The Sign of Peace... in the Gospels?

Earlier this week I was reading Jesus' instructions to the Twelve prior to sending them out to the villages he planned to visit. I found myself wondering about this particular verse, "And whatever town or village you enter, find out who is worthy in it, and stay with him until you depart. As you enter the house, salute it. And if the house is worthy, let your peace come upon it; but if it is not worthy, let your peace return to you" (Mt. 10:11-13). What exactly did the Lord mean, "let your peace come upon it...but if it is not worthy let your peace return to you?" I'm not sure, nor can I find a satisfying answer in the commentaries I have consulted. Perhaps peace, in this context, simply means fellowship, friendship; when we extend charity to others, and it is not reciprocated, our souls are not depleted in any way. I still feel like there is something more to be learned here.

Regardless, this verse returned to my mind at today's Mass during the Sign of Peace. At Mass we unite ourselves to the prayer and offering of the Lord Jesus. We turn to each other as members, cells, of our Lord's Body and, in His name, say "Peace be with you." We are like the Apostles in the gospel, speaking peace upon the house that the Lord will enter in Holy Communion. And just after the sign of peace we petition the Lamb of God to send us His mercy and peace, finally kneeling and confessing, "Lord, I am not worthy that you should enter under my roof; but only say the word and my soul shall be healed."

The question then becomes, "Will I allow the Lord's peace, His friendship, to remain upon this house - upon me? Or will I squander this gift He has made to me of Himself?" There seem to be so many ways to do so - sins of speech, neglecting Him in my thoughts, etc. I just offered a prayer for all who read this, a prayer that you cooperate with His grace and continue to live in His peace. I would be grateful if you did the same for me! 

And he came and preached peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near; for through him we both have access in one Spirit to the Father. So then you are no longer strangers and sojourners, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure is joined together and grows into a holy temple in the Lord; in whom you also are built into it for a dwelling place of God in the Spirit.   Ephesians 2:17-22

It's New Year's Day - Why Am I Supposed to Go to Mass?

Besides offering this new year to the Father in union with Jesus (the best start to a year imaginable), today's liturgical feast - Mary, the Mother of God - gives us a whole lot to contemplate! The God Who brought this universe into existence, who ordained the orbit of our planets before a single atom was formed, took flesh inside a young woman in Palestine. She was the most beautiful creature He ever created - although those living around her day-in and day-out didn't see it. "The LORD sees not as man sees; for man looks on the outward appearance, but the LORD looks on the heart" (1 Samuel 16:7). He did not bring her into being to act as a home for a brief nine months, but to be His Mother - the person to whom He would entrust Himself, whole and entire. She was not simply the person from whom He took the flesh and blood He used to redeem the world.  She nursed and warmed Him with her body. She was His diaper-changer, roommate, nutritionist and chef, educator, sounding board, prayer partner and confidant.  She was His Mother - God has really, truly become a man! Jesus, our God, truly has a Mother - a Mother He formed for Himself!  And not for Himself alone.  As He said to John, our representative there at the foot of the Cross, "Behold, your mother!" (John 19:27).

Mary, Mother of God, our Mother, may the Holy Spirit make you our companion, our most faithful companion, as we set out to journey through this next year. We give ourselves entirely into your arms, as the Incarnate Word Himself did, knowing that we shall find Him there, nestled against your heart. May His Spirit flood our hearts with that same love with which He flooded yours. Amen. 
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Bonus:  Today is also the 8th Day of Christmas, the day we celebrate Jesus circumcision (entry into God's covenant with Israel) and His naming by St. Joseph.

Thank you to "On Call with Wendy Wiese" for this image!

 

Making Pilgrimage - A Touch of Irony

This Sunday is Palm Sunday, the liturgical celebration of Jesus' final Passover pilgrimage to Jerusalem.  As the Torah commanded, He traveled to Jerusalem to celebrate Passover in the Spring, Pentecost or the Feast of Weeks fifty days later, and Tabernacles in the fall (Ex.23:14-17; 34:22-23).  Keeping the feasts allowed the Jewish people to not only relive Israel’s deliverance, the giving of the Law, and entrance into the Promised Land; but to look ahead to the time when the Messiah would usher in a period of unequaled freedom, faithfulness, and prosperity.  That reached a fever pitch when Jesus entered Jerusalem amidst the other pilgrims on Palm Sunday.  

Why make pilgrimage to Jerusalem?  Because of the Temple! It is impossible to overstate the Temple's importance in Judaism.  It was the only place on earth from which legitimate sacrifice, avodah, could be offered by Israel’s Levitical priests.  The synagogue and prayer in the home were never a substitute for the sacrificial worship of the Temple, but means for those living at a distance to unite themselves to it. Prayer in the synagogue took place facing the Temple, at the same time as the morning and evening sacrifice.  And although Jews recognized that the universe itself couldn’t contain God, His presence in their Temple was utterly unique.  It was “His House.”  Just look at the love and esteem Jesus showed for His "Father's House" throughout the gospels.

And all of these elements have of course been carried over into Christianity - pilgrimage, the centrality of sacrifice (Jesus' sacrifice, made present in the Eucharist), and even our church buildings as "God's House."

Now, in the title of this post I mentioned that there is an ironic aspect to making a pilgrimage.  I do not mean to discount the wonderful experience that pilgrimage can be - traveling to the places where the awesome events in salvation history took place and being able to pray there.  It simply strikes me that the most important pilgrimage we can make is the one we make down the road each Sunday morning to the local parish where Jesus, God Himself, is present in the tabernacle.  We visit God's House, where we enter into Jesus' Passover from earth to the Heaven in the Eucharistic celebration!  There are surely wonderful benefits to be gained in making a pilgrimage overseas, but it cannot objectively bring you into any more intimate contact with God than your mini-pilgrimage to Palm Sunday Mass in your local parish.  And that is something to celebrate!

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Praying the "Our Father" at Mass

Our Faith is so immensely deep that we will never stop unpacking it. At Mass, just today, I was struck by the placement of the Our Father within the Liturgy of the Eucharist:

The Our Father could be prayed at any point, but it is only after the Consecration, when Jesus is sacramentally and substantially present with us, that we pray "Our Father." Jesus is present to us in the Liturgy in several different ways - in the other members of the congregation, in the priest through Holy Orders, in the Word  proclaimed to us - but it is only after He becomes substantially present to us in the Eucharist that, together with Him, we say "Our Father." 

It takes my mind to two beautiful passages of Scripture. The first is from John's Gospel, when the Risen Christ sent Mary Magdalen to the Apostles with the message, "I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God" (Jn 20:17). And the second is from the pen of Paul, "Because you are his sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, “Abba, Father!" (Gal 4:6).

The majesty of pronoun "Our" in the Our Father derives from its inclusion of Christ Jesus!

Richest Man in the World

Now, I realize that I am not; but I feel like it.
 
Walking back to my seat after receiving Communion, I had one of those moments of clarity. "Lord Jesus, You are here. You are in me. You are greater than anything else I could ever want. In You, I have everything. You are the treasure I want for all eternity."

I am not the richest man in the world. Everyone who receives the Lord in Communion is equally as rich as me. That is staggering.  How can I, how can we, not marvel at this reality? "Oh God, Creator of all, Your love for us is beyond all comprehension."

Answers to More Questions about the Eucharist

A month ago, I posted an email question from a former Catholic and my response. He asked me to explain why the Eucharist wasn't an act of idolatry.  (You can read it here).  This morning he sent a follow up email.  His comments are in white, and mine in yellow.  Please keep this seeker in your prayers!

____________________________________

Dear Derek (name has been changed),

Thank you for your email.  I thought my response would be clearer if I responded to each part of your letter in turn.

Dear Shane,

Thank you for your reply.

I still feel you have left my question unanswered. The problem is how can a priest convert a piece of bread into the Body, blood soul and divinity of Our Lord Jesus, the second person in the Trinity. I do believe in Transubstantiation - that one substance is changes into another but one substance i.e. bread is changed into the flesh of Christ but one substance is changed into two body and blood is not acceptable , but I fail to see however how does the soul and divinity come in.

Derek, I think if you go back and read your original question, you will discover that I actually did answer it, as stated.  Here you are raising new questions, more specific questions than you did before – and honestly, that’s quite exciting.  It is by really grappling with Christ’s teachings that we open ourselves to receiving all He has for us!

That you believe in Transubstantiation is wonderful, because it should make what I’m about to say a little easier to understand.  You said that you believe “bread is changed into the flesh of Christ but one substance,” not two, “body and blood.”  Excellent, because that is what the Church teaches.  And here is the next step:

Christ’s Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity, are joined together.  Where one is, there the whole Christ becomes present.  So if the bread’s substance is changed to that of Christ’s Body, His Blood, Soul, and Divinity must likewise be present there as well.  And if the substance of the wine is changed into that of His Blood, then His Body, Soul, and Divinity must be present there as well.  This is called concomitance. To say otherwise would be to say that Christ could be divided up.  No, He is a living Person, a Person both divine and human (body, blood, soul).We’re talking about something supernatural, it does not violate reason, but it is something above our powers of thought to completely comprehend.

God is spirit and we must worship him in spirit.

Yes, “in spirit and truth” (Jn.4:23)

In the book of Acts chapter 7:48, 17:24, it states that God does not live in temples built by man.

The Jewish people knew that the Creator of the universe could not be contained in building made of a stone (1 Kg.8:27).  No one knew this better than the God-Man, and yet Jesus reverenced the Temple as “My Father’s house” (Lk.2:49; Jn.2:16). So the transcendent God could make Himself present in a very unique way in a specific part of creation.

As I said in my original email response, with the Incarnation we have entered into a new way of relating to God. The Second Person of the Trinity joined a human nature, a soul and a body, to Himself. It is the human soul and body of God. So wherever that Body is, there the soul and divinity must be present as well.

So, in direct response to your citation of Acts 7:48 and 17:24 – no, the divine essence cannot be “pigeon-holed” in a temple made of stone, much less the entire created universe … and yet in Christ, “the fullness of Deity dwells bodily” (Col. 2:9).  And thus, we could say that God incarnate did live in a house in the village of Nazareth.  He seems to have lived in a house in Capernaum as well –  Derek, you must recognize this.  And God incarnate, Jesus, can also be present in our church buildings today in the Eucharist.

At the last supper when Christ says 'take eat this is my body' did he by his will and power create a mirrored image of himself or an entity apart and distinct from his real self that is from a piece of bread. this bread has now become his creation. First it was bread and now it is God, It is an offence against the 1st commandment.

No, not a mirror image of Himself; but an extension of His One Self. This is a rough analogy, because in the Eucharist we are talking about a supernatural extension; but in the natural sphere you can see how Christ “extended” Himself when He grew from an infant to a man. His infant Body and adult Body were one and the same.

The Host (Communion) exhibits no form of life nor is able to communicate. It is as if God is punished by imprisonment or solitary confinement unable to relate with all who receive him worthy or unworthy. This very thought of a mute God is absurd. We should not use imagination to say he speaks to me in communion.

Derek, take a step back and consider for a moment, what you already believe:  In the paragraph ahead you profess your belief that the Holy Spirit lives inside of you.  Good.  Is He a “mute God,” or do you hear an audible voice?  If you are hearing an audible voice, then you are among a very small minority among Christians.  I think most of us would say that the Holy Spirit does speak to us, but by bringing certain thoughts to our minds or causing us to recognize the significance of things. Is the Holy Spirit a prisoner within you? No, I wouldn’t characterize Him like that.

Consider the words of Christ in John 16:7- it is to your advantage that I go away because if I do not go the Holy Spirit will not come but if I go I will send the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit has the advantage of being with everybody at the same time.

In chapter 16, it explains how Christ will be with us and help us and he will be with us till the end of time.

He even reiterates in a little while - you will see me no more. The absence of his person , body, soul and divinity till the second coming is confirmed here. 

Derek, Jesus is most certainly not “absent” from the disciples.  Please go back and look at John 16 again.  In context, Jesus is talking about the change that will take place with His Passover to the Father; He will not be with them as He had been during the previous three years.  But He will continue to be with them – spiritually (Mt.28:20) and sacramentally in the Eucharist (Lk.24:30-31; note the use of the same four verbs here as at the Last Supper).

I would recommend meditating more deeply on the nature of the Trinity and what Jesus tells us in John, chapters 14-17.  “If a man loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him” (14:23) “I go away and I come to you” (14:28), “when the Counselor comes, whom I shall send you from the Father” (15:26).

We partake of one Loaf not a multiplication of the same loaf.

Yes, that is what we believe: these multiple loaves scattered throughout the world have been supernaturally joined to the One Loaf, Christ.  They can be joined to Him Whose Body is now outside of space and time as we understand it. 

We must remember the soul is not divisible, it cannot be replicated, duplicated in any way, so does the soul of Christ.

You can see the answer to this in what I shared above.

Please show me any scripture which confirms his presence of his body, soul and divinity in communion.

Happily. 1 Corinthians 11, beginning at verse 27:

“Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of profaning the body and blood of the Lord. ²⁸ Let a man examine himself, and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup. ²⁹ For any one who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment upon himself. ³⁰ That is why many of you are weak and ill, and some have died. ³¹ But if we judged ourselves truly, we should not be judged. ³² But when we are judged by the Lord, we are chastened so that we may not be condemned along with the world.”

The Eucharist is no mere figure or image of Christ. To sin against the Lord’s Body and Blood in such a way that sickness and death are suitable chastisements, the Lord’s Body and Blood must truly be present. You are not convicted of assault because you ripped up a man’s photograph, but because you have wronged his actual person!

Also please let me know the official Catholic position on whether the body is a crucified body or the resurrected body of Christ.

The Church’s position is that it is Christ’s Body, as it exists right now, which is made present.  Because Christ is risen from the dead, it is His resurrected Body made present in the Eucharist.

God has put in place safeguards that we might not do and believe like what Catholics do and believe.

But Derek, what Catholics do and believe is what the Orthodox Church does and believes, and is exactly what all Christians did and believed up until the time of the Reformation. There are safeguards in place to keep us believing and doing the truths Jesus entrusted to the Apostles, but when a person rejects the teaching authority of the successors to the Apostles, the Pope and Bishops, they have rejected that safeguard. Do you really think that God would abandon His Church and allow it to believe in a heretical teaching from the time of the apostles until the Reformation?  Ridiculous.  God is a faithful Father.

I’ve shown you passages in the New Testament testifying to the Catholic understanding of the Eucharist, but have you not studied how these were understood in the early Church?  The Catholic Church did not create its faith in the Eucharist centuries later; it is what Christians have believed from the start! When we go back to the earliest Christian writings we have outside of the New Testament, the writings left to us by the men who were actually taught by the Apostles, this is what we find:

Ignatius, the disciple of the Apostle John and Bishop of Antioch, wrote in 110 A.D. that he desired “the Bread of God, which is the Flesh of Jesus Christ, Who was of the seed of David, and for drink, His Blood, which is love incorruptible.” He admonished the believers in Philadelphia, Asia Minor, to “use one Eucharist so that whatever you do, you do according to God: for there is one flesh of our Lord Jesus Christ, and one cup in the union of his blood; one altar as there is one bishop with the presbytery and the deacons.” To the Church in Smyrna, Ignatius wrote, 

“Take note of those who hold heterodox [or heretical] opinions on the grace of Jesus Christ which comes to us, and see how contrary their opinions are to the mind of God ... They abstain from the Eucharist and from prayer, because they do not confess that the Eucharist is the flesh of our Savior Jesus Christ, flesh which suffered for our sins and which the Father, in his goodness, raised up again. They who deny the gift of God are perishing in their disputes.”

Our faith in the mysteries of God should not border on the ridiculous and absurd.

Ooh, but telling God what He can and cannot do out of love for us is the height of absurdity.  For one who limits God, the authentic Faith, taught to us by Christ and His Apostles, will always seem ridiculous.  That is what Paul wrote, “Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? …Jews demand a sign and Greeks seek wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles …For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men” (1 Cor.1:20-25).

Christ Himself, when He first spoke of the Eucharist, was met with jeers and rejection:

“The Jews then disputed among themselves, saying, ‘How can this man give us his flesh to eat?’ So Jesus said to them, ‘Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you … for my flesh is food indeed, and my blood is drink indeed …” (Jn. 6:52-56). 

And John goes on to tell how, 

“Many of his disciples, when they heard it, said, ‘This is a hard saying; who can listen to it?’ …. After this many of his disciples drew back and no longer walked with him” (Jn.6:60,66).

Derek, why is it so hard to take Jesus at His word on the Eucharist? Is it because we cannot observe the change through our five senses or detect it with our most sensitive instruments? Our technology is finite – His power limitless! As the Creator, Jesus grasps matter much better than me or you. If He pronounced the bread and wine to be His Body and Blood then I have to believe He can make it so. Lets keep in mind, this is the same Person who said, “Let there be light…dry land…living creatures….man…woman” (Genesis 1-2). He showed Himself able to manipulate matter at will – multiplying the loaves, walking on water, even appearing and disappearing into thin air after His resurrection. And let’s not forget that this is the Body and Blood formed in the womb of Mary without sexual intercourse – talk about turning the laws of nature upside down! 

Thank You

You are welcome.  Derek, I hope you do not feel that I am being antagonistic.  What I want to help you see is how your objections are nothing novel or unexpected.  They are the same objections Protestant Christians have made throughout the last 500 years, and the answers to them are relatively simple.  Jesus waits for you in the Eucharist.  He wants to give Himself to you in a way so humble and loving that we hesitate to believe it is true.  But that’s what makes the Good News, so good! “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.” (Matt.11:28-29)

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A reader asks, "Aren't Catholics committing idolatry at Mass?"

I received an inquiry by email this morning that I thought would make a good post:

Dear Sir,

I viewed your interview on the Journey Home on EWTN. I was a catholic till the age of 58 and have since moved on. I would like to know how would you justify worshiping the Eucharist in the light of the 1st commandment, are you not worshiping a created God ?

Thank  you 
_________________________

My response:

First, thank you for contacting me.  I think you have actually provided the answer to your own question:

In the Eucharist I worship Jesus.  Now, a Jewish person in the first century would say that anyone who worshiped Jesus was guilty of violating the First Commandment - "worshiping a created God." The moment that the all-holy ("holy" meaning "completely separate") God became a man, and the apostles worshiped Him (see Mt.28:17; Jn.20:27-28), we Christians became susceptible to such a charge.

You and I of course know that this charge is false, because the man we are worshiping is God and man, so the worship that we extend to Him in the flesh is no sin.  On the contrary, to understand that this man is God, and to fail to render Him the worship He is due, would be sinful.  The Catholic Church holds, as it has since Christ founded her, that Jesus' words, "This is My Body ... this is My Blood," transform the bread and wine presented in the Eucharist - at a level far deeper than our senses or instruments can register - into His Body and Blood.  This is the SAME Body and Blood that the Apostles worshiped in union with His Divinity.

This is really a continuation of the original "scandal" of the Incarnation- the thought that the eternal God would take flesh and die upon a Cross was a scandal to the Jews and foolishness to the Gentiles (1 Cor.1:23-25); but we Christians recognize it as the wisdom and power of God.  Our belief in the Eucharist flows directly from this:  We believe that the God Who abased Himself to the point of being born as an infant in Bethlehem (the name means "House of Bread") and laid in a feeding trough for animals (Lk.2:16), loves us to the point of giving us the flesh and blood He assumed - along with His Divinity - as food for our bodies and souls.

This was the difficult teaching that caused "many of his disciples" to abandon Him (Jn.6:60).  Jesus insisted on it to the point of requiring assent to it from the Apostles, "Do you take offense at this?  What if you were to see the Son of Man ascending where He was before?" (Jn.6:61-62).  Jesus' teaching has always been a difficult one for people to wrap their heads around, this teaching that the SAME flesh He offered in sacrifice upon the Cross is given to us, to bring us into Communion with Himself and the Father (Jn.6:51).  This is what St. Paul reiterated, "Consider the practice of Israel; are not those who eat the sacrifices partners in the altar? ... The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not a participation in the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ? (1 Cor 10:18,16).

The most powerful words on this point of course come from our Lord Himself,  “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat [“phogein” in Greek, the usual verb for “eat”] the flesh of the Son of man and drink his blood, you have no life within you; he who eats [“trogein” in Greek, meaning “to munch or gnaw”] my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day.  For my flesh is real food and my blood is real drink. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I in him. Just as the living Father sent me and I live because of the Father, so the one who feeds on me will live because of me.” (John 6:53-56, NIV)

This Eucharistic Flesh we worship is the Flesh of the God-Man, and that is why it cannot be an act of idolatry.  Is that at all helpful?

Your brother in Christ,

Shane

It's the Difference Btw. Talking on the Phone and Making Love

I have been under the weather this weekend.  That being the case, I didn't want to take a chance of passing my illness to others by attending Mass. Instead, I prayed from the Liturgy of the Hours, read today's Scripture readings, talked to God, and meditated with the Rosary.  It was time spent with God, and that is obviously fantastic. I realized however, that it wasn't the same as being at Mass.  An analogy occurred to me.  I recognize that it is imperfect, but it captures how I have come to think of my worship outside vs. inside the Eucharist: It's the difference between a husband and wife speaking by phone vs. making love.

It suffers, I know.  If you're familiar with this blog, then you know the profound reality I ascribe to even the simplest of prayers.  Jesus pours Himself out to the Father through our hearts, minds, and voices!  And yet, when we take part in the Eucharist, our prayer and union with Christ is raised up to a different, a higher plane.

In the Eucharist, Jesus gives Himself to us not just in a spiritual manner, and He gives us not just His teaching, but His very Self - His whole Self.  In the Eucharist we take the God-Man into us - His Divinity, His human Soul, His Body and Blood.  We receive Him into ourselves, as a bride receives her husband.  It is a manifestation of the mystery written of by St. Paul:

“For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh” [Genesis 2:24]. This is a great mystery, and I mean in reference to Christ and the Church. (Ephesians 5:31-32)

It is the most intimate we can be with Jesus, this side of eternity. I remember how emphatic Jesus was about our need to receive Him in the Eucharist:

“Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat [“phogein” in Greek, the usual verb for “eat”] the flesh of the Son of man and drink his blood, you have no life within you; he who eats [“trogein” in Greek, meaning “to munch or gnaw”] my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day.  For my flesh is real food and my blood is real drink. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I in him. Just as the living Father sent me and I live because of the Father, so the one who feeds on me will live because of me.” (John 6:53-56, NIV)

Throughout the Old Testament the Passover and Temple sacrifices had united God and His people in the life of the sacrificial victim. God’s people had to take that life into themselves through a covenant meal. The New Covenant reality to which they pointed - the most powerful way we unite ourselves to Jesus' sacrifice - is the Eucharist. 

Look at what the Apostle Paul wrote to the Corinthians:

Christ, our passover lamb, has been sacrificed. Let us, therefore, celebrate the festival. (1 Cor 5: 7-8) 

Consider the practice of Israel; are not those who eat the sacrifices partners in the altar? ... The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not a participation in the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ? (1 Cor 10:18,16) 

Whoever, therefore eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of profaning the body and blood of the Lord. Let a man examine himself, and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For any one who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on himself. That is why many of you are weak and ill, and some have died." (1 Cor 11: 27-30)  

I know the early Church understood Jesus' words regarding the Eucharist just as literally as the Apostle Paul.  In 107 A.D., while awaiting martyrdom, Ignatius (Bishop of Antioch and disciple of the Apostle John) wrote:  

“I desire the Bread of God, which is the Flesh of Jesus Christ, Who was of the seed of David, and for drink, His Blood, which is love incorruptible.”(Epistle to Romans)

"Take note of those who hold heterodox [or heretical] opinions on the grace of Jesus Christ which comes to us, and see how contrary their opinions are to the mind of God ... They abstain from the Eucharist and from prayer, because they do not confess that the Eucharist is the flesh of our Savior Jesus Christ, flesh which suffered for our sins and which the Father, in his goodness, raised up again. They who deny the gift of God are perishing in their disputes." (Epistle to the Smyrnaeans)

As hard as we might try, there's simply no way to rival or go beyond the Mass - it is Jesus and His Sacrifice made present upon the altar.  The Divine Bridegroom comes to make himself one flesh with His Bride ... and that's a union you just can't "phone in."

We Still Find Him in the Temple

Mary and Joseph were at their wits end.  After three days of searching, they had finally found Jesus.  There he was, seated in the Temple's second court, asking questions of the rabbis.  Mary blurted out, "Son, why have you done this to us?  You see that your father and I have been searching for you in sorrow."  His answer caught them completely off-guard, "Why were you searching for me?  Did you not know that I had to be in my Father's house?" (Lk 2:48-50). Jesus says exactly the same thing to those of us hungering for his presence today! He waits for us in the temple of our parish church.

The Catechism (593) reminds us how deeply Jesus loved the Temple of his day. It was adamat-qodesh, holy ground. God was present in the Temple's innermost chamber in a way unsurpassed anywhere else in all of creation, except in Jesus himself. It was the only place where sacrifice could lawfully be offered and, like all faithful Jews, Jesus made pilgrimage there at least three times a year. 

In the New Covenant, Jesus takes all of this to a higher level.  The Temple prefigured him, in whom "the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily" (Col. 2:9). Through Baptism he makes us members of his Church, "living stones" in the spiritual temple of his Body (1 Pet 2:5). The many sacrifices of the Jerusalem Temple found their fulfillment in his one upon the cross, the same sacrifice renewed in our celebration of the Eucharist; and it is his Eucharistic presence that allows us to speak of our church buildings as temples.

Jesus waits for us in these buildings, ready to engage our hearts as he did the Temple's rabbis.  The tabernacle in which our Lord dwells under the appearance of bread is the reality foreshadowed in the Temple's Holy of Holies and the table of shewbread kept before it.  When Jesus told the woman of Samaria, "an hour is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem ... [but] authentic worshipers will worship the Father in Spirit and truth," he was not eliminating the idea of holy ground.  Rather, he was expanding it.  Holy ground is now found wherever our Lord's Body is reserved in the tabernacle.

Are you longing for Jesus?  Do you feel like you can't find him no matter how hard you pray?  Make a pilgrimage to the temple - not thousands of miles away, but down the road to your parish.  There you will find him.  There you will objectively enter into his presence, no matter how deep your sadness or confusion.  There you will offer yourself to him, place yourself into his heart, without any need for words.  In the simple act of going to him, sitting in his presence, and gazing at him with longing, you will have prayed beautifully.  "The sacrifice acceptable to God is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise" (Ps 51:17).

Like Mary and Joseph, you will always find Jesus in the Temple.

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If you enjoyed this post, you might also enjoy the soon-to-be-released, Through,With, and In Him: The Prayer Life of Jesus and How to Make It Our Own.