Sixteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time

FROM THE DESK OF FATHER JACOB LIVECCHI YOUR PRIEST IN RESIDENCE AT EPIPHANY OF THE LORD PARISH

Greetings folks! 

The National Eucharistic Congress is this week! For the past three years, we as a country, diocese, and parish have been seeking ways to revive our faith in the Eucharist. The Eucharistic revival has sought to deepen faith in and awareness of the True presence of Jesus in the Eucharist! There is no doubt that the Eucharist is perhaps one of the hardest parts of our faith to understand. Everything our senses experience tells us that it’s just bread and wine. But the bottom-line reality of our faith as Catholics is that the Eucharist is not a symbol nor is it a sign, it is what Jesus said it is: “he took bread, and blessed, and broke it, and gave it to them, and said, “Take; this is my body.” And he took a cup…And he said to them, “This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many.” (Mk 14:22-24) There are many different religions that think that Jesus said these words metaphorically and thus, the Eucharist is just a nice symbol. But we as Catholics believe literally what Jesus said, and we believe that this bread and wine through the power of the Holy Spirit becomes Jesus’s Body and Blood. 

If it was a symbol then why put so much effort into showing reverence to it? Why worry about it? Why would people throughout history die defending it? If it’s just a symbol, then who cares? But if it’s truly Jesus – if the little bread becomes God – then everything has to change! Jesus was very clear about what he said in Jn 6:54, “My flesh is really food and my blood is drink.” This is not easy to understand; people back then did not understand it either, they said “This is hard who can accept it” (Jn 6:60) and they stopped following Jesus. If it was just a symbol, Jesus wouldn’t have let his followers leave him, but he didn’t stop them from leaving. What does this tell us? It tells us that Jesus is very serious about what he meant. The Apostles probably didn’t understand how this bread could be his flesh, but they did believe and trust in Jesus and so they took him at his word. We can’t fully understand the mystery of the Eucharist with our senses, but we don’t need to understand it to believe it we can follow the apostles and trust in Jesus’s word. We can let our faith provide for what our senses fail to grasp. 

The well-known author, Flannery O’Connor in the defense of the Eucharist once said, “Well, if it’s a symbol, to hell with it! That was all the defense I was capable of but I realize now that this is all I will ever be able to say about it, outside of a story, except that it is the center of existence for me; all the rest of life is expendable.” 

What is highlighted in this defense is that if we believe what Jesus said about the Eucharist, then everything must change. The Eucharist needs to become the source of life for us. It’s not just a symbol – it’s truly God made present to us. The reason we exist as a parish is because of the Eucharist. I ask that you pray for two intentions. First, pray that our country will experience a revival of faith in the real presence of the Eucharist. Secondly, pray for a revival of our faith in and love for the Eucharist here in Epiphany of the Lord Parish. Let us ask for the gift of faith so that we can come to know in a new way the great mystery of the presence of God in the Eucharist. 

In Christ, 
Fr. Jay