Dear friend,

The Eucharist and Pentecost are two unique events with which God has sealed the New Covenant: God offers Himself as a Father; man agrees to participate of His Life. This "moving" of man toward God till his unification with Him is the oldest, most daring and desired ambition of mankind.

How such “foolishness“ was ever possible? God has taken the initiative and out of love for man He has made Himself “touchable". He has done it gradually. In what way? First, God has accepted to adopt a Name, and He reveals it to us so that we know that He is Somebody - He is not something – Whom we can talk to confidently. Thus, in the desert, God emerged before Moses with the 'I AM'. A slightly strange name for us! But the truth is that this is His true name: "God IS” ("He is ALWAYS" and "He is EVERYTHING," the fullness of being).

In the second place, God became man: the Father sends the Son, who assumes our human nature. This is the great gift to mankind: Christ! With this token God becomes so "touchable" that we can treat Him... We can even reject Him, pursue Him and crucify Him! The man sentences God!, to the point that God gives His life for us, pay for our deeds, stirs us by His example and boosts us with his mercy.

Finally, this "foolish" love story debouches, on the one hand, in the gift of the Holy Spirit to our souls. And, on the other, in the great gift: The Eucharist. "And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age" (Mt 28:20). Jesus remains with us in His Spirit, but also physically with his Body and his Blood, hidden under the Eucharistic "manifestations” of the bread and wine.

It is not something improvised! It comes from afar: God’s self-deliverance in the Eucharist was already announced and anticipated in the Old Testament. The "manna", the bread that miraculously came down each morning out of the sky to feed the Jews during their journey through the desert was a foretaste of the Eucharist. So it was the multiplication of loaves and fishes made by Jesus Christ to satiate the hunger of the people who were listening to Him.

This is why Jesus appeared by saying that "I am the living bread that came down from Heaven" (Jn 6:51). He has actually come down from Heaven, He is alive, and - the most amazing thing – He "becomes" bread to feed us with His life, a life that was "sacrificed" during the Passion. «Take and eat, all of you, because this is my body which will be given for you» (cf. Mt 26:26; LC 22:19). Jesus-Eucharist becomes present whenever the priest pronounces those "words of pain": "delivered" Body; "poured out" Blood. From Jesus’ Passion we get the company of the Holy Spirit and the food/company of the Body of Christ.

In the gift of the Eucharist, the life of God is hidden and our salvation offered. God offers Himself there to us with utmost discretion and, at the same time, with extreme availability. Love is like that: discreet and helpful. It seems that it is not there, but, yes, it is. With this "method", the announcement that a descendant of David - as new King - would forever and everywhere strengthen the Kingdom of God, was fulfilled in Jesus Christ. It does not make noise, but it is effective! In the Corpus Christi processions our King walks through countless streets in our world. It is Heaven down to Earth! «What else do we like God to do for us?», asked St. John Paul II.

Fr. Antoni Carol i Hostench

(General Coordinator of evangeli.net)