Take, Eat, Digest, Live
2021년 8월 8일Take, Eat, Digest, Live!
<Nineteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time >
Imagine being really, really hungry so you go to the kitchen and sit in front of the refrigerator, staring at it for forty-five minutes, and then you just get up and go. Even if you spent that whole time thinking about food, you would not be satisfied. Or suppose your mother comes along while you are sitting there, opens the refrigerator door, and takes out some food to show you, then puts it away again. Not very filling either. No, the only way to satisfy your hunger is to take and eat some food.
Jesus gave us his body and blood in the Eucharist, not to be locked away in the tabernacle where we can think about him and even pray to him, much less to be put in a monstrance where we can adore him in the Blessed Sacrament. Don’t get me wrong. Thinking about Jesus, praying to him, and even adoring him are wonderful spiritual practices. But nothing compares to our actually taking communion and eating the consecrated host so Jesus can truly nourish, strengthen and sanctify us. Just as you wouldn’t sit down to a formal dinner without first washing your hands, and just as you would never serve a meal on dirty dishes, so too we must come to this divine banquet of the Eucharist with a clean conscience and pure heart. We must present ourselves as living, loving tabernacles in which to cherish the sacred bread that is the Body of Christ so that, in turn, we might also become the Body of Christ.