Brothers and Sisters,
This week we celebrate the Solemnity of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ also known as the Feast of Corpus Christi. This celebration is a special opportunity to worship the Lord Jesus, the true and eternal Priest, who is really present in the sacrament of his Body and Blood. The Eucharist is the source and summit of the Christian life, and the grace and divine life that Jesus gives leads to ever greater holiness and joy in this life and eternal salvation in the next.
In the gospel reading (Lk 9:11b–17), the miracle of the feeding of the five thousand is a prefigurement of the Eucharist, in which Jesus continues to miraculously feed the crowds through offering us his body, blood, soul, and divinity under the form of bread and wine. The multiplication of the bread was a miracle for the people, and it still is today—a miracle that takes place every day on all of the altars of the world. The term for this miracle of changing the bread and wine into Christ’s body and blood is called transubstantiation. And when the priest consecrates the body and blood of Jesus Christ on the altar, he stands “in persona” of Christ. He acts in the place of the Lord himself, for all of us. Jesus has no human body to do this, except for theirs, and that is why we need our holy priests. They are the treasure of our church.
Thank you Fr. Carl and all priests for your unselfish, loving service to the Lord and His people.
God Bless,
Deacon Howard
