The Eucharist and a generous
Christian life (E.J.Tyler)

1. Our human nature
One of the characteristics of our human nature is that we come to
know things initially through our senses. We start from what we see,
hear, feel, taste or smell. We then abstract, consider, theorize, and
go on to higher forms of knowledge. But we start with what we can sense
because we live in a material world and we are ourselves part of that
world. We tend to prefer to consider things with the aid of images,
because that is how we generally come to know things. So people prefer
to read a novel or a comic rather than a work of philosophy that
considers things abstractly.
That consideration looks at things from our side. From
God’s side, we notice a similar pattern in his dealings with us. God is
utterly other than the material universe, utterly beyond it. He is not
material and in every respect he is not limited either. But in his
dealings with us he acts in and through the material world. The world
itself speaks of him, if we let it. It speaks of his power, of his
intelligence, of his goodness. But over and above the very fact of the
universe, God has dealt with man by acting in history and in the
course of events. He has communicated directly with certain people,
Abraham, Moses and the prophets, and finally he sent his own divine Son
to become one of us. It was done in a material way, within the
limitations of the material world. God accommodated himself and adapted
to our capacities his method of communicating with us. We are capable
of knowing things, including him, but we start from what we see, hear,
feel, taste and smell. God made us to start through our knowledge of
material phenomena, and so too in his communication with man God has
made use
of material phenomena.
2. The danger
Now, on the positive side, because all comes from the hand of
God, and because God in his own dealings with us immerses himself in
his material creation so as to make himself accessible to us, we are
able to know sublime realities that lie behind material phenomena. But
on the negative side we can very easily take these wonderful and even
divine realities that are clothed in material form for granted. We see
this in the attitude people displayed to our Lord himself. There we had
a man who
walked the earth and who was the Son of God himself, in his nature
equal to the Father, and in whom the fulness of the Godhead dwelt
bodily. Yet throughout his years at Nazareth, his townspeople and
relatives knew nothing of this, with the exception of Mary and Joseph
in his immediate family, the Holy Family. When his public ministry
began and his greatness became gradually apparent, still, the notion
that he was divine was not accepted. It evoked a tremendous opposition
from some.
There was an enormous greatness beyond compare hidden
beneath what people saw, heard and felt. They did not rise beyond the
appearances and discern the deeper reality. Our Lord was
rejected, persecuted, and put to death. The great danger in matters of
religion and of God is that we shall rest in mere appearances, and not
attempt to get behind the appearances and recognise through a living
faith the true nature of the reality before us.
3. Living by faith not by
sight
Our Lord rose from the dead, appeared repeatedly to his
disciples in his risen physical reality, then went back to heaven. But
he remains with us invisibly as the head of the Church, promising to do
so till the end of time. He remains with us but we do not see his risen
physical form as did the disciples before his Ascension. He continues
in his full risen reality to act within the Church, enabling us to
approach him and receive from him his gifts of grace that he won for us
by his death and resurrection. How do we approach him when we do not
see
him in his physical form? We encounter him in the preaching and
teaching of his word and in the Sacraments. When the Church’s pastors
teach us in his name and proclaim his word by reading and explaining
the Scriptures, it is Christ who is teaching us. When the Church’s
pastors give to us the Sacraments, it is Christ who comes to us in
those Sacraments to give us his gifts of grace and the Holy Spirit. We
must therefore be on guard against our tendency to think that what we
see going on is no more than what we see. We will tend to think that
when the reader at Mass is reading the scripture passage, all we are
hearing is an inspiring text. We will tend to miss the deeper reality
that the living Jesus is speaking to us through his word. It will
become a ceremonial routine. And when the priest preaches his homily,
we will tend to think that it is just a talk by the priest, and forget
what it really is, the living Jesus speaking to us through him. It is
the living word of God being uttered to us by God himself. We will tend
to miss all
this because we usually go on what we see, rather than on what has been
revealed to us by God. We will tend to live by sight, and not by faith.
This applies to the Sacraments as well. We tend to think that when we
go to Confession, we are confessing our sins to a man because that is
what we see, rather than to our Lord whom we cannot see. The Sacraments
are signs that symbolize what Christ here and now within the Sacrament
is doing. The Sacrament of Penance symbolizes and shows forth the
forgiving action of our Lord. It our Lord who is doing what is being
symbolized. It is not just a symbolic ceremonial action. It is not just
a ceremony performed in the presence of God by certain religious
officials. It is the action
of the living person of Jesus. Our Lord is really there doing
what the action of the Priest shows. In the case of Confession, it is
an encounter with the forgiving Christ who is invisible. Christ is in
the priest. That is to say, we must approach with faith, not just with
sight.
4. The Eucharist is a
sacrament
This encounter with the invisible Jesus doing what is
symbolized in the action of the Sacrament applies above all in the case
of the Sacrament of the Eucharist. This is the first thing we must
really appreciate, that the Sacraments are encounters with the living
risen Jesus. It is in and through the Sacraments that Jesus touches us
and fills us with his sanctifying blessings. He is as truly present and
active in the Sacraments as if we were to meet him in his visible
physical form. He is more present still, because now in the Eucharist
he is able to attain a far more intimate union with us than was
possible for him while he walked the earth with the physical
limitations that came with the Incarnation prior to his resurrection.
But the problem is that we
do not see his visible physical form, and because we depend so much on
our senses for what we know, we tend to think that all that there is
there is just a ceremony. We miss our Lord, or think he is there only
in a general spiritual sense. We need to bear in mind in a spirit of
living faith who really is there: Jesus in his full risen, bodily and
divine reality. The person and the actions involved in the Sacrament
are signs of the presence of Jesus, and what those actions symbolize
reveal the kind of thing Jesus is doing here and now for the person
receiving the Sacrament.
5. The Eucharistic presence
The greatest of the Sacraments is the Eucharist. Somehow we must
get into the habit of appreciating and remembering just what the Mass
is whenever we are about to participate in it. As said above, we will
tend to think of
it just as readings, just a sermon by the priest, just a long and
beautiful prayer read out by the priest and listened to by all of us
together, with Jesus simply somehow there in a general sense, more or
less in the way God is everywhere. It is not hard to
forget the special presence of Jesus at Mass especially if we are in
the habit
of chatting in the church before and after Mass, during the collections
and after having received Holy Communion, or if we are thinking of the
kind of singing that is going on. The great reality at Mass is the
living Jesus and we are meant to unite ourselves with him in what he is
doing. We must constantly remember what the Church teaches us about the
Mass, and it is each person’s responsibility to think about this, to
appreciate it, to remember it, and to act according to it. If we do
not, the riches of the Mass will pass us by.
6. The Mass: Calvary made
present
So then, what is the Mass? The Church teaches us
that in some mysterious way, the Mass is Calvary made present - but of
course Calvary present in different circumstances. We do not see or
hear the hammer blows and the shouts and the yelling, nor the silent
figure on the Cross so full of pain. But all this was not of the
essence of the sacrifice of our Lord at Calvary. The momentous thing
about Calvary was the complete gift of himself by Christ to the Father
on our behalf. That was the essence of it, Christ’s gift of himself in
complete obedience to the Father on our behalf, expressed in and
through unimaginable sufferings. As fallen creatures, we could not
offer to
the Father the gift of our complete obedience, because we were and are
under the power of sin. Christ did it for us. In doing this, Christ
made up for the sins of each one of us and gave to his heavenly Father
a perfect sacrifice of obedience and praise from humanity. By his death
he took away the sin of the world.
In some mysterious way, the Last Supper was the first
Mass, and the disciples who were present were mysteriously united to
our
Lord’s sacrifice the next day. Every time Mass is celebrated, that
sacrifice of himself at Calvary that won for us our salvation is made
present. A flood of heavenly and saving blessings is made present in
the person of Christ at Mass. In Holy Communion we are able to enter
into communion with our Lord in his gift of himself to the Father on
our behalf. Christ’s sacrifice is able to be our own sacrifice by means
of Holy Communion. He gives himself to us and in giving himself
to us he brings us the gifts of grace he won for us by his sacrifice on
Calvary. It is as if we are present at Calvary, uniting ourselves to
him in union with our Lady at the foot of the cross. We give ourselves
to him, and he gives himself to us with all the blessings he brings
from heaven. The greatest blessing is the grace to be generous in our
surrender to the Father in obedience, a surrender we live out each day
in union with our Lord.
Just as Calvary was the summit of our Lord’s life and the source
of the blessings he won for us, so too the Mass (which is Calvary made
present) is the summit of the life of the Church and of each one of us,
and the source of our whole Christian life, with the blessings of grace
it contains. It is from the Mass that we obtain the graces we need to
be generous
and persevering, because in some mysterious way the Mass is the
sacrifice of Calvary made present. I remember years ago attending a
talk given by an Anglican girl. She said that she had resolved to love
others in the way our Lord wanted. To gain the grace to do this she
resolved to go to the Eucharist regularly. She had the right idea, even
though her Anglican Eucharist was probably not a valid Eucharist.
7. We must participate
But of course, if we are to profit from this tremendous
reality we must truly enter into it. We must participate in the Mass
heart and soul. The great effort of the Church ever since the Second
Vatican Council forty years ago has been to help everyone who goes to
Mass to participate profoundly in the action of the Mass. This means
entering into a deep union with our Lord and with the Church his body,
because the Mass is his action and in him it is the Church’s action. It
is an action of self-giving to the Father in the Son by the power of
the Holy Spirit. If we do this, it will bring us tremendous resources
of grace. Grace will flow from Christ to us to enable us to be generous
in our living of a Christian and apostolic life.
8. Mass will inspire us
Apart from receiving abundant help and grace from Christ through
our participation in Mass, if we keep before us what the Mass really
is, it will inspire us throughout the day. We must remember constantly
that the Mass is Christ making himself and his sacrifice at Calvary
present. So whenever we think of the Mass we ought think of Christ
giving everything to the Father on our behalf. When we go to Mass we
participate in that gift of our Lord to his Father and make it our own.
We must bring to it the whole of our life, offering it to the Father
with Christ every time we participate in Mass. Then when we depart from
Mass we ought bring to our daily life the union with our Lord which our
Lord makes possible at Mass, and offer every part of every day to the
Father in the Mass we have been to or the Mass we will soon be
attending. The very thought of Mass, if we keep in mind what it really
is, ought fire our imagination and inspire our hearts to be generous
with the generosity of Christ. At Mass when our Lord comes to us he
comes bringing with him the gift of the Holy Spirit. In the Letter to
the Hebrews the inspired author writes that Christ offered himself up
on the Cross by the power of the Holy Spirit, and rose from the dead by
the power of the Holy Spirit too. At Mass Christ in uniting himself
with us gives us the grace of the Holy Spirit to help us to offer
ourselves up with him together with all the prayers, works, joys and
sufferings of the day. Our morning offering ought be made in union with
the Masses that are being celebrated, and the Mass we will soon be
participating in. Why? Because Mass is the offering of our Lord in
obedience to the Father, the greatest act of generosity in the history
of the world. By means of the Mass we are able to unite ourselves with
that greatest of acts of generosity. To name but one saint, St
Josemaria Escriva was constantly living in thanksgiving for the last
Mass and preparing for the next. In that way he made the Mass the
summit and the source of his entire Christian life.
9. Mass and Confession
The thought of the Mass ought inspire us to go to
Confession frequently and regularly. If we are to make the complete
offering of ourselves with Christ that participation in the Mass calls
for, we ought prepare for it by frequent Confession. It is much easier
to make a full personal offering to the Father if one’s sins have been
forgiven and cleansed. I am speaking now of the Confession of venial
sins. Moreover, if we have the excellent practice of frequent and
regular Confession, say - even every week, then a very good way of
preparing for a good Confession is to go to Mass and make the coming
Confession the intention being prayed for at that Mass.
10. Holiness is our goal
Let us ask ourselves if we are using the time God has given us in
life to make real progress in personal holiness. Are we truly earnest
about this great goal, the goal of loving God as perfectly as possible?
We could be just coasting along and not really working at it. Let us
during these moments of prayer consider how well we are keeping to a
plan of spiritual life, how well we are sanctifying our daily work
whatever it
is, how well we are working at our daily duties and responsibilities.
An excellent model for every one of us is the Holy Family, given over
to humble daily work and harmony and a silent yet total obedience to
God our Father in everyday life. The Mass will be our principal means
of achieving this hidden sanctity, so let us put an
extremely high priority on Mass as the centre and the summit of our
Christian life.