Today on the Feast Day of Corpus Christi, I am aware of a renewed sense of profound gratitude for the sublime gift of Jesus Himself in the Eucharist after undergoing the deprivation of not being able to receive Our Lord for more than two months during the Covid-19 pandemic. Oh, how I missed the King of my heart during those long weeks, but how He also stoked a renewed awareness of the Divine Indwelling within me. He kept whispering to me throughout those long days not to forget that "the Kingdom of God is within" and that He never leaves us orphaned. These are His promises. He builds this Trinitarian Indwelling within each one of us using the Eucharist as the foundation, as a "living stone" that enables perpetual adoration within the altar of one's heart. Just like Brother Lawrence tells us in the Practice of the Presence of God, "We do not have to go to Church to be with God. We can make our hearts an oratory where we can withdraw from time to time to converse with him there, gently, humbly, and lovingly." [Letter 9] This of course is hard to do in the midst of missing our Beloved so very much, but certainly not impossible as we abide in Him and in His Word. [See https://carmelphoenix.blogspot.com/2012/11/celebrating-indwelling-with-bl.html]
Indeed, all daily happenings direct us to God and draw us to Him. Nothing is wasted. Even those weeks of being without the Mass and the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ were a time of stirring the strongest desires of my heart for deeper union and communion with Him, and a longing to receive what perhaps I had taken for granted so many times. In the midst of my thirst, He was calling me closer to Himself in the center of my soul where He resides, and where only He can slake this unquenchable desire for eternal food. Day in and day out there was an opportunity for interior encounter as I fasted from physically being able to receive Him from the hands of the priest, but was invited to more intently enter into the silent sanctuary within my heart.
Now fast forward a few weeks later into a semi-restored rhythm of sacramental life, and the invitation and call is deepening to be as 'zakar'-a remembering one. Remember what life was like without His eucharistic presence, and remember all that He has done for me all the days of my life to this very moment. Recall His goodness, mercy, and kindness and seek to strive , be transformed into His very likeness by becoming what we eat. Like St. Leo the Great said, "For the effect of our sharing in the body and blood of Christ is to change us into what we receive. As we have died with Him, and have been buried and raised to life with Him, so we bear him within us, both in body and in spirit, in everything we do."
So how do we imitate Our Master in becoming food for others and ensuring that we receive Jesus with the proper respect and love that He deserves? I believe that the key is found in the concept of light. This is because everything that we eat has its origin in light which provides energy for plants to grow and all the means by which all of creation and humanity itself is sustained. "Let there be light." were the first words of creation. Jesus told His disciples, "I am the light of the world" [Jn 8:12]. In the Nicene Creed we identify Jesus as "God from God, Light from Light, true God from True God." In the Eucharist, Jesus nourishes our deepest spirits through His Divine Light empowered by the Holy Spirit. At Holy Mass, He beckons us towards Him like a magnet, "While you have the Light, believe in the Light, so that you may become sons of light." [Jn 12:36].
Just as light transforms green plants and leaves into light energy which is captured and then used to convert water, carbon dioxide, and minerals into oxygen and other energy-rich organic compounds in the process of photosynthesis, so must we receive the Eucharist into our hearts and allow the process of heating up our hearts in the Rays of the Son to allow for internal change, purification, and illumination. If we receive Him with openness, attentiveness and surrender, He gifts us with the nourishment and energy we need to become the children of the light He calls us to be. We are assumed into Him and become grafted into His interior life, which enables us to be transformed into a container of Jesus' Divine Essence as well as food for others we encounter on the journey. Jesus as the Light is welcomed within and begets more light. This light produces energy and food that can then be blessed, broken, and shared with others.
Where there is Light there is life, truth, and the radiance of God. Pope Benedict XVI tells us that "In the Biblical message, light is the most immediate image of God. He is total Radiance, Life, Truth, Light...The resurrection of Jesus is an eruption of Light, the tomb is thrown open. The Risen One Himself is Light, the Light of the world. With the Resurrection, the Lord's day enters into the nights of history."
St. Pope John Paul II tells us when celebrating a solemn Mass to institute the Year of the Eucharist in 2008,
Mystery of light! The human heart, oppressed by sin, often disoriented, tired and burdened by all sorts of suffering, needs light. The world, too, needs light in its difficult search for a seemingly distant peace at the beginning of a new millennium distressed and humiliated by violence, terrorism and war.
The Eucharist is light! In the Word of God constantly proclaimed, bread and wine become the body and blood of Christ. It is He, the resurrected Lord, who opens minds and hearts. When the bread is broken, He lets Himself be recognised as did the two disciples in Emmaus.
In his ENCYCLICAL LETTER ECCLESIA DE EUCHARISTIA, he reiterates this call to become as light, food, and sacrament for others:
How our own hearts, homes, communities, nation, and world need this light. Let us approach this beautiful Sacrament of Light with open hearts, minds, hands, eyes and ears to receive Him who is the refulgence of light itself, and desires to make us partakers in His Light and become as food- nourishing, life-giving, and a source of breath and blessing for others. Amen.
