we seek to understand and be grateful for and encounter more deeply and spread for easily the human and divine love of Jesus for the world. And so this devotion gets to the heart of our Faith, the heart of Christianity. God loves us, and commands that we love each other. Love is the Lord’s first and greatest commandment. God asks for our love because He wishes to be the God and Master of our hearts through love. Our Lord has loved us with an infinite love, even unto death, and still loves us without limit. He wants to be loved by us. He appeals to our hearts and bids us love Him in return.

St. Margaret Mary to whom the Lord revealed the devotion to his Heart writes, “He made me see that it was the great desire He had of being loved by men, and of withdrawing them from the road of perdition, that induced Him to conceive this plan of making His Heart known to men, with all the treasures of love, of mercy, of grace, of sanctification, and of salvation, in order that those who wish to render and procure Him all the honor, glory, and love of which they are capable, might be abundantly and profusely enriched with the treasures of the Heart of God.”

Some amazing things in that one statement. First, Jesus revealed to St. Margaret Mary that he desires to be loved by us. God wants our love. God wants signs of our love. God wants us to spend time with him. He wants to hear our words of adoration and receive the silent gaze of adoration.

In the Eucharist, he has certainly given us this opportunity. For when we kneel in Eucharistic Adoration we are able to express our love for God through words and in silence, in simple loving attention. In fixing our hearts on his, present in the Eucharist, our hearts can be set ablaze like his.

And that’s the other thing from that passage from St. Margaret Mary: we are abundantly and profusely enriched with treasure from the heart of God when seek to love God as we can. This gets to the very heart of who God is. God is love. And he enriches us as we seek to love Him. We become better and richer when we love, because by doing so we become like Him.

To know and love Jesus Christ is our highest gain both for time and eternity. No sacrifice could be too great to attain it. And yet, we have this simple blessed hour, which is more like a gift than a sacrifice, to know His love and to seek to love Him more. May this time be blessed, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

First Friday Holy Hour - October 2022 - Eucharistic Adoration and the Holy Rosary

 This morning, on the feast of Our Lady of the Holy Rosary, the priests of the diocese concluded our week long convocation with Bishop Malesic, and at Mass this morning, His Excellency, the bishop, evoked a beautiful image that I’d like to share with you.

The bishop spoke of a statue that he encountered in a parish Church in Kentucky, of Our Lady, kneeling in front of the blessed Sacrament with a lighted lamp in her hands. He said, that often, when he kneels in front of the Blessed Sacrament, he recalls that statue, of Our Lady, in adoration of her Son, holding that lighted lamp, like the Wise Virgins in the Gospel parable.

Our Lady models for the Church the posture we are to take, and the attitude we are to have for the Blessed Sacrament; we kneel in adoration, for He is God with us. Falling to our knees in adoration is the appropriate response to His Presence. And He is the lamb worthy of Our Love. “Worthy is the Lamb to receive honor, glory, and blessing” We bend the knee to Him, Our King, Our Savior—the Victor over Sin and Death.

The feature of the statue, of Our Lady holding a lighted lamp, is also a poignant one, and recalls the parable of the wise virgins, who keep their lamps filled with oil, as they await the return of the bridegroom. We are to keep faith, hope, and love for Him burning, like the lighted lamp, until his return. In fact, by our devotion to Him, we pray that faith, hope, and love might be kindled elsewhere, in the dark places of the world, where faith has grown dim.

Our Lady models for us why Eucharistic Adoration is so important. Catholics need to fervently express our belief that Jesus is truly present in the Eucharist here in Church, so that we can bring that faith out in the world, to draw souls back to Him. And don’t we see our Lady modeling for us that task of deepening belief so that we may draw others to Him. “Do whatever he tells you” she says, at the Wedding Feast of Cana. She teaches us to lead others to submit their lives to Him, a submission that is renewed everytime we celebrate the Eucharist, and every time we receive the Eucharist, we are to do whatever the one whom we encounter and receive tells us. 

On the Feast of Our Lady of the Rosary, it is also good for us to consider the connection between the Rosary and Eucharistic Adoration.

The U.S. Bishops write that the Rosary, 'a prayer inspired by the Gospel and centered on the mystery of the Incarnation and the Redemption,' 'should be considered a prayer of deep Christological orientation,' and may rightly be counted among the prayers designed to 'direct the attention of the faithful to the worship of Christ the Lord.' ... [T]he recitation of the Rosary before the exposed Sacrament should help lead the faithful back 'to a knowledge and love of the Lord Jesus, to union with him, finding great encouragement and support in liturgical prayer before the Eucharist.'"

Every time we come and kneel before the blessed Sacrament it is good to spend time in silent adoration, listening to Our Lord in the Silence, and allowing our Hearts to offer worship that is too deep for words. But also, it is praiseworthy to pray Our Lady’s Rosary—which directs us to union with the one whom we adore.

May this time with the Lord allow us to stir into flame our faith, hope, and Love of Him whom we adore, and may Our Lady, and her rosary, draw us deeper into union with Him, that we may in turn draw others to Him out in the world, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

First Friday Holy Hour - February 2022 - The truth that conquers lust

 This morning at mass I reflected upon how today’s Gospel helps us to understand that as disciples of the Lord, we, like John the Baptist will experience hostility when we stand for Truth.

John the Baptist was hated by Herodias for speaking the Truth about her adulterous conduct with King Herod. “It is not lawful for you to have your brother’s wife” he told the King. 

For speaking the truth, the Baptist’s life, like Our Lord’s culminated, in a violent death: for speaking the Truth of God, John was beheaded.

Herodias did not want to hear the truth, so she did everything in her power to silence it. John was silenced for challenging Herodias’ lust for flesh, foreshadowing how Jesus would by silenced by the scribes, chief priests, and pharisees, for challenging their lust for power. 

Nothing incurs some people’s wrath like speaking the truth about their lusts. They do not want to even acknowledge the possibility that their life has become bent on something disordered, something harmful to their souls, to their families, to society. But the Truth of the Gospel helps us to unravel the lies of our life, in order to live more fully for God.

Here in the Lord’s Eucharistic presence, in the silence, we ask him to speak to our hearts. Our lives are so frenetic, but this time of silence with the Lord, will help us to quiet down in order to hear him. Anything True that the Lord wants to tell us, any truth that he wants to communicate to us, we need to open our hearts and our minds to. For the Lord desires our greatest good, he desires what will make us eternally happy in heaven. 

We can be sure that he will tell us nothing that will contradict God’s laws, but what he has to say will help us to follow them more faithfully. Speak O Lord your servants are listening, you have the words of everlasting life. 

May our time with the Lord open our hearts and minds to his truth, and help us to communicate that truth with patience, boldness, conviction, courage, and clarity. May we hear the words he longs to speak to us, the words we long to hear, that we need to hear, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

December 2021 - First Friday Holy Hour - The Eucharist and the healing of spiritual blindness

 Then he touched their eyes and said, “Let it be done for you according to your faith.”

In today’s Gospel, the Lord heals two blind men.  The healing of physical blindness in this instance comes when faith is placed in Jesus as the Son of God. This points to the spiritual healing that comes through the Christian faith. The Lord restores our senses and opens the eyes of our soul when we place our faith in him. 

In Eucharistic Adoration, we have the wonderful opportunity to kneel in faith before the same Lord and Divine Physician who healed the blind men in the Gospel. And just like it was for those blind men, this act of faith can be a conduit of healing for ourselves and our loved ones. 

The blind men in the Gospel could not see the Lord, but cried out “Have pity on us.”  They recognized their blindness, they recognized their need for healing, and they recognized that they cannot heal themselves.

Recognizing our blindnesses, those times when we have looked to gods other than Christ to save us, let us call upon the Lord, “have pity on us…come close to us and heal us that we may be restored that we may be healed, that our fracture hearts and fractured lives may be made whole.”

Listen to these words offered by St. Alphonus Ligouri about the healing of spiritual blindness. He writes as if kneeling in front of the Lord, gazing upon and adoring his goodness, just as we are doing tonight.

“My dear Redeemer, how I have been so blind as to abandon you—who are infinite goodness, and the fountain of all consolation—for the miserable and momentary gratifications of the senses? I am astonished at my blindness, but I am still more astonished at your mercy, which has so bountifully borne with me. I thank you for making me aware now of my folly, and of my obligation to love you. I love you, O my Jesus, with my whole soul, but I desire to love you with greater fervor. Increase my desire and my love. Enamor my soul of you, who are infinitely loveable; of you, who have left nothing undone to gain my love; of you, who so ardently desire my love. “If you will it, you can make me clean.”

Ah, my dear Redeemer, purify my heart from all impure affections, which hinder me from loving you as I would wish! It is not in my power to inflame my whole heart with the love of you, and to make it love nothing but you. This requires the power of your grace, which can do all things. Detach me from every creature, banish from my soul every affection which is not for you, make me all yours…I resolve to consecrate all the days of my life to your holy love; but it is only your grace that can make me fulfill this resolution. Grant me, O Lord, this grace for the sake of the Blood which you shed for me with so much pain and so much love. Let it be the glory of your power to make my heart, which was once full of earthly affections, now become all flames of love for you, O infinite Good. O Mother of Fair Love, O Mary, by your prayers, make my whole soul burn, as yours did, with the charity of God.”

This evening, in the silence of adoration, ask the Lord to come close to you to heal any spiritual blindness that afflicts you. Ask the Lord to have pity on you and your family and this parish. Ask him to bring his healing to the blindnesses of those in our neighborhood, especially those blind to his love the salvation offered through him, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

First Friday Holy Hour - November - Eucharistic Lessons from the Dishonest Steward

 As you know, for our first Friday Holy Hours, I like to draw some sort of Eucharist Lesson or insight from the readings or saint of the day. As, I mentioned this morning at Mass, today’s Gospel is very strange.

The Lord tells this parable about a dishonest steward who had been embezzling from his master’s business. The steward goes to the master’s debtors, who had been delinquent in paying their rent to the master, because the master, was an absentee landlord. The steward then falsifies entries in the books of accounts so that the debtors would be grateful to him, but also complicit in his fraud. Perhaps he would blackmail them later. And when the master discovers all this underhanded business, he’s actually impressed and praises the criminal mastermind for his shrewdness.

What Eucharistic lesson could we possible derive from this?

On one hand the lesson of the parables seems to be that Jesus wants his followers, like the steward in the parable, to employ cleverness, creativity, gumption, cunning, and ingenuity in and fulfilling our Gospel mandate.

On the other hand, Christians are not likely to be as cunning and shrewd as the “children of the world” as the Lord calls them, in dealing with worldly matters. We will not likely be as proficient with computers as criminal computer hackers or as sly and cutthroat as a corrupt politician. And that’s okay. We have other matters to do attend to: heavenly matters, spiritual matters. 

And that’s why we are hear tonight. We give up a Friday tonight, to pray, to kneel before the Lord, recognizing the priority of faith, strengthening and exercising faith, over all other earthly matters. We come to the Lord to be strengthened in what matters most, so that we can make inroads into the world, so that we can reach the minds and the hearts of the children of the world in bringing them to Christ.

We come here so that we can go out into the world in order to reach the criminal computer hacker, the corrupt politician, the drug addict, the pimp, and lead them to Christ. These people are not our enemy, they are our mission. 

And we kneel in front of the Lord recognizing our weakness, our lack of cleverness and capability, and facility with speaking, and timidity, and ask him to bless us, strengthen us, and embolden us to do the work he has for us, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

First Friday Holy Hour - October 2021 - St. Therese & the Eucharist

 On this Feast of the Little Flower, St. Therese of Liseaux, as we kneel in front of the Blessed Sacrament tonight, I would like to reflect a bit upon Therese’s profound Eucharistic Devotion, 

St. Therese was born into a family with a fervent Eucharistic spirituality.  Her parents attended Mass every day, and, as soon as the children were old enough, they would attend mass as well. 

Therese and her father went for a walk almost every afternoon, and they never came home without visiting one of the town’s churches or chapels to pray before the Blessed Sacrament. This is how she first encountered the Carmelite Order, during those daily visits to the Eucharist with her Father. 

During the school day, Therese would sacrifice her 15 minutes of recreation time e to pray before the tabernacle in the chapel, this occurred even before she made her First Holy Communion.

After she entered Carmel, she was saddened to discover that the Sisters did not receive Communion daily. But daily, she would kneel before the tabernacle and express her desire to receive the Lord. 

Once, her cousin wrote to the saint about the great temptations she was experiencing in Paris, and Therese, who was just 16 wrote back:  “Oh, my darling, think, then, that Jesus is there in the Tabernacle expressly for you, for you alone, He is burning with the de­sire to enter your heart ... so don't listen to the devil, mock him, and go without any fear to receive Jesus in peace and love… receive Communion often, very often. . . . That is the only remedy if you want to be healed.”

During the pandemic of the 1890s, her community’s policy regarding frequent communion changed, and Therese writes of “the unspeakable consolation of receiving Holy Communion every day”. After receiving Communion, she would ardently plead with the Lord: “Remain within me, as You do in the Tabernacle. Do not ever withdraw Your presence from Your little host.”

Near the end of her short life, when she had become quite ill, she dragged herself with great effort to receive Communion. One morning after Holy Communion, she was in her cell exhausted. One of the sisters remarked that she should not exert herself so much. The Saint replied, “Oh, what are these sufferings to me in comparison with one daily Holy Communion?” 

As we kneel before our Eucharistic Lord tonight, let us ask the intercession of the Little Flower to love him with an ever-purer child like love, to value more deeply the gift of being able to receive Him frequently, to seek the transformation of mind and heart that he wants for us, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

First Friday Holy Hour - February 2021 - Courage in uncertain times comes from the Eucharist

 This morning we celebrated the feast of the virgin martyr St. Agatha of Sicily, so widely venerated by the early Church. For resisting the advances of a degenerate civil official, she was arrested, and when she refused to offer pagan sacrifice to save her life, she was tortured and martyred. 

In 2005, Pope Benedict made a pastoral visit to St. Agatha’s native Sicily and celebrated mass for the people in Palermo. He acknowledged that in Palermo, as in the whole of Sicily, problems and worries and difficulties, he said, “are not lacking” in particular unemployment which gives rise to uncertainty and worry about the future, and also the physical and moral suffering caused by organized crime. Today I am among you, the Holy Father said, “to witness to my closeness and my remembrance in prayer. I am here to give you strong encouragement not to be afraid to witness clearly to the human and Christian values that are so deeply rooted in the faith and history of this territory and of its people.”

In a way, it sounds a lot like our own country, now in 2021. Unemployment, the breakdown of the family, organized crime in the form of vast corruption in government. We come here tonight, uncertain about the future. 

The Holy Father recalled how in past centuries the Church in Sicily was enriched and enlivened by such fervent faith, seen particularly in the lives of Sicily’s saints, like St. Rosalia, St. Lucy, and of course, St. Agatha. And how has inspired and guided family life, fostering values such as the capacity of giving of themselves, and the respect for life that constitutes a precious heritage to be jealously guarded. 

Again this makes us think of our own country, how the Christian faith so shaped and guided the early history of this country and family life. And now, religion is banished from public life, banished from schools, faith is replaced with materialism in many families, Catholic tradition is not kept or upheld or passed on. 

And I think that reading from mass this morning from the letter to the Hebrews is just so pertinent. Let brotherly love continue. Let marriage be honored among all. Let your life be free from love of money. Remember with confidence that the Lord is your helper. And where does true brotherly love come from, but the Eucharist. Where does honor for God's holy institutions like marriage come from, but from the Eucharist. Where does freedom from the love of money and all that keeps us from holiness, but from the Eucharist.

Do not do not fear, Pope Benedict said to the lay faithful of Palermo,  to live and to witness to the faith in the various contexts of society, in the many situations of human existence, especially in those that are difficult! May faith give you the power of God in order to be ever confident and courageous, to go ahead with new determination, to take the necessary initiatives to give an ever more beautiful face to your land. And when you come up against the opposition of the world, may you hear the Apostle’s words: “Do not be ashamed then of testifying to our Lord” (v. 8).

In difficult and confusing times, it is always best to return here, to the Blessed Sacrament, to receive the courage and guidance and inspiration we need to live with the courage we need to testify to the truth, and to remain faithful when faced, like St. Agatha, and the martyrs, with the opposition of the world. May our time with the Lord tonight bear fruit in this life and the life to come, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

First Friday Holy Hour - January 2021 - Mary Mother of the Eucharist

 

This morning at Mass for the Solemnity of the Motherhood of Mary, I reflected upon the beautiful image of the Madonna and Child. Already in the first centuries of the Church, the early Christians revered images of Our Lady holding the Christ Child. It is certainly a fitting image for us to contemplate, especially today on the octave day of Christmas, for this holy season aims at deepening our love and devotion for the Lord. And there has been no greater love for him, no greater devotion to him, than that of his mother. We contemplate the mother’s love for her son, that we might come to love him as she loves him.

Kneeling before the monstrance this evening, we are not limited to an artist’s representation, painted on canvas or on the wall of catacomb. The very word made flesh is present in our midst—the flesh held in the arms of the mother—cradled, nursed, and protected. She invites us to gaze upon him this evening, she invites us to tenderly enter into the stable of Bethlehem, like the shepherds, like the magi, like St. Joseph, like her very self, to quietly enter into Bethlehem to gaze lovingly upon his flesh.

She is the Mother of the Lord and therefore she the Mother of the Eucharist. St. Augustine writes that in the Eucharist "Mary extends and perpetuates Her Divine Maternity"  Wherever the Eucharist is, she is there, lovingly adoring him, inviting us to adore and worship him along with her. It was from her that the Lord took flesh and blood, the very flesh and blood we kneel before this evening. Her love for this Sacrament and her love for Jesus are the very same.

She is both the eternal Eucharistic Monstrance and also the eternal Eucharistic Adorer.

We can be sure that in those places where the Eucharist is profaned and abandoned and treated with little respect, there is also little love for the mother. But in those places where love and devotion to the mother increase, so too will love and devotion to the Eucharist.

We can be sure, too, that Our Lady wants nothing more than the life of her son to become more and more present in us, and so we will pray the rosary this evening, asking her to intercede for us, and for the world, that 2021 may be a year in which many souls return with great devotion and zeal to the eucharist, that the world may know through our Lady’s aid, blessing through Him for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

 

 

 

 

October 2020 - First Friday Holy Hour - Bread of Angels

 

After witnessing the Eucharistic Miracle in Bolsena Italy, the Pope tasked one of the well-known theologians of his day, the saintly domnican friar Thomas Aquinas, with composing the orations for a new feast in honor of the Body and Blood of Christ—the feast of Corpus Christi.

In addition to composing the beautiful hymn, the pange lingua, whose last verses we sing at benediction, "Tantum Ergo Sacramentum", St. Thomas composed for Corpus Christi a second hymn titled “Sacris solemniis” --on this sacred solemnity. Thanks to Mozart a few centuries later, we are particularly familiar with the last two stanzas of the sacris solemniis, which begins “panis angelicus fit panis hominum” the bread of angels is made into bread for men.

As we gather for eucharistic adoration on this feast of the holy angels, this evening, I thought I would reflect on that beautiful phrase “panis angelicus” so that perhaps we could love and appreciate the Eucharist as the angels do. Why does the great angelic doctor, Thomas Aquinas, refer to the Eucharist as the bread of angels?

Well the phrase “bread of angels” is first found in scripture in the 78^th Psalm: “God rained manna upon them for food; grain from heaven he gave them. Man ate the bread of the angels; food he sent in abundance.” While making their way to the promised land, God fed the Israelites with manna. The manna would appear daily, as a gift from heaven. It was believed that God used angels to place the manna every day, so it was rightly called the bread of angels.

The Lord takes up similar language in the bread of life discourse, teaching how he would feed the Church with the true bread from heaven in the Sacrament of his flesh and blood. “I Am the true bread that came down from heaven.” That daily manna in the desert was therefore a foreshadowing of the true bread of angels, Christ himself, who feeds the Church daily with his body and blood as we make our way to heaven.

Christ feeds us with his body and blood, so that our earthly journey may end in his presence in heaven. In the 4^th century, St. Augustine writes, so that man could come to behold  the vision of God the Lord of the angels became man, that we may partake of the bread of angels in heaven.

Thomas Aquinas expounded upon this idea in his Summa Theologica. The Eucharist can be called the bread of angels, for in a sense the angels feed on Christ. They do not physically consume Christ, as they do not have physical bodies. Rather they consume him spiritually, by beholding him, adoring him and worshiping him. 

We humans, on the other hand, partake of Christ, the Bread of Angels, according to our human nature, by receiving him under the sacramental species.

And yet, when we kneel in adoration of Christ in the Eucharist we are able to share in an angelic experience of Christ. We are really and truly side by side with the angels this evening. We worship him, we adore him along with the angels. 

We do so, imperfectly. So, it is quite fitting for us, on this feast of the holy angels, to ask your own guardian angel this evening to enflame in your heart the same love that burns in his angelic heart. Ask your guardian angel to help him to contemplate Christ on earth, that you may come to behold him face to face in heaven, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

September 2020 - First Friday Holy Hour - The wedding Feast and Eucharistic Adoration

Weddings are a recurring theme in the Gospel. The Lord’s first miracle recorded in the Gospel of John takes place at a wedding—the wedding at Cana—where the Lord transforms water into an abundance of wine. And, as we heard in this evening, the Lord compares his ministry—his dining with tax collectors and sinners—to a wedding feast. He is the bridegroom—and can the wedding guests fast while the bridegroom is with them?

The Lord’s original audience would no doubt have picked up on the messianic undertones of the all of this wedding language. The age of the Messiah, the long awaited for final stage of human history, when the Lord’s Messiah would usher in the definitive kingdom of God—is scripturally linked to the wedding feast. Through the work of the Messiah, the Lord God would provide for his people rich food and choice new wines—juicy rich food and pure choice wines.

So, the Gospel reading certainly helped the early church understand their place in history. This is the age of fasting. In the words of the Lord, “the bridegroom has been taken away”—he has ascended to the Father’s right hand. And so, we fast and do penance and prepare our souls for the bridegroom’s return. We are to be like those wise virgins who await the bridegroom with lighted lamps, waiting to be welcomed in the wedding feast. 

And yet, at the same time, the bridegroom is already here, isn’t he? We are already fed with the rich food and choice wine, of the Eucharist. At holy Mass. This is why the Church fathers speak of the Mass as a foretaste of heaven. Already we sit at the banquet table of the lamb. Already we are fed with the rich food from heaven—the Eucharist. And already we are able to mystically experience and celebrate the joining of the bridegroom to his bride—the Church—when we participate at Mass.

And when we come to Holy Hour, and adore the Blessed Sacrament—we are able to glimpse the Bridegroom—with joyful anticipation—like the Bride in the Song of Songs—who rejoices at the sight of her lover right standing at her window. “Here he stands behind the wall, gazing through the windows, peering through the lattices. My lover speaks; he says to me, Arise, my beloved, my dove, my beautiful one, and come!” The bridegroom of the Song of Songs says, “the flames of true devotion are a blazing fire. Deep waters cannot quench love, nor floods sweep it away.”

This night, we gaze upon the bridegroom. May he set our hearts afire with the flames of true devotion—flames that cannot be drowned by worldliness or selfishness or the floods of worldly anxiety. We kneel, and adore, and await his return where he will arrive, not simply under sacramental signs—but in the fullness of his glory…for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

August 2020 - First Friday - Reparation for sins against the Eucharist

 

This morning at Mass I reflected upon this powerful reading from the prophet Nahum: the prophet speaks of the terrible destruction that will afflict the kingdom of Judah and the holy city of Jerusalem at the hands of the Babylonian invaders. The prophets repeat over and over and over again: sin makes us vulnerable to the powers of evil—sin brings division, destruction and death.

In the midst of this prognostication of corpses, and ruined walls, Nahum offers a beautiful promise: the Lord will restore the vine of Jacob. Restoration will occur, but the effects of sin cannot be avoided. Purification will be precede restoration—and that purification might be painful, like scrubbing the debris out of a wound. 

At Mass on Sunday I extended the invitation to the parish to attend this evening of adoration and reparation, and I mentioned how needed acts of reparation are needed. I mentioned how a priest friend of mine, in this diocese, was distributing holy communion and a very troubled soul approached him, snatched the consecrated host from his hands, and threw the blessed sacrament to the ground and stomped upon it.

Purification, reparation is needed for sins against the Eucharist.

I also mentioned how we have heard stories of many parishes having very strange, irreverent, and even sacrilegious practices in distributing holy communion during this time of social distancing. Purification, reparation is needed for sins against the Eucharist, especially those which occur due to pastors being neglectful of their duties.

But purification, as we see over and over in the scriptures, is rarely, ever easy. Penance and mortification are likely the instruments the Holy Spirit will use to bring about purification within the body of Christ, the Church. Reparation must be done on our knees. 

But, we undertake these penances willingly don’t we, because we love the Eucharist, we love the Church, we yearn for tepid souls and ignorant souls to fall in love with the Lord, don’t we? And we trust, that the prayers and penances and acts of reparation we offer up for the good of souls and the good of the Church are received lovingly by God—the meager loaves and fishes of our sufferings—are taken by the Lord and multiplied—because they are offered up willingly in union with Christ.

We express to the Lord our concern for unbelievers, our prayers for reparation, purification, and restoration, and our adoring love, entrusting our hearts to him and the needs of the world and the Church to Him for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

July 2020 - First Friday Holy Hour - "My Lord and My God"

Prior to the second Vatican Council, it was quite common during the celebration of Mass, when the priest elevated the consecrated host, for the laity to whisper the words of St. Thomas in the Gospel today: “My Lord and My God” and perhaps too, to strike their breast penitentially. Though his heart was initially full of doubt, the Apostle Thomas’ doubt was transformed into faith—faith that the Lord Jesus was Risen from the dead and was truly present. So how fitting that the faithful developed this pious custom of echoing Thomas’ words of faith in the real presence of Christ: “My Lord and My God.”

This practice was so praiseworthy, that Pope St. Pius X, in 1907 issued a decree granting a partial indulgence if a person looked at the Body and Blood of Christ and said “My Lord and My God.” Perhaps, this custom ought to be rediscovered in this 21st century when faith in the real presence seems to be lacking, even among many mass going Catholics.

Another St. Thomas, 1200 years later wrote that while our physical senses of sight, taste, touch and smell, fail to detect the presence of Jesus in the Eucharist, our faith surely enables us to recognize his presence. Præstet fides supplementum Sensuum defectui…Let faith provide a supplement For the failure of the senses.

The beautiful prayer after Communion for mass on this Feast of Thomas the Apostle, too, gives such a beautiful summary of Eucharistic faith. Listen closely to this prayer: “O God, as we truly receive in this Sacrament the Body of your Only Begotten Son, grant, we pray, that we may recognize him with the Apostle Thomas by faith as our Lord and our God and proclaim him by our deeds and by our life.”

Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed. The Lord pronounces his blessing upon those who come before the Eucharist and believe that he is truly present. The promise of blessedness in this life and the next is offered to those who believe in the presence of Christ and allow that belief to shape their life.

This evening we come before our Eucharistic Lord to acknowledge that He is the source of all blessing. On this eve of our nation’s independence we beseech the Lord for all the graces we need in order to be a righteous nation, praying for conversion for all those who do not believe, praying for the grace to proclaim him by our deeds and by our life. Following our normal prayers of reparation, we will offer together the prayers of petition composed for the inauguration of President George Washington by Archbishop John Carroll, First Roman Catholic bishop in our country whose brother Charles Carroll was one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence.

May the Lord bless all who believe and bring about the conversion of all who do not, may he bless us with ever deeper Eucharistic faith and the grace to proclaim that faith in our deeds and by our life, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

June 2020 - First Friday - Eucharistic Lessons from an axe-wielding Bishop

At morning Mass I told one of my favorite stories from the saints, about the bishop and martyr St. Boniface, known as the apostle to the Germans. Boniface was an English Benedictine monk who devoted his life to evangelizing the Germanic Tribes, who at the time worshiped the false Norse gods and goddesses like Thor, Freya, Loki, and Odin. The Pagans were proving quite resistant to conversion, abandoning their false gods and accepting the Christian Gospel. So the holy missionary went to the giant oak tree where the Pagans gathered to offer false worship to Thor.  And Boniface took an axe, and he begins chopping down this pagan idol. The pagans cursed Boniface and waited for him to be struck dead by their gods for his sacrilege.  The story says that when Boniface had chopped just a small notch into the tree, God finished the job, the tree was blast apart from above.  And the pagans who had before cursed Boniface now began to believe.  And moreover, Boniface took the wood of the tree and built an oratory in honor of Saint Peter. 

Boniface’s actions certainly would not be considered politically correct in our modern age, but neither is the Gospel really, not when it is preached in its entirety.

What does this holy missionary, who went on to become bishop and a martyr for the faith teach us about eucharistic adoration? Well, we come here for the same reason, don’t we, that Boniface went to the pagan germans: that the Christian Gospel, that the kingdom may be spread, in our nation, in our neighborhoods, in our families, and in our hearts. We come here to pray that the Gospel may be spread—more devoutly preached and lived.

We also come here, not to a pagan idol, but to the One True God, truly present, here and now, under the appearance of bread and wine. He has the power to save us, he has the power to bring about true peace. He has the power to strike down the pagan oak trees that seem to be springing up like weeds in our modern culture. We come here to be equipped by him with the grace we need to be his instruments in the world--to be his axes in the world--his scythes for harvest and his swords of truth. We come here also to pray that our bishops, especially our future bishop of Cleveland, may be well-equipped and have the competency and courage to utilize the spiritual weapons at their disposal. That their faith may be sturdier than any pagan oak, that they may wield the blade of the spirit, to convict us of the Gospel.

And we come here before our Eucharistic Lord, that any worldliness, any vice, any coldness toward God or neighbor, may be struck down within us. May the Lord help us to identify anything within us that is resistant to the Gospel, any pagan oaks or weeds of worldliness, anything that keeps us from experiencing the peace that comes from God, and anything that keeps us from the courage exhibited by saints and martyrs like Boniface, any fear or timidity that keeps us from witnessing to the transforming power of the Gospel, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

January 2020 - First Friday Holy Hour - Bethlehem and Eucharist

Gospel - LK 2:16-21
The shepherds went in haste to Bethlehem and found Mary and Joseph,
and the infant lying in the manger.
When they saw this,
they made known the message
that had been told them about this child.
All who heard it were amazed
by what had been told them by the shepherds.
And Mary kept all these things,
reflecting on them in her heart.
Then the shepherds returned,
glorifying and praising God
for all they had heard and seen,
just as it had been told to them.
When eight days were completed for his circumcision,
he was named Jesus, the name given him by the angel
before he was conceived in the womb.
 

Just 10 days ago, we sang those beloved words, “Adeste Fidelis, Venite Adoremus” Come, Ye Faithful, Come, Let us Adore Him. Well, tonight we fulfill those words. We gather this evening on the feast of the Holy Name, to adore the one who is called Jesus and Lord.

At Christmas, we looked to the crib, to the beauty of the crèche, and we were drawn to gaze with love upon the face of the Christ Child. We imagined what it was like for Joseph and Mary to see that face for the first time.

As they gazed upon Christ as he was that first Christmas in Bethlehem, we gaze upon Christ as he is, not just once a year, or once in a lifetime, but how he is every day, mysteriously under the appearance of bread and wine.

It is no coincidence that the word Bethlehem, in Hebrew means, “The House of Bread.”  St. Mother Theresa of Calcutta reflects upon the connection between Bethlehem and the Eucharist. “The Holy Eucharist is the continuation of Christ’s incarnation on earth. The mystery of the Eucharist gives us the joy of having Christmas every day. When we come to the Blessed Sacrament we come to Bethlehem, a name which means “house of bread.” Jesus chose to be born in Bethlehem because He would dwell with us forever as the “Living Bread” come down from heaven. When the shepherds and Magi came to adore Him, they brought Him so much joy with their humble visit to Bethlehem that their visit has been praised and retold down through the centuries. God has never stopped honoring them for honoring His Son in Bethlehem. So too, your humble visit to Jesus today in the Blessed Sacrament brings Him so much joy that it will be retold for all eternity and bring the world closer to His promise of peace on earth.”

In Bethlehem, the prophecy of Emmanuel was fulfilled: the prophecy of God-with-us was fulfilled at Bethelehem. So, too the Emmanuel prophecy is fulfilled in the Eucharist. For in the Eucharist God is truly with us. “Bethlehem”, says servant of God Fr. John Hardon, “is wherever there is a Catholic Church or chapel in which Christ is present.”

What an honor, then, for us to visit Bethlehem this evening, to adore Emmanuel, the Christ Child, to gaze on him in love, to ask him to bless us with his peace, to strengthen us in virtue, to nourish our souls with the wheat of his body and the wine of his blood. Bethlehem heralds the Eucharist. May our lives resonate with the peace of Bethlehem today and always, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

December 2019 - First Friday Holy Hour - Light in our Darkness

During the Advent Season daylight is seen less and less, the darkness comes earlier, the weather grows colder.  Remember back in summer—the long wonderful days of summer, sunlight until 9pm?

As we near Christmas, the days get darker and darker, and in response so many of our Advent prayers and liturgies call to mind the promises of God’s light.  We watch for “the dawn from on high to break upon us”, we watch for the coming of the Lord, the coming of the Messiah. Isaiah prophecies that the coming of the messiah will bring so much light that “out of the gloom and darkness, the eyes of the blind will see”.

One of the recurring themes in the Gospel is Jesus bringing light to the eyes of the blind.

What beautiful words, we hear in the Gospel today, “He touched their eyes…and their eyes were opened.” What a wonderful thing to ponder, as we kneel before the Lord in the Holy Eucharist this evening.

We wouldn’t be here tonight if the Lord had not already touched the eyes of our soul bestowing the gift of faith. As St. Thomas rightly puts it: what our physical senses fail to detect, faith rightly perceives. We perceive through faith that the Lord is truly present. We see rightly with our souls that he is here. Blessing us with his presence.

And he sees us. As he looks out upon the Church from the thousands of altars around the world, he sees souls coming to him to be healed, souls looking to him for guidance and strength, souls looking to him to be their light in the darkness and chaos of this fallen world.

Lord heal our blindnesses, Lord scatter our gloom and darknesses, Lord clarify our confused paths. Surround us, protect us, and enfold us in your light.

Through our Advent prayer, may the have pity on us, and touch the eyes of our hearts, deepen our faith, and strengthen us in his service for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

September 2019 - First Friday Holy Hour - New Wineskins and Eucharistic Adoration

“New wine must be poured into fresh wineskins” .

At mass this morning, I reflected upon how these words remind us of the need for constant renewal in the Christian life. Baptism transforms our souls into new wineskins of grace, but without renewal, prayer, without faithfulness, and the Sacraments, our souls can become brittle again, resistant to the sanctification the Lord desires for us.

We know Catholics, even members of our families, who though baptized, have become resistant to grace. The mere mentioning of the Church at a family gathering, or even a gentle reminder of the need to return to the Sacraments can lead to a heated argument.

So we come before Our Eucharistic Lord tonight for them and for ourselves. We entrust the fallen-away to the Sacred Heart, pleading for miracles of conversion. And we come before Lord asking for conversion for our hearts as well, for the grace we need to be instruments of healing and evangelization.

At World Youth Day, in Cologne, in 2005, Pope Benedict spoke about the profound transformation which the Eucharist both signifies and brings about. He said, “This first fundamental transformation of violence into love, of death into life, brings other changes in its wake. Bread and wine become his Body and Blood. But it must not stop there; on the contrary, the process of transformation must now gather momentum. The Body and Blood of Christ are given to us so that we ourselves will be transformed in our turn…His dynamic enters into us and then seeks to spread outwards to others until it fills the world, so that his love can truly become the dominant measure of the world.”

We kneel down in Adoration, there is a profound contact of our heart with His. The Latin word for adoration, after all is, is ad-oratio - an embrace of love. We embrace Him and He embraces us to make us like Himself.

So let us take some time now to become quiet, to adore the Lord who embraces us and transforms us, who longs to heal us of selfishness and fear, we seeks to set our hearts ablaze with the fire of His Sacred Heart.

After a period of silent adoration, we will offer prayers of reparation followed by benediction.
Rejoice, for the Bridegroom is with us, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.