The Happy Priest: The Importance of a Eucharistic Life

Attending Mass not just on Sunday, but every day of the week, will give you an indescribable power to soar through and over the challenges of life.  Over and over I have spoken to many people who attend daily Mass and they continually affirm that they could never live without it.  This is why we must have a daily Eucharistic life.  Each time we have contact with our Eucharistic Lord, we become one with him.  We assimilate him into our being.  Holy Communion becomes a communion of two persons and thus, transformation takes place.  

CORPUS CHRISTI, TX (Catholic Online) - "Forsake foolishness that you may live" (Book of Proverbs 9: 6).

"Watch carefully how you live, not as foolish persons but as wise, making the most of the opportunity because the days are evil.  Therefore, do not continue in ignorance, but try to understand what is the will of the Lord" (Ephesians 5: 15-16).
 
A casual glance at the daily news provides ample evidence of the worldwide chaos caused by many who have rejected Christianity.  Continual violence, hedonism, materialism, and corruption now reaching previously unimaginable dimensions have resulted from the actions of those who have foolishly tossed aside the truth of Jesus Christ to indulge in their own insatiable proclivities.
 
Only Jesus can satisfy the deepest aspirations of the human spirit.  Only Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life.  Only Jesus is the way to the Father.  Only through Jesus can we hope to gain eternal life in Heaven.  The foolish and the ignorant reject this truth.  When Christianity is abandoned, the results are devastating.
 
Jesus remains with us in the tabernacle of every Catholic Church.  His Real Presence is celebrated and adored in the monstrance placed in every chapel dedicated to Perpetual Adoration.  He is truly with us. 

"Amen, amen, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you do not have life within you.  Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him on the last day.  For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink" (John 6: 52-55).
   
Every time we gaze upon him, every time Our Lord and Savior comes to us through Holy Communion, he gives us the graces that we need to put into practice his way of life so that we may gain eternal life in heaven. 
 
As Blessed John Paul II so eloquently teaches us in his first encyclical letter, Jesus reveals man to himself.  Jesus is the perfect man who shows us exactly how we must live out our daily lives.  Jesus embodies every human and spiritual virtue. The true disciple of Jesus must take him as the model and make his teaching the criterion for every human thought and action undertaken.
 
"The man who wishes to understand himself thoroughly - and not just in accordance with immediate, partial, often superficial, and even illusory standards and measures of his being - he must with his unrest, uncertainty and even his weakness and sinfulness, with his life and death, draw near to Christ.  He must, so to speak, enter into Him with all his own self, he must 'appropriate' and assimilate the whole reality of the Incarnation and Redemption in order to find himself."  (Blessed Pope John Paul II, Redemptor Hominis)
 
Each time we come to the Eucharist, it is Jesus himself who not only shows us how to live our lives, but who also provides us with the divine grace to live out the gospel teachings in our daily existence.  
 
This is why we must have a daily Eucharistic life.  Each time we have contact with our Eucharistic Lord, we become one with him.  We assimilate him into our being.  Holy Communion becomes a communion of two persons and thus, transformation takes place.  

Only the foolish and the ignorant would stay away from the greatest gift that Jesus has given to us.
 
"Amen, amen, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you do not have life within you.  Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him on the last day.  For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink" (John 6: 52-55).

Attending Mass not just on Sunday, but every day of the week, will give you an indescribable power to soar through and over the challenges of life.  Over and over I have spoken to many people who attend daily Mass and they continually affirm that they could never live without it. 

Sometimes it might be the case that objectively, daily Mass is just impossible.  However, it may be possible to spend some time with Our Lord in adoration or a visit before the tabernacle.

Saint John Bosco once said, "Visits to the Blessed Sacrament are powerful and indispensable means of overcoming attacks of the devil. Make frequent visits to Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament and the devil will be powerless against you."

Center your life on the awesome gift of the Eucharist. 

Dr. Scott Hahn, the famous former Protestant minister that converted to Catholicism wrote in his conversion story one of the most beautiful testimonies about the Eucharist that I have ever read.  Here are his words, written in his book that he co-authored with his wife Kimberly.

"Then one day, I made a 'fatal blunder' - I decided that it was time for me to go to Mass on my own.  Finally I resolved to darken the doors of Gesu, Marquette University's parish.  Right before noon, I slipped quietly into the basement chapel for daily Mass.  I wasn't sure what to expect; maybe I'd be alone with a priest and a couple of old nuns.  I took a seat as an observer in the back pew.

All of a sudden lots of ordinary people began coming in off the streets; rank-and-file type folks.  They came in, genuflected, knelt and prayed.  Their simple but sincere devotion was impressive.

Then a bell rang and a priest walked out toward the altar.  I remained seated; I still wasn't sure if it was safe to kneel.  As an evangelical Calvinist, I had been taught that the Catholic Mass was the greatest sacrilege that a man could commit - to re-sacrifice Christ - so I wasn't sure what to do.

I watched and listened as the readings, prayers and responses - so steeped in Scripture - made the Bible come alive.  I almost wanted to stop the Mass and say, 'Wait.  That line is from Isaiah; the song is from the Psalms.  Whoa, you've got another prophet in that prayer'.  I found numerous elements from the ancient Jewish liturgy that I had studied so intensely.

All of a sudden I realized, this is where the Bible belongs.  This was the setting in which this precious family heirloom was meant to be read, proclaimed and expounded.  Then we moved into the Liturgy of  the Eucharist, where all my covenant conclusions converged.

I wanted to stop everything and shout, 'Hey, can I explain what's happening from Scripture?  This is great!'  Instead I just sat there, famished with a supernatural hunger for the Bread of Life.

After pronouncing the words of consecration, the priest held up the Host.  I felt as if the last drop of doubt had drained from me.  With all of my heart, I whispered, 'My Lord and my God.  That's really you! And if that's you, then I want full communion with you.  I don't want to hold anything back' (Rome Sweet Home, pp. 87-88).

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Father James Farfaglia, is a contributing writer for Catholic Online and author of Get Serious! - A Survival Guide for Serious Catholics.  Visit him online at www.fatherjames.org. 

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