“If we but paused for a moment to consider attentively what takes place in this Sacrament, I am sure that the thought of Christ’s love for us would transform the coldness of our hearts into a fire of love and gratitude.”
– St. Angela of Foligno
“Christ held Himself in His hands when He gave His Body to His disciples saying: ‘This is My Body.’ No one partakes of this Flesh before he has adored it.”
– St. Augustine
“Recognize in this bread what hung on the cross, and in this chalice what flowed from His side… whatever was in many and varied ways announced beforehand in the sacrifices of the Old Testament pertains to this one sacrifice which is revealed in the New Testament.”
– from the writings of St. Augustine, Sermon 3, 2; circa A.D. 410 {original translation}
“O Lord, we cannot go to the pool of Siloe to which you sent the blind man. But we have the chalice of Your Precious Blood, filled with life and light. The purer we are, the more we receive.”
– St. Ephraem
“When the bee has gathered the dew of heaven and the earth’s sweetest nectar from the flowers, it turns it into honey, then hastens to its hive. In the same way, the priest, having taken from the altar the Son of God (who is as the dew from heaven, and true son of Mary, flower of our humanity), gives him to you as delicious food.”
– St. Francis de Sales
“When you have received Him, stir up your heart to do Him homage; speak to Him about your spiritual life, gazing upon Him in your soul where He is present for your happiness; welcome Him as warmly as possible, and behave outwardly in such a way that your actions may give proof to all of His Presence.”
– St. Francis de Sales
“What wonderful majesty! What stupendous condescension! O sublime humility! That the Lord of the whole universe, God and the Son of God, should humble Himself like this under the form of a little bread, for our salvation”
“…In this world I cannot see the Most High Son of God with my own eyes, except for His Most Holy Body and Blood.”
– St. Francis of Assisi
AT THE FEET OF CHRIST IN THE EUCHARIST
From the writings of Saint Faustina
O Jesus, Divine Prisoner of Love, when I consider Your love and how You emptied Yourself for me, my senses deaden. You hide Your inconceivable majesty and lower Yourself to miserable me. O king of Glory, though You hide Your beauty, yet the eye of my soul rends the veil. I see the angelic choirs giving You honor without cease, and all the heavenly Powers praising You without cease, and without cease they are saying: Holy, Holy, Holy.
Oh, who will comprehend Your love and Your unfathomable mercy toward us! O Prisoner of Love, I love up my poor heart in this tabernacle that it may adore You without cease night and day. I know of no obstacle in this adoration: and even though I be physically distant, my heart is always with You. Nothing can put a stop to my love for You. No obstacles exist for me…
O Holy Trinity, One and Indivisible God, may You be blessed for this great gift and testament of mercy. Amen.
I adore You, Lord and Creator, hidden in the Most Blessed Sacrament. I adore You for all the works of Your hands, that reveal to me so much wisdom, goodness and mercy, O Lord. You have spread so much beauty over the earth and it tells me about Your beauty, even though these beautiful things are but a faint reflection of You, incomprehensible Beauty. And although You have hidden Yourself and concealed your beauty, my eye, enlightened by faith, reaches You and my souls recognizes its Creator, its Highest Good, and my heart is completely immersed in prayer of adoration.
My Lord and Creator, Your goodness encourages me to converse with You. Your mercy abolishes the chasm which separates the Creator from the creature. To converse with You, O Lord, is the delight of my heart. In You I find everything that my heart could desire. Here Your light illumines my mind, enabling it to know You more and more deeply. Here streams of grace flow down upon my heart. Here my soul draws eternal life. O my Lord and Creator, You alone, beyond all these gifts, give Your own self to me and unite Yourself intimately with Your miserable creature.
O Christ, let my greatest delight be to see You loved and Your praise and glory proclaimed, especially the honor of Your mercy. O Christ, let me glorify Your goodness and mercy to the last moment of my life, with every drop of my blood and every beat of my heart. Would that I be transformed into a hymn of adoration of You. When I find myself on my deathbed, may the last beat of my heart be a loving hymn glorifying Your unfathomable mercy. Amen.
“Do grant, oh my God, that when my lips approach Yours to kiss You, I may taste the gall that was given to You; when my shoulders lean against Yours, make me feel Your scourging; when my flesh is united with Yours, in the Holy Eucharist, make me feel Your passion; when my head comes near Yours, make me feel Your thorns; when my heart is close to Yours, make me feel Your spear.”
– St. Gemma Galgani
I hunger for the bread of God, the flesh of Jesus Christ …; I long to drink of his blood, the gift of unending love.
– St. Ignatius of Antioch
“Jesus taught a new sacrifice which the Church received from the Apostles and offers throughout the whole world.”
– St. Irenaeus (d. 202)
“If Christ did not want to dismiss the Jews without food in the desert for fear that they would collapse on the way, it was to teach us that it is dangerous to try to get to heaven without the Bread of Heaven.”
– St. Jerome
“How many of you say: I should like to see His face, His garments, His shoes. You do see Him, you touch Him, you eat Him. He gives Himself to you, not only that you may see Him, but also to be your food and nourishment.”
– St. John Chrysostom
“I throw myself at the foot of the Tabernacle like a dog at the foot of his Master.”
– St. John Vianney
“All the good works in the world are not equal to the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass because they are the works of men; but the Mass is the work of God. Martyrdom is nothing in comparison for it is but the sacrifice of man to God; but the Mass is the sacrifice of God for man.”
– St. John Vianney, Cure d’Ars
“Of the sacrifice which we offer in every place, that is, of the bread and chalice of the Eucharist, Malachias has prophesied.”
– St. Justin, 2nd Century Martyr
“God dwells in our midst, in the Blessed Sacrament of the altar.”
– St. Maximilian Kolbe
“He remains among us until the end of the world. He dwells on so many altars, though so often offended and profaned.”
– St. Maximilian Kolbe
“The culmination of the Mass is not the consecration, but Communion.”
– St. Maximilian Kolbe
“You come to me and unite Yourself intimately to me under the form of nourishment. Your Blood now runs in mine, Your Soul, Incarnate God, compenetrates mine, giving courage and support. What miracles! Who would have ever imagined such!”
– St. Maximilian Kolbe
“If angels could be jealous of men, they would be so for one reason: Holy Communion.”
– St. Maximilian Kolbe
“He is The Bread sown in the virgin, leavened in the Flesh, molded in His Passion, baked in the furnace of the Sepulchre, placed in the Churches, and set upon the Altars, which daily supplies Heavenly Food to the faithful.”
– St. Peter Chrysologus (400-450)
“Words cannot express the perfection of his adoration. If Saint John leaped in the womb at the approach of Mary, what feelings must have coursed through Joseph during those six months when he had at his side and under his very eyes the hidden God! If the father of Origen used to kiss his child during the night and adore the Holy Spirit living within Him, can we doubt that Joseph must often have adored Jesus hidden in the pure tabernacle of Mary? How fervent that adoration must have been: My Lord and my God, behold your servant! No one can describe the adoration of this noble soul. He saw nothing, yet he believed; his faith had to pierce the virginal veil of Mary. So likewise with you! Under the veil of the Sacred Species your faith must see our Lord. Ask St. Joseph for his Lively, constant faith.”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“At Nazareth Joseph’s days were filled with work which necessarily took him away at times from his Infant God. During these hours Mary replaced him, but when evening brought him home again, he would pass the entire night in adoration, never tiring, only too happy for the chance to contemplate the hidden riches of Jesus’ divinity. For he pierced the rough garments the Child wore, until his faith touched the Sacred Heart. In profound adoration he united himself to the special grace of each one of the events in the life of Jesus. He adored our Lord in His hidden life and in His Passion and Death; he adored in advance the Eucharistic Christ in His tabernacles: there was nothing that our Lord could hide from Saint Joseph. Among the graces which Jesus gave to His foster-father — and He flooded him with the graces attached to every one of His mysteries — is that special to an adorer of the Blessed Sacrament. That is the one we must ask of St. Joseph. Have confidence, strong confidence in him. Take him as the patron and the model of your life of adoration.”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“THOUGHT FROM FATHER FABER – St. Joseph worshiped Jesus as no saint before had done. From his deep, calm soul he poured out a very ocean of love – tenderest love, humblest love, love shrinking from being like the Father’s love, yet also daring to be like it as Mary’s had been like the conjoined loves of Father and of Spirit, as she was Mother and Spouse conjoined. No angel might love Jesus as Joseph loved Him, as Joseph was bound to love Him. No temporal love but Mary’s could be more like an eternal love than the love of Joseph for the Child, because of its likeness to the love of the everlasting Father. Aside from the Blessed Virgin, Saint Joseph was the first and most perfect adorer of Our Lord.”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“We have close to us as much as Joseph had at Nazareth; we have our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament, but our poor eyes fail to see Him. Let us once become interior souls and we shall immediately see. In no better way can we enter into the Heart of our Lord than through Saint Joseph. Jesus and Mary are eager to pay the debts which they owe him for his devoted care of them, and their greatest pleasure is to fulfill his least desire. Let him, then, lead you by hand into the interior sanctuary of Jesus Eucharistic.”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“We cannot help but marvel at the faith of Saint Joseph. Tormenting doubts harass his soul and he is on the point of leaving Mary. But an angel appears to him and all his doubts and fears vanish. On the angel’s word He accepts the mystery of the Incarnation. In the ensuing years his faith was to be frequently put to the test. At Bethlehem he had to content himself with a stable for a home where the Incarnate Word might be born. Soon after, he was forced to flee in order to save the Infant God, and when later he returned to the tiny village of Nazareth it was to live there unknown and in dire poverty. All these trials only tempered his faith. Although he sees only the Child’s wretchedness and poverty, his faith pierces the shroud and uncovers the hidden God within this weak baby frame. Because his faith was so strong, Joseph’s mind and heart bowed in perfect adoration. Imitate his faith as you kneel before the humble Christ annihilated in the Eucharist. Pierce the veil which covers this furnace of love and adore the hidden God. At the same time respect the veil of love and make the immolation of your mind and heart your most beautiful homage of faith.”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“Do you realize that Jesus is there in the tabernacle expressly for you – for you alone? He burns with the desire to come into your heart…don’t listen to the demon, laugh at him, and go without fear to receive the Jesus of peace and love…
“Receive Communion often, very often…there you have the sole remedy, if you want to be cured. Jesus has not put this attraction in your heart for nothing…”
“The guest of our soul knows our misery; He comes to find an empty tent within us – that is all He asks.”
– St. Therese of Lisieux
“How I loved the feasts!…. I especially loved the processions in honor of the Blessed Sacrament. What a joy it was for me to throw flowers beneath the feet of God!… I was never so happy as when I saw my roses touch the sacred Monstrance…”
– from St. Therese’s Autobiography: Story of A Soul
“By our little acts of charity practiced in the shade we convert souls far away, we help missionaries, we win for them abundant alms; and by that means build actual dwellings spiritual and material for our Eucharistic Lord.”
“It is not to remain in a golden ciborium that He comes down each day from Heaven, but to find another Heaven, the Heaven of our soul in which He takes delight.”
“You must open a little, or rather raise on high your corolla so that the Bread of Angels may come as divine dew to strengthen you, and to give you all that is wanting to you.”
– St. Therese of Lisieux, Doctor of the Church
“La saintetรฉ c’est une disposition du coeur qui nous rend humbles et petits entre les bras de Dieu, conscients de notre faiblesse, et confiants jusqu’a l’audace en sa bontรฉ de Pere.”
– Ste. Thรฉrese de l’Enfant-Jรฉsus
“Holiness is a disposition of the heart that makes us humble and little in the arms of God, aware of our weakness, and confident — in the most audacious way — in His Fatherly goodness.”
– St. Therese of the Infant Jesus
“The Blessed Sacrament is indeed the stimulus for us all, for me as it should be for you, to forsake all worldly ambitions. Without the constant presence of our Divine Master upon the altar in my poor chapels, I never could have persevered casting my lot with the lepers of Molokai; the foreseen consequence of which begins now to appear on my skin, and is felt throughout the body. Holy Communion being the daily bread of a priest, I feel myself happy, well pleased, and resigned in the rather exceptional circumstances in which it has pleased Divine Providence to put me.”
– Blessed Fr. Damien, Apostle of the Lepers
Words of Monsignor Jara to Blessed Teresa of the Andes First Communion Class at Mass before receiving Jesus for the first time:
“Ask Jesus Christ that, if you will ever commit a mortal sin, that He will take you today, since your souls are as pure as the snow on the mountains. Pray to Him for your parents, the authors of your existence. For those who have lost their parents, this is the moment to seek to be united with them. Yes, you are approaching to become witnesses of the intimate union of your souls with Jesus Christ. Look at the angels of the altar, dear little girls. Look at them, they envy you. All heaven is present.”
From Our Holy Father, Pope John Paul II’s World Youth Day homily on Sunday, August 24, 1997 in Paris, France:
“Rabbi, where are you staying?” Each day the Church responds: Christ is present in the Eucharist, in the sacrament of His death and resurrection. In and through the Eucharist, you acknowledge the dwelling-place of the Living God in human history. For the Eucharist is the Sacrament of the Love which conquers death. It is the Sacrament of the Covenant, pure Gift of Love for the reconciliation of all humanity. It is the gift of the Real Presence of Jesus The Redeemer, in the bread which is His Body given up for us, in the wine which is His Blood poured out for all. Thanks to the Eucharist, constantly renewed among all peoples of the world, Christ continues to build His church: He brings us together in praise and thanksgiving for salvation, in the communion which only infinite love can forge. Our worldwide gathering now takes on its fullest meaning, through the celebration of the Mass. Dear young friends, may your presence here mean a true commitment in faith! For Christ is now answering your own question and the questions of all those who seek the Living God. He answers by offering an invitation: This is My Body, take It and eat. To the Father He entrusts His supreme desire: that all those whom He loves may be one in the same communion.
THE EUCHARIST IS THE HEART OF THE CHURCH
This begins a series of excerpts from the English translation of the Homily given in Polish by the Our Holy Father, Pope John Paul II, at the close of the Eucharistic Congress in Wroclaw.
“Mystery of Faith!”
In order to examine in depth the mystery of the Eucharist, we must continually return to the Upper Room where in the evening of Holy Thursday the Last Supper took place. In today’s liturgy St. Paul speaks precisely of the institution of the Eucharist. This text seems to be the most ancient one concerning the Eucharist, preceding the account itself given by the Evangelists. In his Letter to the Corinthians Paul writes: “The Lord Jesus on the night when He was betrayed took bread, and when He had given thanks, he broke it, and said “This is My Body which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” In the same way also the cup, after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in My Blood. Do this, as often as you drink of it, in remembrance of Me.” For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until He comes.” (1 Cor 11:23-26)
THE EUCHARIST IS THE HEART OF THE CHURCH
(Excerpt from Our Holy Father, Pope John Paul II’s homily continued.)
“Christ has died. Christ is risen. Christ will come again in glory. These words contain the very essence of the Eucharistic mystery. In them we find what we bear witness to and share in every day as we celebrate and receive the Eucharist. In the Upper Room Jesus effects the consecration. By virtue of His words, the bread – while keeping the external appearance of bread – becomes His Body, and the wine – while maintaining the external appearance of wine – becomes His Blood. THIS IS THE GREAT MYSTERY OF FAITH! THIS IS THE LIVING BREAD WHICH CAME DOWN FROM HEAVEN!”
THE EUCHARIST IS THE HEART OF THE CHURCH
(Excerpt from Our Holy Father’s homily continued.)
“Celebrating this mystery, we not only renew what Christ did in the Upper Room, but we also enter into the mystery of His death! “We proclaim Your death!”- redeeming death. “Christ is risen!” We are sharers in the Sacred Triduum and the night of Easter. We are sharers in the saving mystery of Christ as we await His coming in glory. Through the institution of The Eucharist we have entered the end times, the time of awaiting Christ’s second and definitive coming, when the world will be judged and at the same time the work of redemption will be brought to completion. The Eucharist does not merely speak of all this. In The Eucharist – all this is celebrated – in It all this is fulfilled. Truly The Eucharist is the Great Sacrament of The Church. The Church celebrates The Eucharist, and at the same time The Eucharist makes the Church.”
THE EUCHARIST IS THE HEART OF THE CHURCH
(Excerpt from Our Holy Father, Pope John Paul II’s homily continued.)
“I Am the Living Bread” (Jn 6:51). The message of John’s Gospel completes the liturgical picture of this great Eucharistic mystery that we are celebrating today… The words of John’s Gospel are the great proclamation of The Eucharist, after the miraculous multiplication of bread near Capernaum. Anticipating as it were the time even before the Eucharist was instituted, Christ revealed what it was. He spoke thus: “I Am the Living Bread which came down from heaven; if anyone eats of this Bread, he will live forever; and the Bread which I shall give for the life of the world is My Flesh” (Jn 6:51). And when these words brought protests from many who were listening Jesus added: “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; he who eats My Flesh and drinks My Blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day. For My Flesh is food indeed, and My Blood is drink indeed. He who eats My Flesh and drinks My Blood abides in me, and I in him.” (Jn 6:53-56).
THE EUCHARIST IS THE HEART OF THE CHURCH
(Excerpt from Our Holy Father, Pope John Paul II’s homily continued.)
“These are words which concern the very essence of the Eucharist. Behold, Christ came into the world to bestow upon man divine life. He not only proclaimed the Good News but He also instituted the Eucharist which is to make present until the end of time His redeeming mystery. And as the means of expressing this He chose the elements of nature – the bread and wine, the food and drink that man must consume to maintain his life. The Eucharist is precisely this food and drink. This food contains in itself all the power of the Redemption wrought by Christ. In order to live man needs food and drink. In order to gain eternal life man needs the Eucharist. This is the food and drink that transforms man’s life and opens before him the way to eternal life. By consuming the Body and Blood of Christ, man bears within himself, already on this earth, the seed of eternal life, for the Eucharist is the sacrament of life in God. Christ says: “As the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so he who eats me will live because of me.” (Jn 6:57).
THE EUCHARIST IS THE HEART OF THE CHURCH
(Conclusion of the excerpts from Our Holy Father, Pope John Paul II’s homily.)
“The eyes of all look to You, and You give them their food in due season (Ps 145.15) In the first reading of today’s liturgy Moses speaks to us of God who feeds His people on their journey through the wilderness to the Promised Land: “Remember all the way which the Lord your God has led you these forty years in the wilderness, that He might humble you, testing you to know what is in your heart… (He) fed you in the wilderness with manna which your fathers did not know, that He might humble you and test you, to do you good in the end.” (Dt. 8:2, 16) The image of a pilgrim people in the wilderness, which emerges from these words, speaks also to us who are approaching the end of the second millenium after Christ’s birth. In this image all the peoples and nations of the whole earth find a place, and especially those who suffer from hunger.” – L’Osservatore Romano, 4 June 1997
HOLY EASTER!!! THE LAMB WHO WAS SLAIN, IS THE LAMB WHO IS RISEN! JESUS IN THE MOST BLESSED SACRAMENT IS THE LAMB OF GOD!!! WORTHY IS THE LAMB! O COME LET US BEHOLD HIM WHO HAS WON FOR US SALVATION! O COME LET US ADORE HIM, FOR THE BREAD OF LIFE – JESUS EUCHARISTIC – IS REALLY AND PERSONALLY HERE!
MAY JESUS IN THE MOST BLESSED SACRAMENT, THE LAMB OF LOVE, BE WITH YOU AND BLESS YOU THIS EASTER AND ALWAYS! MAY OUR LADY OF THE MOST BLESSED SACRAMENT, MOTHER OF THE LAMB, LEAD YOU EVER CLOSER TO HIS EUCHARISTIC HEART!
“This is our Passover feast, when Christ, the true Lamb, is slain, whose blood consecrates the homes of all believers.” “Night truly blessed when heaven is wedded to earth and man is reconciled with God!”
“May the Morning Star which never sets find this flame still burning: Christ, the Morning Star, who came back from the dead, and shed His peaceful light on all mankind.”
– taken from the Exultet.
“The best way to economize time is to ‘lose’ half an hour each day attending Holy Mass.”
– Frederic Ozanam
It is there in His Eucharist that He says to me: “I thirst, thirst for your love, your sacrifices, your sufferings. I thirst for your happiness, for it was to save you that I came into the world, that I suffered and died on the Cross, and in order to console and strengthen you I left you the Eucharist. So you have there all My life, all My tenderness.”
– Mother Mary of Jesus, foundress of the Sisters of Marie Reparatrice
Father Lessius (1554-1623), the eminent Jesuit theologian, was afflicted with more than one painful disease. In spite of his sufferings, he would prolong his thanksgiving a full hour after Mass. To those who pitied him he would reply: “Why should I complain? Mine is still the joy of receiving the bread of angels.”
(From THE LINK)
The Bread of Heaven and the Cup of Salvation
On the night He was betrayed our Lord Jesus Christ took bread, and when He had given thanks, He broke it and gave it to His disciples and said: “Take, eat: this is My Body.” He took the cup, gave thanks and said: “Take, drink: this is My Blood.” Since Christ Himself has declared the bread to be His Body, who can have any further doubt? Since He Himself has said quite categorically, This is My Blood, who would dare to question it and say that it is not His Blood?
Therefore, it is with complete assurance that we receive the bread and wine as the Body and Blood of Christ. His Body is given to us under the symbol of bread, and His Blood is given to us under the symbol of wine, in order to make us by receiving them one body and blood in our members, we become bearers of Christ and sharers, as Saint Peter says, in the divine nature.
Once, when speaking to the Jews, Christ said: Unless you eat My Flesh and drink My Blood you shall have no life in you. This horrified them and they left Him. Not understanding His words in a spiritual way, they thought the Savior wished them to practice cannibalism.
Under the old covenant there was showbread, but it came to an end with the old dispensation to which it belonged. Under the new covenant there is Bread from Heaven and the Cup of Salvation. These sanctify both soul and body, the bread being adapted to the sanctification of the body, the Word, to the sanctification of the soul.
Do not, then, regard the Eucharistic elements as ordinary bread and wine: they are in fact the Body and Blood of The Lord, as He Himself has declared. Whatever your senses may tell you, be strong in faith.
You have been taught and you are firmly convinced that what looks and tastes like bread and wine is not bread and wine but the Body and Blood of Christ. You know also how David referred to this long ago when he sang: Bread gives strength to man’s heart and makes his face shine with the oil of gladness. Strengthen your heart, then, by receiving this bread as spiritual bread, and bring joy to the face of your soul.
May purity of conscience remove the veil from the face of your soul so that by contemplating the glory of the Lord, as in a mirror, you may be transformed from glory to glory in Christ Jesus our Lord. To Him be glory forever and ever. Amen.
– from the Jerusalem Catecheses
(Cat. 22, Mystagogica 4, 1. 3-6. 9: PG 33, 1098-1106)
“Consider the generosity of our Savior: what He acquired by dying becomes ours by eating. As often as we receive this Sacrament with proper dispositions, we make our own the fruits of all the labors, injuries and sufferings of His life, especially those borne at the time of His passion and death. Just as the power and the sensations of the head reach all the members of the body, in the same way, because Christ is “the head of the Church which is His Body” (Eph. 1:23), the treasures of His grace are made abundantly available to all who through charity are one with Him as living members.”
– Louis of Grenada (1554-1623)
“We should never again use the expression, ‘When Jesus was on earth’ or think of Him as being only in heaven, Jesus is still on earth.”
“While all the sacraments confer grace, the Eucharist contains the author of grace, Jesus Christ Himself.”
– Fr. John Hardon, S.J.
“My Jesus! What a lovable contrivance this holy Sacrament was – that You would hide under the appearance of bread to make Yourself loved and to be available for a visit by anyone who desires You!”
– St. Alphonsus Ligouri
“How beautiful she is, Our Lady of compassion! How dear! How utterly unselfish! How filled with joy for Him – and us – in the depths of her own agony and desolation!”
– St. Alphonsus Ligouri
“O God, O Creator, O Spirit of Life overwhelming Your creatures with ever new graces! You grant to Your chosen ones the gift which is ever renewed: the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ!
“O Jesus, You instituted this Sacrament, not through any desire to draw some advantage from it for Yourself, but solely moved by love which has no other measure than to be without measure. You instituted this Sacrament because Your love exceeds all words. Burning with love for us, You desired to give Yourself to us and took up Your dwelling in the consecrated Host, entirely and forever, until the end of time. And You did this, not only to give us a memorial of Your death which is our salvation, but You did it also, to remain with us entirely and forever.”
– St. Angela of Foligno
“Jesus took His flesh from the flesh of Mary,”
– St. Augustine
“The bread that you see on the altar is the Body of Christ as soon as it is sanctified by God’s word. The chalice, or better what is contained in the chalice, is the Blood of Christ as soon as it is sanctified by God’s word,”
– St. Augustine
Of Jesus, St. Augustine says, “Look upon the beauty of your Lover.”
“It was love that motivated His self-emptying, that led Him to become a little lower than angels, to be subject to parents, to bow His head beneath the Baptist’s hands, to endure the weakness of the flesh, and to submit to death even upon the cross,”
– St. Bernard
| The King Of Love My Shepherd Is St. Columba |
| The King of Love my Shepherd is, Whose goodness fails me never; I nothing lack if I am His, and He is mine forever. Where streams of living water flow With gentle care He leads me, And where the verdant pastures grow With Heav’nly food He feeds me. Perverse and foolish I have strayed But yet in love He sought me, and on His shoulder gently laid, and home, rejoicing brought me. In death’s dark vale I fear no ill With You, dear Lord, beside me, Your rod and staff my comfort still, Your Cross before to guide me. You spread a table in my sight, Your saving grace bestowing; And O what joy and true delight From Your pure chalice flowing! And so through all the length of days Your goodness fails me never; Good Shepherd, may I sing Your praise Within Your house forever |
“To speak of the Blessed Sacrament is to speak of what is most sacred. How often, when we are in a state of distress, those to whom we look for help leave us; or what is worse, add to our affliction by heaping fresh troubles upon us. He is ever there waiting to help us.”
– St. Euphrasia Pelletier, Foundress of the Sisters of the Good Shepherd
“We must visit Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament a hundred thousand times a day.”
– St. Francis de Sales
“We adore Thee most holy Lord Jesus Christ, here in all Thy Churches, which are in the whole world, because by Thy holy cross, Thou hast redeemed the world,”
– St. Francis of Assisi
“There is a school in Heaven, and there one has only to learn how to love. The school is in the Cenacle; the Teacher is Jesus; the matter taught is His Flesh and His Blood,”
– St. Gemma Galgani
“Every Consecrated Host is made to burn Itself up with love in a human heart,”
– St. John Vianney, the Cure of Ars
“I love so much a soul’s desire to receive Me, that I hasten to it each time it summons Me by its yearnings,”
– Words of Jesus to St. Margaret Mary Alacoque
“You Yourself, O Christ are my all. For you I keep myself chaste, and holding aloft my shining lamp I run to meet You, my Spouse,”
– St. Methodius, Bishop of Olympus
“In one day the Eucharist will make you produce more for the glory of God than a whole lifetime without it.”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“To be possessed by Jesus and to possess Him – that is the perfect reign of Love.”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“Moreover, on Calvary, men had become her children; she loved them with all the tenderness of a mother, and wanted their sovereign good as much as her own. That is why she was so eager to make Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament known to all, to enkindle all hearts with His love, to see them all bound and chained at His loving service, to group them into a Eucharistic Guard of Honor, a court of faithful and devoted adorers. To obtain that grace, Mary carried out a perpetual mission of prayer and of penance in the presence of the Most Holy and Adorable Eucharist, pleading for the salvation of a world redeemed by Divine Blood and, in her boundless zeal, including the needs of the faithful of every age and place who would ever share in the heritage of the Divine Eucharist,”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“Jesus has prepared not just one Host, but one for everyday of our life. The Hosts for us are ready. Let us not forfeit even one of them,”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“Love cannot triumph unless it becomes the one passion of our life. Without such passion we may produce isolated acts of love; but our life is not really won over or consecrated to an ideal.
“Until we have a passionate love for our Lord in the Most Blessed Sacrament we shall accomplish nothing,”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“The devotion to the Eucharist is the most noble because it has God as its object; it is the most profitable for salvation, because It gives us the Author of Grace; it is the sweetest, because the Lord is Sweetness Itself,”
– St. Pius X
One day St. Teresa of Avila heard someone say: “If only I had lived at the time of Jesus… If only I had seen Jesus… If only I had talked with Jesus…”
To this she responded: “But do we not have in the Eucharist the living, true and real Jesus present before us? Why look for more?”
“God does not despise these hidden struggles with ourselves, so much richer in merit because they are unseen: โThe patient man is better than the valiant and he that ruleth his spirit than he that taketh cities.โ (Prov. xvi. 32). By our little acts of charity practiced in the shade we convert souls far away, we help missionaries, we win for them abundant alms, and by that means build actual dwellings both spiritual and materials for our Eucharistic Lord.”
– St. Therese
“To virginity is awarded the tribute of the highest beauty,”
– St. Thomas Aquinas
“Were it not for the constant presence of our divine Master in our humble chapel, I would not have found it possible to persevere in sharing the lot of the lepers in Molokai…The Eucharist is the bread that gives strength… It is at once the most eloquent proof of His love and the most powerful means of fostering His love in us. He gives Himself every day so that our hearts as burning coals may set afire the hearts of the faithful,”
– Blessed Fr. Damien, Apostle of the Lepers
“I hope that this form of Adoration, with permanent exposition of the Blessed Sacrament, will continue into the future. Specifically, I hope that the fruit of this Congress results in the establishment of Perpetual Eucharistic Adoration in all parishes and Christian communities throughout the world,”
– Pope John Paul II, at the 45th International Eucharistic Congress, Seville, Spain, June 1993
“Our own belief is that the renovation of the world will be brought about only by the Holy Eucharist.”
– Pope Leo XIII
“The more pure and chaste is a soul, the more it hungers for this Bread [Jesus in the Eucharist], from which it derives strength to resist all temptations to sins of impurity, and by which it is more intimately united with the Divine Spouse;
‘He who eats My Flesh and drinks My Blood, abides in Me and I in him,'”
– Pope Pius XII, Sacra Virginitas, On Consecrated Virginity
“The Power of One Hail Mary can change the world. In all our efforts and endeavors, we can never underestimate the power of prayer, and must always rely upon the help of God. In a special way we commend our efforts to the Mother of God and our own Blessed Mother.”
“The Rosary, especially prayed in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament, is a powerful means of spiritual grace. In all of our efforts to promote the sanctity of human life, prayer is our first and strongest resource. May we rely upon the power of our Lord’s presence in the Blessed Sacrament and the intercession of His Blessed Mother to guide and help us in fostering a greater respect for human life and an end to abortion in our society…”
– Most Reverend Thomas Daily, Bishop of Brooklyn
“Christ underwent His passion and death freely, because of the sins of men and out of infinite love, in order that all may reach salvation.
It is, therefore, the burden of the Church’s preaching to proclaim the Cross of Christ as the sign of God’s all-embracing love and as the fountain from which every grace flows,”
– Vatican Council II
“When you look at the Crucifix, you understand how much Jesus loved you then. When you look at the Sacred Host you understand how much Jesus loves you now,”
– Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta
“The day’s food for the day’s march…that is what Holy Communion is meant to be.”
– Mgr. Ronald Knox
“As I read the sad statistics… that only 30% believe what the church teaches on the Real Presence of Christ, my mind went back to an earlier heresy – the Protestant Revolt. It was not the so called “selling of indulgences” that caused the painful break in our family. It was… [those] who no longer believed in the Real Presence…”
“When Catholics are asked, ‘Do you have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ?’ they should answer a resounding YES! There is no closer union with Jesus than when you receive Him in the Eucharist. You too can say with St. Paul, ‘…and the life I now live is not my own CHRIST IS LIVING IN ME.’ (Gal 2:20)”
– Rev. Msgr. Richard L. Carroll, V.F.
“We know, too, that united to the Divinity in the Eucharist there is Jesus’ Body and Blood taken from the body and blood of the Blessed Virgin. Therefore at every Holy Communion we receive, it would be quite correct, and a very beautiful thing, to take notice of our Holy Mother’s sweet and mysterious presence, inseparably united with Jesus in the Host. Jesus is always the Son She adores. He is Flesh of Her flesh and Blood of Her blood. If Adam could call Eve when she had been taken from his rib, ‘bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh,’ (Gen. 2:23), cannot the holy Virgin Mary even more rightly call Jesus ‘Flesh of my flesh and Blood of my blood’? Taken from the ‘intact Virgin’ as says St. Thomas Aquinas, the flesh of Jesus is the maternal flesh of Mary, the blood of Jesus is the maternal blood of Mary. Therefore it will never be possible to separate Jesus from Mary.”
– from Jesus, Our Eucharistic Love, by Fr. Stefano Manelli, O.F.M. Conv., S.T.D.
“When St. John Mary Vianney arrived at the obscure little village of Ars, someone said to him with bitterness, ‘Here there is nothing to do.’ ‘Therefore there is everything to do,’ replied the Saint.
“And he began immediately to act. What did he do? He arose at 2:00am in the morning and went to pray near the altar in the dark church. He recited the Divine Office and prepared himself for Holy Mass. After the Holy Sacrifice, he made his thanksgiving; then he remained at prayer until noon. He would be always kneeling on the floor without any support, with a Rosary in his hand and his eyes fixed on the tabernacle.”
– from Jesus, Our Eucharistic Love, by Fr. Stefano Manelli, O.F.M. Conv., S.T.D.
Recently, I heard a story about Fr. Benedict Groeschel, CFR. He was traveling with a Protestant minister in a car and when they passed a Catholic Church, Fr. Benedict made the sign of the Cross. The minister asked him why he did this. Fr. Benedict explained that it was out of reverence for Jesus in the Most Blessed Sacrament. The minister told him, if I believed what you believe, I would get out of the car, run inside the Church, fall on my knees and never get up again.
In 1859, at the request of the Bishop, Bl. Eugene Mazenod, St. Peter Julian [Eymard] established Perpetual Adoration in a church entrusted to his congregation in the city of Marseilles. Shortly after returning to Paris, he wrote to the priest in charge of the Church. “Do pursue the work we have inaugurated. You know that beginnings are accompanied with more abundant grace and light. There is a greater fervor in the beginning and then enthusiasm is apt to wane. But it should be different in our case: we must keep on growing and ascending like the noonday sun, because we are always exposed to the rays of the Eucharistic Sun.”
– from The Link
“Lourdes, where non-Catholics imagine that we accord Mary undue eminence, is no doubt that place in the world where Christ in the Eucharist is most glorified. It is the only place in the world where, under the veil of the Host, Christ mingles in the midst of so many rich people and is as closely pressed by them as He was during His mortal life. His mother prays for these bodies and these souls, and Christ cures them. The procession of the Blessed Sacrament in Lourdes starts from the Grotto to show that Jesus was given to us by the Virgin. And she who stood on Golgotha, at the foot of the Cross a condemned Man, stands here by the side of the King of eternal glory.”
– Francois Mauriac, Holy Thursday
“Each time we accept to bear that cross and be nailed to it, believing against all believing – when it’s impossible any longer to believe because of our pain – that’s when we defeat him [satan].
– By the Blood of THE LAMB [Jesus in the Most Blessed Sacrament],” Fr. Elijah, Michael O’Brien
Our Holy Father, Pope John Paul II’s 1996 letter to the Bishop of Liege titled
“Eucharist: Sacrament to be Adored”
The letter was written on the occasion of the 750th anniversary of the first celebration of the Feast of Corpus Christi.
To Bishop Albert Houssiau
of Liege, Belgium
1. In 1246, Robert of Thourotte, your distant predecessor in the see of Liege, instituted in his Diocese the Eucharistic feast now known as Corpus Christi, at the request of Juliana of Cornillon, who had already composed an office for Corpus Christi, Eve of St. Martin and other women of Liege. A few years later in 1264, Pope Urban IV made this feast of the Body of Christ a holy day of obligation for the universal Church, thereby expressing the importance of venerating the Eucharistic Body of our Saviour. On the occasion of the 750th anniversary of the institution of this feast, as I join all the pilgrims who will be participating in the jubilee ceremonies and the faithful all over the world who ceaselessly pray before the Blessed Sacrament, I raise a fervent prayer of thanksgiving to the Lord.
2. Christ whom we adore is really present
Jesus is no longer present to men in the same way that he was on the roads of Palestine. After the Resurrection, he appeared in his glorious body to the women and to his disciples. Then he took the Apostles and “led them out as far as Bethany, and lifting up his hands he blessed them. …He parted from them, and was carried up into heaven” (Lk 24:50-51). But in ascending to the Father, Christ did not distance himself from men. He dwells forever in the midst of his brethren and, just as he promised, he accompanies them and guides them with his Spirit. Henceforth, his presence is of another kind. Indeed, “at the Last Supper, after celebrating the Passover with his disciples and when he was about to pass from this world to his Father, Christ instituted this sacrament as the perpetual memorial of his Passion…, the greatest of all his miracles; and he left this sacrament to those whom his absence filled with grief, as an incomparable consolation” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Office of Corpus Christi, 57, 4). Every time we celebrate the Eucharist in the Church, we recall the death of the Saviour, we proclaim his Resurrection as we await his return. Thus no sacrament is greater or more precious than that of the Eucharist; and when we receive Communion, we are incorporated into Christ. Our life is transformed and taken up by the Lord.”
3. Outside the Eucharistic celebration, the Church is careful to venerate the Blessed Sacrament, which must be “reserved…as the spiritual centre of the religious and parish community” (Paul VI, Mysterium Fidei, n. 68). Contemplation prolongs Communion and enables one to meet Christ, true God and true man, in a lasting way, to let oneself be seen by him and to experience his presence. When we contemplate him present in the Blessed Sacrament of the altar, Christ draws near to us and becomes more intimate to us than we are to ourselves. He grants us a share in his divine life in a transforming union and, in the Spirit, he gives us access to the Father, as he himself said to Philip: ‘He who has seen me has see the Father’ (Jn 14:9). Contemplation, which is also a Communion of desire, intimately associates us with Christ, and in a very special way associates those who are prevented from receiving it.
Remaining in silence before the Blessed Sacrament, it is Christ totally and really present whom we discover, whom we adore and with whom we are in contact. However, it is not through the senses that we perceive him and are close to him. Under the appearance of bread and wine, it is faith and love which lead us to recognize the Lord, he who fully communicates to us ‘the blessings of Redemption which he accomplished, he, the Master, the Good Shepherd, the Mediator of most pleasing to the Father’ (Leo XIII, Mirae caritatis). As the Livre de la foi of the Belgian Bishops recalls, prayer of adoration in the Presence of the Blessed Sacrament unites the faithful ‘with the paschal mystery; it enables them to share in Christ’s sacrifice, of which the Eucharist is the ‘permanent sacrament.'”
4. In honouring the Blessed Sacrament, we also offer a profound thanksgiving to the Father, for in his Son he visited us and redeemed his people. Through the sacrifice of the Cross Jesus gave his life to the world and made us his adoptive children, in his image, establishing a particularly intimate relationship that enables us to call God by the beautiful name of Father. As Scripture reminds us, Jesus spent nights in prayer, especially at the moments when he had to make important decisions. In his prayer, by an act of filial trust and in imitation of his Lord and Master, the Christian opens his heart and his hands to receive God’s gift and to thank him for his freely offered blessings.
5. It is invaluable to converse with Christ, and leaning against Jesus’ breast like his beloved disciple, we can feel the infinite love of his Heart. We learn to know more deeply the One who gave Himself totally, in the different mysteries of his divine and human life, so that we may become disciples and in turn enter into this great act of giving, for the glory of God and the salvation of the world. ‘Following Christ is not an outward imitation, since it touches man at the very depths of his being’ (Veritatis splendor, n. 21). We are called to learn from him, gradually to be conformed to him, to let the Spirit act within us and to fulfil the mission entrusted to us. In particular, Christ’s love spurs us to work constantly for the unity of his Church, to proclaim the Gospel to the ends of the earth, and to serve men, ‘we who are many are one body, for we all partake of one bread’ (1 Cor 10:16) such is the Good News which gladdens man’s heart and shows him that he is called to take part in the blessed life with God. The Eucharistic mystery is the source, the centre and the summit of the Church’s spiritual and charitable activity (cf. Presbyterorum ordinis, n. 6).
Model your life on the mystery of the Lord’s Cross
Closeness to Christ in silence and contemplation does not distance us from our contemporaries but, on the contrary makes us attentive and open to human joy and distress and broadens our heart on a global scale. It unites us with our brothers and sisters in humanity and particularly with children, who are the Lord’s dearly beloved. Through adoration, the Christian mysteriously contributes to the radical transformation of the world and to the sowing of the Gospel. Anyone who prays to the Saviour draws the whole world with him and raises it to God. Those who stand before the Lord are therefore fulfilling an eminent service. They are presenting to Christ all those who do not know him or are far from him; they keep watch in his presence on their behalf.
6. On the occasion of this jubilee, I encourage priests to revive the memory of their priestly ordination, by which Christ called them to take part in a particular way in his one priesthood, especially in the celebration of the Eucharistic sacrifice and in building up his Mystical Body which is the Church. May they remember the words spoken by the Bishop at their ordination liturgy: “Know what you are doing, and imitate the mystery you celebrate: model your life on the mystery of the Lord’s Cross”! In drawing from the source of the sacred mysteries by faithful and regular periods of contemplation, they will derive spiritual fruit for their personal life and their ministry, and, in turn, they will be able to make the Christian people entrusted to their care capable of understanding the greatness “of their own particular sharing in the priesthood of Christ” (Letter to Priests for Holy Thursday 1996, n. 2; L’Osservatore Romano English edition, 27 March 1996, p. 3).
7. “When the faithful adore Christ present in the sacrament, they should remember that his presence derives from the sacrifice and is directed towards both sacramental and spiritual communion” (Sacred Congregation of Rites, Instruction on the Worship of the Eucharistic Mystery, n. 50). I therefore encourage Christians regularly to visit Christ present in the Blessed Sacrament of the altar, for we are all called to abide in the presence of God, thanks to him who is with us until the end of time. In contemplation, Christians will perceive ever more profoundly that the paschal mystery is at the heart of all Christian life. This practice leads them to join more intensely in the paschal mystery and to make the Eucharistic sacrifice, the perfect gift, the centre of their life in accordance with their specific vocation, for it “confers and incomparable dignity upon the Christian people” (Paul VI, Mysterium Fidei, n. 67); in fact, during the Eucharist, we are welcomed by Christ, we receive his forgiveness, we are nourished by his word and his bread, we are then sent out on mission in the world; thus each one is called to witness to what he has received and to do the same for his brethren. The faithful strengthen their hope by discovering that with Christ suffering and distress can be transfigured, for with him we have already returned from death to life. As a result, when they offer the Lord of history their own life, their work and all creation, their days are illumined by him.
8. I urge priests, religious and lay people to continue and redouble their efforts to teach the younger generations the meaning and value of Eucharistic adoration and devotion. How will young people be able to know the Lord if they are not introduced to the mystery of his presence? Like the young Samuel, by learning the words of the prayer of the heart, they will be closer to the Lord who will accompany them in their spiritual and human growth, and in the missionary witness which they must give throughout their life. The Eucharistic mystery is in fact the “summit of evangelization” (Lumen gentium, n. 28), for it is the most eminent testimony to Christ’s Resurrection. All interior life needs silence and intimacy with Christ in order to develop. This gradual familiarity with the Lord will enable certain young people to be involved in serving as acolytes and to taking a more active part in Mass; for young boys, to be near the altar is also a privileged opportunity to hear Christ’s call to follow him more radically in the priestly ministry.
9. As I commend you to the intercession of the Mother of God, St. Juliana, and also St. Lambert and St. Hubert, zealous evangelizers of your country, and all the saints of your land, I cordially grant my Apostolic Blessing to you, to all the members of the diocesan community and to the faithful who during the year will take part in the various events of the jubilee.
From the Vatican, 28 May 1996.
Joannes Paulus II (Signed)
“On her return to Lisieux [from her pilgrimage to Rome to see the Pope regarding her entrance to the Carmel], she sent her gold bracelet to the chaplains of Montmarte so it could be melted into part of a great monstrance – a gesture that clearly expressed Therese’s desire to keep watch day and night close to Jesus in the Eucharist.”
Note: The monstrance containing the gold of Therese’s bracelet is at Le Sacre Coeur in Paris, France where Jesus in the Most Blessed Sacrament is perpetually adored to this day.
“My mission (is) to make God loved…,” – St. Therese of Lisieux.
– Therese and Lisieux, by Pierre Descouvemont and Helmuth Nils Loose
“One Sunday in July 1887, Therese received a great Eucharistic grace at Saint-Pierre cathedral. At the end of the Mass, a picture of the Crucified Christ stuck out of her missal. She was struck by the idea that His Blood was falling to the ground without anyone thinking of collecting it. She decided to remain at the foot of the cross for the rest of her life to receive this precious Divine dew for the sake of sinners. In her heart sounded the cry of Jesus, โI thirst.โ It was her thirst for love,”
– Therese and Lisieux, by Pierre Descouvemont and Helmuth Nils Loose
“The message of all the Marian apparitions, both past and present, is that the triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary will culminate in the Eucharistic reign of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. This Eucharistic reign will come through perpetual adoration of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament,”
– Perpetual Eucharistic Adoration – Fire from Heaven
“After Communion, he felt the Presence inside himself as a radiant fire of such exceeding sweetness that all sense of time and every sensation of anxiety disappeared… Eventually all articulate words subsided into a current of communication flowing like a river of love between Lord and servant, between Creator and creature, between Friend and friend, Lover and lover. The union was so utterly complete that the old priest sat immobile in perfect recollection for a time that existed beyond time,”
– from Eclipse of the Sun, by Michael O’Brien
“We need… not just devotion to the Eucharist, but profound union with Him in the Eucharist,”
– from Eclipse of the Sun, by Michael O’Brien
In the Eucharist, Christ is truly present and alive, working through his Spirit; yet, as Saint Thomas said so well, “what you neither see nor grasp, faith confirms for you, leaving nature far behind; a sign it is that now appears, hiding in mystery realities sublime”.(16) He is echoed by the philosopher Pascal: “Just as Jesus Christ went unrecognized among men, so does his truth appear without external difference among common modes of thought. So too does the Eucharist remain among common bread”.(17)
– from #13 of Pope John Paul II’s new encyclical Faith and Reason, (Fides et Ratio)
Revelation of the Sacred Heart
Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque, (1647-1690)
It was on June 16, 1675, that the last of the grand revelations relative to the Sacred Heart took place. It was to close the cycle of those solemn disclosures. Until then the humble virgin had received from the Lord only personal favors, very like those with which other holy souls had already been favored. He had only demanded of her some individual practices of devotion. Now however, the hour was come for Him to invest her with her grand, public mission.
During the octave of the feast of the Blessed Sacrament, June 16, 1675, Margaret Mary was on her knees before the choir-grate, her eyes fixed on the tabernacle. She had just received “some of the unmeasured graces of His love”. We have no particulars of these graces.
Suddenly the Lord appeared on the altar and discovered to her His Heart:
“Behold”, said He to her, “this Heart which has so loved men that it has spared nothing, even to exhausting and consuming itself, in order to testify its love. In return, I receive from the greater part only ingratitude, by their irreverence and sacrilege, and by the coldness and contempt they have for Me in this sacrament of love. What is most painful to Me,” added the Savior, in a tone that went to the Sister’s heart, “is that they are hearts consecrated to Me”
Then He commanded her to have established in the Church a particular feast to honor His Sacred Heart.
“It is for this reason I ask thee that the first Friday after the octave of the Blessed Sacrament be appropriated to a special feast, to honor My Heart by communicating on that day, and making reparation for the indignity that it has received. And I promise that My Heart shall dilate to pour out abundantly the influences of its love on all that will render it this honor or procure its being rendered”.
– Bougaud
“I no longer take pleasure in perishable food or in the delights of this world. I want only God’s bread, which is the Flesh of Jesus Christ, formed of the seed of David, and for drink I crave His Blood which is love that cannot perish.”
“Be careful, therefore, to take part only in the one Eucharist; for there is only one Flesh of our Lord Jesus Christ and one cup to unite us with His Blood.”
“I am God’s wheat and shall be ground by their teeth so that I may become Christ’s pure bread.”
– from the letters of St. Ignatius of Antioch, Bishop and Martyr
A spiritual director of St. Issac Jogues writes:
“It would have been well if I had learnt from Father Jogues the manner of praying and making thanksgiving (after Mass) as from a soul, if I can use the phrase, glued to the Blessed Sacrament. It was before this hidden God that he performed all his spiritual exercises, his prayers, his breviary, and he did not mind the bitterness of the cold nor the annoyance of the insects.”
When St. Isaac Jogues became the first white man to see the modern day Lake George in the Adirondack Mountains on Corpus Christi, he called the lake “Lake of the Blessed Sacrament.”
Of St. Rene Goupil, St. Isaac Jogues writes: “We begged God to accept our lives and our blood and unite them to His life and His blood for the salvation of these tribes,” and “It was the Feast of St. Michael, September the 29th, 1642, that this angel in innocence and martyr of Jesus Christ, Rene Goupil, gave his life for Christ who has offered His life on the cross for him.”
Of her First Communion, in which Therese received Love Himself personally for the first time, she writes, “It was a kiss of love, I felt myself loved, and I replied, โI love You and I give myself to You forever.” In her little notebook Therese wrote down all the days on which she received Jesus in Holy Communion. Her second meeting with Jesus was equally as intimate. Of this wedding Therese recalled the words of St. Paul, “It is no longer I who life, but Christ who lives in me” (Gal. 2:20).
“Perpetual Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament is the Solution to our problems of declining vocations.”
– Ricardo J. Cardinal Vidal, Archbishop of Cebu
“It is there in His Eucharist that He says to me: ‘I thirst, thirst for your love, your sacrifices, your sufferings. I thirst for your happiness, for it was to save you that I came into the world, that I suffered and died on the Cross, and in order to console and strengthen you I left you the Eucharist. So you have there all my life, all my tenderness.'”
– Mother Mary of Jesus, the Foundress of the Sisters of Marie Reparatrice
At another time St. Faustina recorded these words as spoken to her by Our Lord: “I remind you, My daughter, that as often as you hear the clock strike the third hour (in the afternoon), immerse yourself completely in My mercy, adoring and glorifying it; invoke its omnipotence for the whole world, and particularly for poor sinners.” What our Lord hinted of in what he said to her next is significant: “My daughter try your best to make the Stations of the Cross in this hour, provided that your duties permit it; and if you are not able to make the Stations of the Cross, then at least step into the chapel for a moment and adore in the Most Blessed Sacrament My Heart, which is full of mercy.” Jesus finally added: “I claim veneration for My mercy from every creature.” (DIARY, V, 145)
“Before the coming of Jesus Christ, men fled away from God and, being attached to the earth, refused to unite themselves to their Creator. But the loving God has drawn them to Himself by the bonds of love, as He promised by the prophet Osee [Hosea]: “I will draw them with the cords of Adam, with the bonds of love” (11:4). These bonds are the benefits, the lights, the calls to His love, the promises of Paradise which He makes to us, but above all, the gift which He has bestowed upon us of Jesus Christ in the Sacrifice of the Cross and in the Sacrament of the Altar…”
– St. Alphonsus Maria Ligouri
“Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament has His hands full of graces, and He is ready to bestow them on anyone who asks for them,”
– St. Peter of Alcantara
“Nowhere does Jesus hear our prayers more readily than in the Blessed Sacrament,”
– Blessed Henry Suson
“Let us go with confidence to the throne of grace that we may obtain mercy and find grace,”
– (Heb. 4:16)
Since Christ Himself said in reference to the bread: “This is My Body,” who will dare remain hesitant? And since with equal clarity He asserted: “This is My Blood,” who will dare entertain any doubt and say that this is not His Blood?… You have been taught these truths. Imbued with the certainty of faith, you know that what seems to be bread is not bread but the Body of Christ, although it seems to be bread when tasted. You also know that what seems to be wine is not wine but the Blood of Christ although it does taste like wine.
– from a catechetical instruction given by Saint Cyril of Jerusalem for his successor John in the 4th century
“Neither theological knowledge nor social action alone is enough to keep us in love with Christ unless both are proceeded by a personal encounter with Him. Theological insights are gained not only from between two covers of a book, but from two bent knees before an altar. The Holy Hour becomes like an oxygen tank to revive the breath of the Holy Spirit in the midst of the foul and fetid atmosphere of the world,”
– Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen
“The Eucharist is at the very center of our life; such was the teaching of Jesus. When commenting on the miracle of the multiplication of the loaves He told His apostles that He Himself is the Living Bread that came down from heaven. He called on the twelve for an act of faith and it was Peter who answered in the name of all: ‘Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of everlasting life. We have come to believe and know that you are the Holy One of God’ (John 6:69). Christian faith is faith in the Eucharistic Christ.”
– Jean Galot, S.J.
“The Sacrament of the Body of the Lord puts the demons to flight, defends us against the incentives to vice and to concupiscence, cleanses the soul from sin, quiets the anger of God, enlightens the understanding to know God, inflames the will and the affections with the love of God, fills the memory with spiritual sweetness, confirms the entire man in good, frees us from eternal death, multiplies the merits of a good life, leads us to our everlasting home, and re-animates the body to eternal life,”
– St. Thomas Aquinas
“Do you want many graces? Go and visit the Blessed Sacrament often. Do you want few graces? Visit the Blessed Sacrament rarely. Do you want none at all? Then never pay a visit to the Blessed Sacrament,”
– St. John Bosco
“Ask Jesus to make you a saint. After all, only He can do that. Go to confession regularly and to Communion as often as you can,”
– St. Dominic Savio
“Salvation is from our God…on the throne, and from the Lamb!” This is the same Jesus Whom “everyone in the crowd was trying to touch…because power came out from Him that cured them all.” …From the Lamb flows a river of grace which heals every nation.
Each time we look upon Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, He raises us up into deeper union with Himself, opens up the floodgates of His merciful love to the whole world, and brings us closer to the day of His final victory “where every knee will bend and proclaim Jesus Christ as Lord”. “The reign of God is already in your midst.” The coming of Jesus to us in the Eucharist is assurance of His promise of final victory: “BEHOLD, I COME TO MAKE ALL THINGS NEW.”
– Excerpts from Rosary Meditations from Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta, Loving Jesus With the Heart of Mary
Prayer of St. Gertrude the Great
“Eternal Father, I offer Thee the Most Precious Blood of Thy Divine Son, Jesus, in union with the Masses said throughout the world today, for all the Holy Souls in Purgatory, for sinners everywhere, for sinners in the universal church, those in my own home and within my family. Amen.”
Our Lord told St. Gertrude the Great that this prayer would release 1000 souls from purgatory every time it is said. The prayer was extended to include living sinners as well.
“By His Eucharistic presence, Christ dwells in our midst. Out of love He has enriched the Church with His unceasing presence. As God in former days dwelt in the temple of Jerusalem, He now lives in our churches and chapels. He invites us to remain in close contact with Him. Through Eucharistic adoration we concentrate our attention on Him as we yield to the fascination of His invisible gaze. Opening our heart, we entrust all our petitions to Him,”
– Jean Galot, S.J.
“[It is appropriate that the Body and Blood of Christ be truly present in this Sacrament] because of the perfection of the New Covenant. The sacrifices of the Old Covenant contained the true sacrifice of Christ’s Passion only in symbol.
…Therefore it was necessary that the sacrifice of the New Covenant, instituted by Christ, have something more, namely, that it contain Christ Himself who has suffered and contain Him not only in symbol but in reality.”
– St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae
We are made partakers of the Body and Blood of Christ, not as taking common flesh, nor as of a holy man united to the Word in dignity, but the truly life-giving flesh of the Word Himself.
– Council of Ephesus 431
Sacrifice and Sacrament
The Eucharist is both a Sacrifice and Sacrament. Does not nature itself have a double aspect: the sacrifice and the sacrament? The vegetables which are served at the table, the meat which is presented on the platter, are the natural sacraments of the body of man. By them he lives. If they were endowed with speech, they would say, “Unless you have communion with me, you will not live.” But how do they come to be our sacrament if it was not by sacrifice? Did not the vegetables have to be pulled up by their roots from the earth, submitted to the law of death, then pass through the ordeal of fire, before they could become the sacrament of physical life or have communion with the body?
– from That Tremendous Love by Fulton J. Sheen, Harper Row. 1967
“…St. John Chrysostom, who, as you know, treated of the eucharistic mystery with such nobility of language and insight born of devotion, instructing his faithful on one occasion about this mystery, expressed these most fitting words: “Let us submit to God in all things and not contradict Him, even if what He says seems contrary to our reason and intellect; rather let His words prevail over our reason and intellect. Let us act in this way with regard to the (eucharistic) mysteries, looking not only at what falls under our senses but holding on to His words. For His word cannot lead us astray.” The scholastic Doctors often made similar affirmations: That in this sacrament are the true Body of Christ and His true Blood is something that “cannot be apprehended by the senses,” says St. Thomas, “but only by faith which relies on divine authority. This is why, in a comment on Luke, 22,19: (‘This is My Body which is given for you’), St. Cyril says: ‘Do not doubt whether this is true, but rather receive the words of the Savior in faith, for since He is the truth, He cannot lie.'” Thus the Christian people, echoing the words of the same St. Thomas, frequently sing the words: “Sight, touch, and taste in Thee are each deceived, the ear alone most safely is believed. I believe all the Son of God has spoken-than truth’s own word there is no truer token.” In fact, St. Bonaventure asserts: “There is no difficulty about Christ’s presence in the Eucharist as in a sign, but that He is truly present in the Eucharist as He is in heaven, this is most difficult. Therefore to believe this is especially meritorious.” Moreover, the Holy Gospel alludes to this when it tells of the many disciples of Christ who, after listening to the sermon about eating His Flesh and drinking His Blood, turned away and left Our Lord, saying: “This is strange talk, who can be expected to listen to it?” Peter, on the other hand, in reply to Jesus’ question whether also the twelve wished to leave, expressed his faith and that of the others promptly and resolutely with the marvelous answer: “Lord, to whom should we go? Thy words are the words of eternal life.”
– Pope Paul VI, Mystery Of Faith, (Mysterium Fidei)
“The faithful are to hold the Eucharist in highest honor, taking part in the celebration of the Most August Sacrifice, receiving the sacrament devoutly and frequently, and worshiping it with supreme adoration; pastors, clarifying the doctrine on this sacrament, are to instruct the faithful thoroughly about this obligation.”
– (Code of Canon Law #898)
“Lord Jesus Christ, pierce my soul with your love so that I may always long for you alone, who are the bread of angels and the fulfillment of the soul’s deepest desires. May my heart always hunger for you, so that soul may be filled with the sweetness of your presence”
– Saint Bonaventure
“On the altar you are looking at the same thing as you saw there last night. You have not heard, however, what this is, what it signifies, or about the greatness of the reality of which it is a sacrament. Your eyes are looking at bread and cup. This is the evidence before your physical sight. But your faith must be instructed concerning it- this bread being Christ ‘s Body and the cup containing His Blood. Though perhaps these words may be enough to initiate faith, faith must be further instructed in accordance with the Prophet’s words: ‘Believe that you may understand’ ( Is 7:9).
– St. Augustine of Hippo
“The Eucharist is the supreme proof of the love of Jesus. After this, there is nothing more but Heaven itself,”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“All expressions of love, even the highest and the most profound, are verified in the Eucharist. Thus, it is a Love that is crucified, a Love that unites, a Love that adores, a Love that contemplates, a Love that prays, a Love that delightfully satisfies,”
– Fr. Stefano Manelli, O.F.M. Conv., S.T.D.
“For One in such a lofty position to stoop so low is a marvel that is staggering. What sublime humility and humble sublimeness, that the Lord of the Universe, the Divine Son of God, should stoop as to hide Himself under the appearance of bread for our salvation! Behold the humble way of God, my brothers. Therefore, do not hold yourselves to be anything of yourselves, so that you may be entirely acceptable to One Who gives Himself entirely to you.”
– St. Francis of Assisi
“In the presence of Jesus in the Holy Sacrament we ought to be like the Blessed in heaven before the Divine Essence,”
– St. Teresa of Avila
…”Can you feel the fragrance of Paradise which diffuses Itself from the Tabernacle?,”
– St. Philip
“The faith of the Church is this: That one and identical is the Word of God and the Son of Mary Who suffered on the Cross, Who is present in the Eucharist, and Who rules in Heaven,”
– Pope Pius XII
“Jesus, Food of strong souls, strengthen me, purify me, make me godlike,”
– St. Gemma Galgani
“It is for us that, during eighteen hundred years, our divine Saviour has remained day and night on our altars, that we may have recourse to Him in all our needs; and nothing so much afflicts His divine Heart as our ingratitude for such a favor, and our neglect to visit Him and ask His blessing. If we knew how profitable those visits are, we should be constantly prostrate before the altar. The Saints understood this truth; they knew that Jesus Christ is the source of all grace, and whenever they encountered any difficulty or wished to obtain any particular favor, they ran to Jesus Christ in the Blessed Sacrament. St. Francis Xavier, St. Francis Regis and others spent whole hours during the day and, frequently, a great part of the night at the foot of the altar; it was in these long interviews with Jesus Christ that they advanced the good works they had in hand, converted sinners, and obtained success in all their undertakings for the glory of God and their own sanctification,”
– Blessed J. B. Marcellin Champagnat (1789-1840)
“My heart feels as if it were being drawn by a superior force each morning just before uniting with Him in the Blessed Sacrament. I have such a thirst and hunger before receiving Him that it’s a wonder I don’t die of anxiety. I was hardly able to reach the Divine Prisoner in order to celebrate Mass. When Mass ended I remained with Jesus to render Him thanks. My thirst and hunger do not diminish after I have received Him in the Blessed Sacrament, but rather, increase steadily. Oh, how sweet was the conversation I held with Paradise this morning. The Heart of Jesus and my own, if you will pardon my expression, fused. They were no longer two hearts beating but only one. My heart disappeared as if it were a drop in the ocean,”
– Blessed Padre Pio
“The Saints, being far advanced in the practice of love, were faithful and ardent adorers of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament. Importantly, Eucharistic adoration has always been considered as the closest likeness we have to the eternal adoration which will make up our whole paradise. The difference lies only in the veil which hides the sight of that divine Reality of which faith gives us unwavering certainty.”
“Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament has been the fervent devotion of the Saints. Their adoration lasted hours and hours, sometimes whole days or nights. There ‘at Jesus’ feet’ like Mary of Bethany (Luke 10:39), keeping Him fond and intimate company, absorbed in contemplating Him, they surrendered their hearts in a pure and fragrant offering of adoring love,”
– Fr. Stefano Manelli, OFM
“When we speak to Jesus with simplicity and with all our heart, He does like a mother who holds her child’s head with her hands and covers it with kisses and caresses.”
– St. John Vianney, on adoring Jesus in the Most Blessed Sacrament
Pope Gregory XV said that St. Teresa of Avila “saw Our Lord Jesus Christ, present in the Host so distinctly with the eyes of her spirit that she said she did not begrudge the happy lot of the Blessed who behold the Lord face to face in heaven.”
“Through perpetual adoration a parish gives the King all the love He truly deserves. This is why today the liturgy for Christ the King begins with this prayer:
‘Worthy is the Lamb to receive honor, glory and praise.’ (Rev. 5:12).
Perpetual adoration is the divine romance between Jesus and His people. It is saying ‘yes’ to His marriage proposal. All He wants is our love. ‘For it is love I desire, not sacrifice.’ (Hosea 6:6). Then, He will surprise us with the inheritance of His Kingdom!”
– from Letters To A Brother Priest (by Rev. Fr. Martin Lucia and Msgr. Josefino S. Ramirez)
“Go with Him, as His inseparable companion, to the wedding feast of Cana, and drink of the wine of His blessing. Let you have ever before you the Face of the Lord, and look upon His beauty, and let your earnest gaze turn nowhere away from His most sweet countenance. Go before Him into a desert place and see the wonder of His works, where He multiplied in His own Holy Hands the bread that sufficed to feed a great multitude. Go, my brother, go forward, and with all the love of your soul follow Christ wherever He may go… “And lovingly behold Him as taking bread into His hands, He blesses it, and breaks it, as the outward form of His own Immaculate Body; and the chalice which He blessed as the outward form of His Precious Blood, and gave to His Disciples; and be you also a partaker of His sacraments,”
– St. Ephrem of Syria (c. 306-73)
“The Eucharist is the link that binds the Christian family together. Take away the Eucharist and you have no brotherliness left,”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“Jesus healed ten lepers. Only one came back to give Him thanks for the miracle of a clean body. Jesus said: ‘Were not all ten made whole? Where are the other nine?’ Every Sunday Jesus performs a far greater miracle for us. The gift of the Holy Eucharist makes us immortal with divine life. Each communion will leave our soul everlastingly more glorious and beautiful in heaven. In spite of the fact that Jesus asks us to give thanks for this great gift by coming back during the week and visiting Him in the Blessed Sacrament, only a very few do. Your sacrifice will make up for the ingratitude of ‘the other nine,’ for the many who never think of visiting Him at all,”
– from The Value of Sacrifice
“Give thanks therefore to God the Father for having given you His divine Son not only as Brother in the Incarnation, as Teacher of truth, and as Savior on the Cross, but especially as your Eucharist, your bread of life, your heaven already begun.”
“Thank the Holy Ghost for continuing, through the priests, to produce Him daily on the altar, as He did the first time in Mary’s virginal womb.”
“Let your thanksgiving ascend to the throne of the Lamb, to the Hidden God as a sweet-smelling incense, as the most beautiful hymn of your soul, as the purest and tenderest love of your heart.”
“Thank Him in all humility of heart, like Saint Elizabeth in the presence of Mary and the Word Incarnate; thank Him with the vibrant ardor of Saint John the Baptist when he felt the closeness of his divine Master, hidden like himself in His mother’s womb; thank Him with the joy and generosity of Zacheus when he received the visit of Jesus in his house; thank Him with the Holy Church and the heavenly court.”
“In order that your thanksgiving may never cease and go on forever increasing, do what is done in heaven. Consider the goodness, the beauty ever old and ever new of the God of the Eucharist, Who for our sake is consumed and reborn without ceasing on the altar,”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“We come here to meet the Heart of Jesus pierced for us, from which water and blood gush. It is the redeeming love, which is at the origin of salvation, of our salvation, which is at the origin of the Church. Now still, today, the living Christ loves us and presents his heart to us as the source of our redemption… We are called not only to meditate and contemplate on this mystery of Christโs love; we are called to take part in it. It is the mystery of the Holy Eucharist, the center of our faith, the center of our worship of Christโs merciful love manifested in his Sacred Heart, a mystery which is adored here night and day. In the Holy Eucharist – this is also the meaning of perpetual adoration – we enter the movement of love from which all interior progress and all apostolate efficacy springs,”
From the Holy Fatherโs address at the Basilica of Montmartre in 1980, where he spoke of the Sacred Heart of Jesus in the Most Blessed Sacrament Who has been perpetually adored there for more than one hundred years.
Adore and praise the immense love Jesus has for you in this Sacrament of Himself. In order not to leave you a lonely orphan in this land of exile and misery, HE COMES FROM HEAVEN FOR YOU PERSONALLY, to offer you companionship and consolation. Thank Him, therefore, with all your love and all your strength; thank Him in union with all the saints. Express your wonder at the sacrifices He imposes on Himself in His sacramental state. He conceals the glory of His divinity and humanity so as not to dazzle and blind you. He veils His majesty so that we may not be afraid to come to Him and speak to Him as friend to friend. He does not manifest the perfection of His virtues so as not to discourage us in our weaknesses. He even checks the ardor of His Heart and of His love for you because you could not stand the strength and tenderness of it. He lets you see only His goodness which filters through, as it were, and escapes from the Sacred Species like a ray of sunshine through a thin cloud. – from Come to Me |
“O marvelous Sacrament! How can I find words to praise you! You are the life of the soul, the medicament healing our wounds, our comforter when we are overburdened, the memorial of Jesus Christ, the proof of his love, the most precious precept of his testament, our companion in the pilgrimage of life, the joy sustaining us in our exile, the burning coal kindling the fire of divine love, the instrument of grace, the pledge of eternal bliss and the treasure of Christians,”
– Louis of Granada (1505-1588)
“The Eucharist is a fire which inflames us,”
– St. John Damascene (d. 749)
“From the Eucharist comes strength to live the Christian life and zeal to share that life with others,”
– Pope John Paul II, to the Bishops of India
“I try to rekindle the fire of the Holy Eucharist,”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“The purpose of exposition [of the Blessed Sacrament] is not only to awaken a sense of wonderment and adoration as we dwell on the reality of the presence of Christ before us. It also brings to mind the benefits that can be derived… it is often said today that through exposition we are exposed to the Blessed Sacrament in such a way as to receive the abundant fruits that come with the life-giving Presence of Christ given for the life of the world,”
– Rev. Roland Huot, S.S.S.
“It’s as if we expose ourselves to the sun and its beneficial influence.”
– Br. Ephraim, about prayer before the Blessed Sacrament exposed
“Lord, by the words of consecration the substance of the bread and wine is converted into the substance of your Body and Blood. All powerful Lord, say over me the word which will change me into You.”
“The faith I have when I am in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament is so strong that I find it impossible to express what I feel… When the time comes to leave I must force myself to overcome the inclination to prolong my stay with Jesus.”
– Quotes of St. Anthony Mary Claret
St. Francis Xavier often spent whole hours during the day and into the night before Jesus in the Most Blessed Sacrament, Who gave Him the grace and the strength to lead so many souls to Christ. His devotion to Our Eucharistic Lord was so great that Fr. Stefano Manelli, O.F.M. writes:
“What shall we say of St. Francis Xavier who at times when distributing Holy Communion felt so carried away by a sense of adoration toward Our Lord Who was in his hands, that he got on his knees and in that position continued giving Holy Communion? Did that not present a witness of faith and love worthy of heaven?”
Because Jesus loves you infinitely, unlimited is the joy you bring to His Sacred Heart when you come to spend an hour with Him in the Blessed Sacrament. In an apparition to St. Margaret Mary Alacoque, Jesus spoke these moving words: “I have a burning thirst to be honored by men in the Blessed Sacrament.”
– from the flyer “Come to Me – I Wait for You in This Sacrament of Love“
“Eucharistic adoration is the greatest of actions. To adore is to share the life of Mary on earth when she adored the Word Incarnate in her virginal womb, when she adored Him in the Crib, on Calvary, in the divine Eucharist,”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“Once for all beloved children, the surest, easiest, shortest way is by the Eucharist. It is so easy to approach the holy table, and there we taste the joys of Paradise,”
– Pope St. Pius X
“The Pope also beatified Dina Belanger because of her devotion to Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament. Jesus revealed to Dina the power of the holy hour in making reparation. One form of reparation is the ability to make up for what is lacking in the life of another. One day before her holy hour, Jesus showed Dina a multitude of souls on the precipice of hell. After her holy hour, Jesus showed the same souls in the hands of God. He told her that through holy hours of prayer a multitude of souls go to heaven who otherwise would have gone to hell as one person can make up for what is lacking in the lives of others by winning precious efficacious graces for their salvation. In other words, Eucharistic Adoration is the outpouring of God’s Divine Mercy on the world!,”
– from “How One Soul Coming Before the Blessed Sacrament Can Change the World.“
The ‘yes’ of Mary gave us the Holy Eucharist, as the body of Jesus was formed from the Immaculate Heart of His Mother, from whose flesh Jesus took the flesh He gives us in the Blessed Sacrament…
“The Virgin shall….give birth to a Son and they shall call Him Emmanuel, a name which means ‘GOD IS WITH US’.” This is our joy today! Jesus chose the name ‘Emmanuel’ BECAUSE OF HIS INFINITE DESIRE TO DWELL WITH US ALWAYS IN THIS MOST BLESSED SACRAMENT, as absolute proof of HIS EVERLASTING LOVE and CONSTANT AFFECTION for each of us.
Jesus calls you to be with Him today, waiting for you with great desire. “I have called you by name…because you are precious in My eyes and glorious, and because I LOVE YOU.” All the love in all the world since the beginning of time is only a drop in the ocean in comparison to the love Jesus has for you alone in this Holy Eucharist, the continuation of His incarnation on earth, the fulfillment of His name: “Emmanuel, God is with us.”
– from the book Rosary Meditations from Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta: Loving Jesus With the Heart of Mary
The womb of Our Immaculate Mother Mary is
“wholly untouched, not dug nor sown, from heaven’s dew alone, it brings forth a Savior, and provides mortal men with the Bread of angels and the food of eternal life,”
– St. Irenaeus
“From one grain of corn which a virgin’s womb brought forth an abundant harvest of faithful souls has grown all over the world,”
– Blessed Gueric of Igny
“O Mother of Mercy, be filled with your Son’s glory, and leave what you have over to your little ones (Ps. 16:4). You are now at the table, we are dogs under the table (Mt. 15:27). Like a maid with her eyes on the hands of her mistress (Ps. 122:2) this hungry family looks to you for the food of life. Through you we have shared in the fruit of life at the table of these present sacraments. Through you may we share at the table of everlasting joys in the same fruit of life, Jesus, the blessed Fruit of your womb, to whom be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen.”
– St. Louis de Montfort
“If souls but understood the Treasure they possess in the Divine Eucharist, it would be necessary to encircle the tabernacles with the strongest ramparts for, in the delirium of a devouring and holy hunger, they would press forward themselves to feed on the Bread of Angels. The Churches would overflow with adorers consumed with love for the Divine prisoner no less by night than by day,”
– Blessed Dina Belanger
“Christ held Himself in His hands when He gave His Body to His disciples saying: ‘This is My Body.’ No one partakes of this Flesh before he has adored it,”
– St. Augustine
“What happiness do we not feel in the Presence of God, when we are alone at His feet… Redouble your fervor; you are alone to adore your God; His eyes rest upon you alone,”
– St. John Vianney
“I felt a great dislike to journeys, especially when they were long. But once I had started, I thought nothing of them, thinking of Him for Whose service they were undertaken and remembering that Our Lord would be praised and the most Holy Sacrament would dwell in the house I was going to found… It should be a great consolation to us – though many of us do not think of it – that Jesus Christ, true God and true man, dwells as He does in so many places in the most Holy Sacrament,”
– St. Teresa of Avila
“I have chosen for my emblem a Star, representing the Virgin Mary, and the Eucharist. Those who know me as a professor of theology will remember my passion for the Eucharist from our classes. Blessed be God for this madness… We must live our commitment to society steeped in the Eucharist. We must take the Eucharist to the streets, both in the heart of the city and on the outskirts, to the poor neighborhoods and to hospitals… In order to obey the Resurrected Christ, I dare say with Pope John Paul II: ‘Open wide the doors of your heart to the Holy Spirit.'”
– from the address of Nicolas Cotugno, Archbishop of Montevideo, Uruguay at his installation ceremony on December 20
“Consider the humble sacrifice that the shepherds and the three Wise Men made in their long journey to adore the Christ Child. Only the humble shepherds and the wise astrologers followed the star of faith to Bethlehem. He was the King, much greater than they were. No journey was too long because any trouble they had was infinitely worth the sacrifice. When they saw Him, they bowed down before Him. Where was the rest of the world? Who could understand then that the Babe wrapped in swaddling clothes was the hidden Incarnate Word of God? He came quietly and lovingly. Only the humble and wise could see the humble Jesus lying in a manger. The rest of the world passed Him by. Look at how God has never stopped honoring the shepherds and the magi for honoring His Son in Bethlehem. The humble sacrifice of their long journey is praised in Scripture. And around the world in every church and Christian home at Christmas, they are included in every Nativity scene. In the Blessed Sacrament. Jesus comes to us even more humbly than He did before. That is why your sacrifice will give God even greater glory than the glory given Him by the shepherds and the three Wise Men. And God will honor you even more than the shepherds and the three Wise Men for all eternity for honoring His Son in the Blessed Sacrament with the humility of your sacrifice!”
– from the pamphlet “The Value of Sacrifice“
“The Holy Eucharist is a need of the heart of Christ, just as it is a need of our hearts.” “Sanctify and dedicate yourselves in all things in the spirit of love which prompted Our Lord to institute the Holy Eucharist, wherein He perpetuates the gift of His love to the glory of the Father.”
– from the writings of St. Peter Julian Eymard
“O most admirable banquet, to which it is an unspeakable favor to be invited! O banquet that saves and gives delight! Nothing can be conceived which is of greater value. What is served is not the flesh of calves and kids, as in the Old Law, but Christ himself the true God. What is more wonderful than this sacrament!
No other sacrament accomplishes more for our souls. It takes away sin, strengthens virtue and enriches the soul with the abundance of all spiritual gifts.
It is offered in the Church for the living and the dead in order that all may benefit from what was meant for all.
There is no language adequate to describe the joy one experiences through this sacrament which draws sweetness from its very source and keeps alive in us the memory of the love, of which Christ gave proof during his passion.”
– St. Thomas Aquinas
“When the Sisters are exhausted, up to their eyes in work; when all seems to go awry, they spend an hour in prayer before the Blessed Sacrament. This practice has never failed to bear fruit: they experience peace and strength,”
– Blessed Mother Teresa
Following are excerpts from Our Holy Father, Pope John Paul II’s address given in Seoul, Korea at Good Shepherd Parish in 1989:
“In beholding the Word made flesh, now sacramentally present in the Eucharist, the eyes of our bodies are united with the eyes of faith in gazing upon the presence “par excellence” of Emmanuel “God with us” until that day when the sacramental veil will be lifted in the Kingdom of heaven.”
“If we are to experience the Eucharist as the “source and summit of all Christian life” (Lumen Gentium. 11), then we must celebrate it with faith, receive it with reverence, and allow it to transform our minds and hearts through the prayer of adoration. Only by deepening our Eucharist communion with the Lord through personal prayer can we discover what he asks of us in daily life. Only by drinking deeply from the source of life-giving water “welling up within us” (cf. Jn 4:14) can we grow in faith, hope and charity. The image of the Church in worship before the Blessed Sacrament reminds us of the need to enter into a dialogue with our Redeemer, to respond to his love and to love one another…”
Reflection from Divine Intimacy by Fr. Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalene, OCD
The Epiphany of Our Lord
PRESENCE OF GOD – I recognize in You, O little Jesus, the King of heaven and earth; grant that I may adore You with the faith and love of the Magi.
MEDITATION
1. “He Whom the Virgin bore is acknowledged today by the whole world…. Today is the glorious Feast of His Manifestation” (RB). Today Jesus shows Himself to the world as God.
The Introit of the Mass brings us at once into this spirit, presenting Jesus to us in the full majesty of His divinity. “Behold the sovereign Lord is come; in His hands He holds the kingdom, the power, and the empire.” The Epistle (Is 60, 1-6) breaks forth in a hymn of joy, announcing the vocation of the Gentiles to the faith; they too will acknowledge and adore Jesus as their God: “Arise, be enlightened, O Jerusalem: for thy light is come…. And the Gentiles shall walk in thy light, and the kings in the brightness of thy rising…. All they from Saba shall come, bringing gold and frankincense, and showing forth praise to the Lord.” We no longer gaze upon the lowly picture of the shepherds at the manger; passing before us now is the resplendent procession of the Wise Men from he East, representing the pagan nations and all of the kings of the earth, who come to pay homage to the Child-God.
Epiphany or Theophany, means the Manifestation of God; today it is realized in Jesus who manifests Himself as God and Lord of the world. Already a prodigy has revealed His divinity – the extraordinary star which appeared in the East. To the commemoration of the miracle, which holds the primary place in the day’s liturgy, the Church adds two others: the changing of water into wine at the wedding feast of Cana, and the Baptism of Jesus in the Jordan, when a voice from heaven announced, “This is my beloved Son.” The Magnificat Antiphon says, “Three miracles adorn this holy day” – three miracles which should lead us to recognize the Child Jesus as our God and King, and to adore Him with lively faith.
2. The verse at the Gradual of the Mass continues the story of the Magi: “We have seen His star in the East and are come with gifts to adore Him.” They saw the star and immediately set out. They had no doubts: their unbounded faith was strong and sure. They did not hesitate at the prospect of the trials of a long journey: they had generous hearts. They did not postpone the journey: their souls were ready.
A star often appears in the heaven of our souls; it is an inspiration from God, clear and intimate, urging us to greater generosity and calling us to a life of closer union with Him. Like the Magi, we too must always follow our star with faith, promptness, and selfless generosity. If we allow it to guide us, it will certainly lead us to God; it will bring us to the One Whom we are seeking.
The Magi did not give up their quest, although the star – at one point – disappeared from their sight. We should follow their example and their perseverance, even when we are in interior darkness. This is a trial of faith which is overcome only by the exercise of pure, naked faith. I know that He wills it, I know that God is calling, and this suffices for me: Scio cui credidi et certus sum (2 Tm 1, 12); I know Whom I have believed. No matter what happens, I shall trust Him.
In this spirit let us accompany the Magi to adore the new-born King. “And as they brought forth from among their treasures mystical gifts, let us from our hearts bring forth something fit to offer Him.” (RB)
COLLOQUY
O Jesus, I adore You, for You are the Lord my God. “For You, my Lord, are a great God, and a great King above all kings. For in Your hand are all the ends of the earth, and the heights of the mountains are Yours. For the sea is Yours, and You made it; and Your hands formed the dry land…. We are the people of Your pasture and the sheep of Your hand” (cf. Ps 94). Yes, O Jesus, I am one of Your lambs, one of Your creatures; and I am happy to acknowledge my nothingness in Your presence, and still happier to adore You, O lovely Infant, as my God and my Redeemer. O that all nations would acknowledge You for what You are, that all might prostrate before You, adoring You as their Lord and God!
O Lord, You can do this. Reveal Your Divinity to all mankind, and just as once You drew the Magi from the East to You, now in like manner unite all peoples and all nations around Your manger.
You have shown me that You want my poor cooperation in order to bring about the coming of Your kingdom. You wish me to pray, suffer, and work for the conversion of those who are near and of those who are far away. You wish that I, too, place before the manger of gifts of the Wise Men: the incense of prayer, the myrrh of mortification and of suffering borne with generosity out of love for You, and finally, the gold of charity, charity which will make my heart wholly and exclusively Yours, charity which will spur me on to work, to spend myself for the conversion of sinners and infidels, and for the greater sanctification of Your elect.
O my loving King, create in me the heart of an apostle. If only I could lay at Your feet today the praise and adoration of everyone on earth!
O my Jesus, while I beg You to reveal Yourself to the world, I also beseech You to reveal Yourself more and more to my poor soul. Let Your star shine for me today, and point out to me the road which leads directly to You! May this day be a real Epiphany for me, a new manifestation to my mind and heart of Your great Majesty. He who knows You more, loves You more, O Lord; and I want to know You solely in order to love You, to give myself to You with ever greater generosity.
“Devotion to the Blessed Sacrament helps us to offer the Mass with greater awareness and depth.
Christ loves the whole Church as his bride. But he also loves each one of us in particular. ‘Behold, I have loved you with an everlasting love.’ This calls for a personal response from each one of us…,”
– Fr. Anthony Foy CSsR.
“Jesus Veiled! let us kneel down before Him in adoring awe, while our Mother teaches us His beauty, and His sweetness, and His goodness, and His nearness. When we think we know Him we shall not know the half, and when we speak of Him we shall stammer as children do, and when our hearts are hot with love of Him, they will be cold in comparison of the love which is His due…
“O sweet Sacrament of Love! we belong to Thee, for Thou art our Living Love Himself. Thou art our well of life, for in Thee is the Divine Life Himself, immeasurable, compassionate, eternal …There shall not be a single thought, a single hope, a single wish, which shall not be all for Thee!”
– from The Blessed Sacrament, by Fr. Faber
Sweet Sacrament Divine Sweet Sacrament Divine, Hid in Thy earthly home; Lo! round Thy lowly shrine, With suppliant hearts we come. Jesus to thee our voice we raise In songs of love and heart-felt praise Sweet Sacrament Divine. Sweet Sacrament Divine. Sweet Sacrament of Peace, Dear home of every heart, Where restless yearnings cease, And sorrows all depart. Here in Thine ear, all trustfully, We tell our tale of misery, Sweet Sacrament of Peace. Sweet Sacrament of Peace. – Irish Traditional Hymn |
“It seems that, after nineteen centuries of extraordinary glorification, the small Host for which so many cathedrals have sprung up, the small Host that has rested in millions of breasts and that has found a tabernacle and worshippers even in the desert – it seems that the triumphant Host of Lourdes and the Eucharistic Congresses of Chicago and Carthage remains as unknown, as secret as when it appeared for the first time in a room in Jerusalem. Light is in the world as in the days of St. John the Baptist, and the world does not know it,”
– Francois Mauriac, Holy Thursday: An Intimate Remembrance
Quotes from the Documents of Vatican II,
Decree on the Ministry and Life of Priests:
“The Eucharist is the Source and Summit of All Preaching of the Gospel.”
“…The other sacramentโs, and indeed, all ecclesiastical ministries and works on the Apostolate are bound up with the Eucharist and are directed towards it. For in the Most Blessed Eucharist is contained the whole spiritual good of the Church, namely, Christ Himself, Our Pasch… FOR THIS REASON, THE EUCHARIST APPEARS AS THE SOURCE AND SUMMIT OF ALL PREACHING OF THE GOSPEL.”
“As a help towards faithful fulfillment of their ministry, priests should love to talk daily with Christ, the Lord, in their visit to the most Blessed Sacrament, and in their personal devotion to it… By this spirit they themselves, and with them the people entrusted in their care, will unite themselves with Christ, the Mediator of the New Testament, and be able to, as adopted sons, cry โAbba! Father!โ” (Rom 8:15).
In the following meditation from the book Sobornost, by Catherine Doherty, she uses the Russian word “sobornost”, meaning unity. A unity not only in the most general sense of the word, but a unity of mind and heart.
“…There is another aspect to the most holy sacrament of the Eucharist. Incredible as it might seem to you, you and I have the strength of God, for God is in us and He has said, “Amen, amen, I say to you, he who believes in me, the works that I do he also shall do, and greater than these he shall do…” (Jn 14:12). Now the road to sobornost is yours for you are penetrated with God. Now nothing is impossible to the prayer of faith, and to you. Now sobornost becomes a reality. It is truly clothed with flesh – the flesh of Jesus Christ. Yes, the most holy sacrament of the Eucharist penetrates the faithful beyond our ken. Now we stride across mountains like gazelles, following our Beloved, and mountains become our habitat. Nothing can stop us. The most holy sacrament of the Eucharist brings sobornost in such a fashion that we must thank God and praise Him for it.”
“Listen well, “Let Him kiss me with the kiss of His mouth” (Sg 1:2). Not only does He become one in me, but He kisses me. Go deeper, friend, and understand the sobornost that binds us through the most holy sacrament of the Eucharist. The Bridegroom comes. Hear Him? He leaps over the mountains like a gazelle. Yes, the Bridegroom comes. Sobornost becomes the breath of the Lover, the Beloved.”
“The mysteries of the sacrament of the Holy Eucharist are high and deep, high and wide. He will reveal them to each of us within the enclosed garden of His love.”
“There is no way to clarify this aspect of sobornost except to fall flat on our faces upon having received the Most Holy Species and His kiss, and lay prostate before the Unity that God the Father has sent us, for the sign of that unity and its substance is Jesus Christ.”
“How sweet, the presence of Jesus to the longing, harassed soul! It is instant peace, and balm to every wound.”
– St. Elizabeth Seton, about Jesus in the Most Blessed Sacrament
“When Our Lord sees pure souls coming to visit Him in the Blessed Sacrament He smiles on them. They come with the simplicity that pleases Him so much.”
“The interior life is like a sea of love in which the soul is plunged and is, as it were, drowned in love,”
– St. John Vianney
“The surest, easiest, shortest way is the Eucharist,”
– Pope St. Pius X
“You [God] are a fire that takes away the coldness, illuminates the mind with its light, and causes me to know your truth and I know that you are beauty and wisdom itself. The food of angels, you give yourself to man in this fire of your love,”
– St. Catherine of Siena
“Love tends to union with the object loved. Now Jesus Christ loves a soul that is in a state of grace with immense love; He ardently desires to unite Himself with it. That is what Holy Communion does,”
– St. Alphonsus Ligouri
Of Jesus in the Holy Eucharist it is written: “This morning my soul is greater than the world since it possesses You, You whom heaven and earth do not contain,”
– St. Margaret of Cortona
O Blessed Host, in golden chalice enclosed for me, That through the vast wilderness of exile I may pass – pure, immaculate, undefiled; Oh, grant that through the power of Your love this might come to be.
O Blessed Host, take up Your dwelling within my soul, O Thou my heart’s purest love! With Your brilliance the darkness dispel. Refuse not Your grace to a humble heart.
O Blessed Host, enchantment of all heaven, Though Your beauty be veiled And captured in a crumb of bread, Strong faith tears away that veil.
– from the Diary of Saint Sr. Faustina (Kowalska) of the Blessed Sacrament, titled Divine Mercy In My Soul.
“To converse with You, O King of glory, no third person is needed, You are always ready in the Sacrament of the Altar to give audience to all. All who desire You always find You there, and converse with You face to face,”
– St. Teresa of Avila
“Our way of thinking is attuned to the Eucharist, and the Eucharist in turn confirms our way of thinking, “
– St. Irenaeus
“The Eucharist is everything, because from the Eucharist, everything is,”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“The Eucharist is the source and summit of the Christian life,”
– Pope John Paul II
“Indeed, this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks upon the Son and believes in Him shall have eternal life. Him I will raise up on the last day.” (Jn. 6:40)
Mary is raised to the height of glory because she allowed God to bring her to the depths of humility. “Whoever exalts himself shall be humbled but whoever humbles himself shall be exalted”…
This mystery assures us of the final victory of Jesus and Mary and the Church. Because the Church is an image of Jesus and Mary, what happens to Jesus and Mary will happen to the whole Church. Mary is the Queen of Heaven and earth. “A great sign appeared in the sky, a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, on her head a crown of twelve stars.” She will crush the head of the serpent with her heel: her humble children who obediently follow Godโs will and cause Jesus, her Son, to reign in every heart. “They defeated him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony.” This is the glory of humility and final victory! These two victories of Jesus and Mary must go hand in hand because they are one and the same.
Mary recognized her absolute nothingness without God that God may be absolutely everything to her. With Mary we humbly adore Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament by acknowledging our absolute dependency on Him. “He must increase, but I must decrease.” The Eucharist is the living Source of all light, life and love. Here Jesus says: “I am the Vine, you are the branches: he that abides in Me, and I in him, will bear much fruit, for without Me you can do nothing.” Every holy hour deepens our union with Him and bears much fruit. “So I gaze on You in the sanctuary to see Your strength and Your glory, for Your love is better than life.”
– Taken from the book Rosary Meditations from Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta
“They will fight against the Lamb, but the Lamb will be victorious. He is the Lord of lords and the King of kings.” (Rev 17:4)
The Eucharist is a constant reminder to “be intent on the things above rather than on things of earth”, “for here we have no lasting dwelling place.” “We have our citizenship in Heaven.” The Holy Eucharist is “the mystery, the plan He was pleased… to carry out in the fullness of time: to bring all things in the heavens and the earth into one under Christโs headship.” “The Lord will reign forever and give His people the gift of peace.” “I will reign through the omnipotent love of My Sacred Heart.” THE HOLY EUCHARIST IS A FORESHADOWING OF HIS REIGN ON EARTH: “This is Godโs dwelling among man. He shall dwell with them.” “Rejoice at the Presence of the Lord, for He comes to rule the earth.” “He has put all things under Christโs feet.” “If we hold out to the end, we shall also reign with Him.”
Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament is the Victorious Lamb, the โAlpha and Omegaโ, the โLord of lordsโ and the โKing of kingsโ. “Who would dare refuse You honor, or the glory due Your name O Lord? Since You alone are holy, all shall come and worship Your Presence.”
“Salvation is from our God…on the throne, and from the Lamb!” This is the same Jesus Whom “everyone in the crowd was trying to touch…because the power came out from Him that cured them all.” He says “I know the plans I have in mind for you: plans for peace, not disaster, reserving a future full of hope for you”: โfrom the Lamb flows a river of grace WHICH HEALS EVERY NATIONโ.
Each time we look upon Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, He raises us up into deeper union with Himself, opens up the floodgates of His merciful love to the whole world, and brings us closer to the day of His final victory โwhere every knee will bend and proclaim Jesus Christ as Lordโ. “The reign of God is already in your midst.” The coming of Jesus to us in the Eucharist is assurance of His promise of final victory: “BEHOLD, I COME TO MAKE ALL THINGS NEW.”
– Taken from the book Rosary Meditations from Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta
From the Holy Father’s Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation Ecclesia in America:
“I announced the theme of the Special Assembly for America of the Synod in these words: Encounter with the Living Jesus Christ: The Way to Conversion, Communion and Solidarity in America. Put this way, the theme makes clear the centrality of the person of the Risen Christ, present in the life of the Church and calling people to conversion, communion and solidarity. The starting-point of such a program of evangelization is in fact the encounter with the Lord. Given by Christ in the Paschal Mystery, the Holy Spirit guides us towards those pastoral goals which the Church in America must attain in the third Christian millennium.
He [Jesus] is present “especially under the Eucharistic species”.26 My Predecessor Paul VI deemed it necessary to explain the uniqueness of Christ’s real presence in the Eucharist, which “is called “real’ not to exclude the idea that the others are “real’ too, but rather to indicate presence par excellence, because it is substantial”!27 Under the species of bread and wine, “Christ is present, whole and entire in his physical โreality’, corporally present”.28 (12)
The journey of Christian initiation comes to completion and reaches its summit in the Eucharist, which fully incorporates the baptized into the Body of Christ. 104 (34)
The Eucharist is more than simply the culmination of Christian initiation. While Baptism and Confirmation serve as a beginning and introduction to the life of the Church and cannot be repeated, 107 the Eucharist is the living and lasting center around which the entire community of the Church gathers. 108 The various aspects of the Eucharist reveal its inexhaustible wealth: it is at one and the same time a Sacrament of Sacrifice, Communion and Presence. 109 The Eucharist is the outstanding moment of encounter with the living Christ. For this reason, by their preaching and catechesis, the Pastors of the People of God in America must strive “to give the Sunday Eucharistic celebration new strength, as the source and summit of the Church’s life, the safeguard of communion in the Body of Christ, and an invitation to solidarity, expressing the Lord’s command: “Love one another as I have loved you’ (Jn 13:34)”. 110 As the Synod Fathers suggest, an effort of this kind must include a number of fundamental aspects. First of all, there is a need to renew in the faithful the sense that the Eucharist is an immense gift.
The whole Church in America needs to be reminded also of “the link between the Eucharist and charity”, 114 a link which was expressed in the early Church by the joining of the agape and the Eucharistic Supper. 115 As a result of the grace received in the Sacrament, sharing in the Eucharist must lead to a more fervent exercise of charity.
The field in which priests work is vast. Therefore they should concentrate on what is essential to their ministry: “letting themselves be configured to Christ the Head and Shepherd, the source of all pastoral charity, offering themselves each day with Christ in the Eucharist, in order to help the faithful both personally and communally to experience the living Jesus Christ”. (39)
“The parish needs to be constantly renewed on the basis of the principle that ‘the parish must continue to be above all a Eucharistic community'”. (41)
66. As the Church’s Supreme Pastor, I urgently desire to encourage all the members of God’s People, particularly those living in America ” where I first appealed for a commitment “new in its ardor, methods and expression” 245 ” to take up this project and to cooperate in carrying it out. In accepting this mission, everyone should keep in mind that the vital core of the new evangelization must be a clear and unequivocal proclamation of the person of Jesus Christ, that is, the preaching of his name, his teaching, his life, his promises and the Kingdom which he has gained for us by his Paschal Mystery. 246″
Our Father THY WILL BE DONE A Meditation by St. Peter Julian Eymard Our Father Who are in Heaven in the heaven of the Eucharist, to You Who are seated on the throne of grace and love, be benediction, and honor, and power and glory for ever and ever! Hallowed be Your Name first in ourselves, through the spirit of Your humility, obedience, and charity. May we in all humility and zeal make You known, loved, and adored by all men in the Holy Eucharist, Thy Kingdom Come Thy Eucharistic kingdom. Rule Thou alone forever over us for Your greater glory through the power of Your love, the triumph of Your virtues, and the grace of a Eucharistic vocation in my state as a layman. Grant us the grace and mission of Your holy love so that we may be able to effectively extend Your Eucharistic kingdom everywhere and realize the desire you expressed: โI have come to cast fire on the earth; and what would I, but that it be kindled?โ Oh! that we might be the incendiaries of this heavenly fire! Thy will be done on earth as it is in Heaven Grant us the grace to find all our joy in wanting You alone, in desiring You alone, and in thinking of You alone. Grant that by denying of ourselves always and in all things, we may find light and life in obeying Your good, acceptable and perfect Will. I will what You will. I will it because You will it. I will it as You will it. I will it as long as You will it. Perish our thoughts and desires if they are not purely from You, for You and in You. Give us this day our daily bread You are our Eucharistic Lord and You alone will be our food and clothing, our riches and glory, our remedy in illness, and our protection against all evil. You will be all things to us. And forgive us our trespasses Forgive me Jesus, for I am sorry for all my sins just as they stand in your eyes. As we forgive those who trespass against us For anyone who has offended us in any way, with our whole heart we forgive them and desire for them the gifts of Your love. And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil Deliver us Jesus, from the demon of pride, impurity, discord and complacency. Deliver us from the cares and worries of life so that with a pure heart and a free mind we may joyfully spend our life and devote all that we are and all that we have in the service of our Eucharistic Lord. Amen. In You, O Lord Jesus, have I hoped; let me not be confounded forever. You alone are good. You alone are powerful. You alone are eternal. To You alone be honor and glory, love and thanksgiving forever and ever. |
“Dear Brothers and Sisters, the Gospel of Godโs love, which we are celebrating today, finds its highest expression in the Eucharist. In the Mass and in Eucharistic Adoration we meet the merciful love of God that passes through the Heart of Jesus Christ,”
– Words of Our Holy Father Pope John Paul II at the Papal Mass at the Trans World Dome in St. Louis on January 27, 1999
“Since Christ is the only way to the Father, in order to highlight His living and saving presence in the Church and the world, the International Eucharistic Congress will take place in Rome, on the occasion of the Great Jubilee. The Year 2000 will be intensely Eucharistic: in the Sacrament of the Eucharist the Savior, who took flesh in Mary’s womb twenty centuries ago, continues to offer Himself to humanity as the source of Divine Life,”
– Pope John Paul II, Tertio Millennio Adveniente
“The mark of the Christian is the willingness to look for the Divine in the flesh of a babe in a crib, the continuing Christ under the appearance of bread on an altar, and a meditation and a prayer on a string of beads,”
– Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen
“You heard me, only Friend whom I love. To ravish my heart, you became man. You shed your blood, what a supreme mystery!… And you still live for me on the Altar. If I cannot see the brilliance of your Face Or hear your sweet voice, O my God, I can live by your grace, I can rest on your Sacred Heart!” – from the poem “To the Sacred Heart of Jesus”, by St. Therese of Lisieux, The Little Flower |
Through perpetual [Eucharistic] adoration Jesus longs to open up the floodgates of His merciful love on a troubled world. He longs to heal a broken humanity. Otherwise, He continues to weep in spirit and say: “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you slay the prophets and stone those who are sent to you! How often have I wanted to gather your children together as a mother bird collects her young under her wings, and you refused me! Your temple will be abandoned I say to you, you shall not see me until the time comes when you say, ‘Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord'” (Luke 13:34-36).
– from “Worthy Is the Lamb”
Jesus is condemned by His own people, by the very ones He showered with His favors. He is condemned as a fomenter of rebellion, He Who is goodness itself; as a blasphemer, He Who is holiness itself; as one seeking power, He Who made Himself the least of all. He is condemned to die on the Cross like the lowest of slaves.
Jesus lovingly accepts this sentence of death: He came down to this earth in order to suffer and die and to teach us to do the same.
In the Holy Eucharist Jesus is again condemned to death: primarily in His graces, which are rejected; in His love, which is slighted; in His sacramental state, by the unbeliever who denies Him, by horrible sacrilege…
Jesus is more cruelly treated by bad Christians than by the Jews. In Jerusalem He was condemned only once, but in the Blessed Sacrament, He is condemned everyday and in thousands of places, and by an appalling number of unjust judges.
And yet Jesus allows Himself to be insulted, despised, condemned: He still continues His sacramental life in order to show us that His love for us is without condition or reserve, that it is greater than our ingratitude.
O Jesus, forgive, I beseech Thee, all sacrileges! Should I ever have committed any, I want to pass my life making reparation for them and loving and honoring Thee for them that despise Thee. Grant me the grace to die with Thee!
– from the “Stations of the Cross” by St. Peter Julian Eymard
A reflection on the Adoring Love of St. Joseph from the writings of St. Peter Julian Eymard:
For three months the Blessed Virgin guarded her secret alone. No one but her knew that she bore her God within her womb. But when Saint Joseph learned of it from the angel, his faith acquiesced at once in blind submission. For six months he poured forth his soul in sublime adoration to God Who dwelt within Mary.
Words cannot express the perfection of his adoration. If Saint John leaped in the womb at the approach of Mary, what feeling must have coursed through Joseph during those six months when he had at his side and under his very eyes the hidden God! If the father of Origen used to kiss his child during the night and adore the Holy Spirit living within him, can we doubt that Joseph must often have adored Jesus hidden in the pure tabernacle of Mary? How fervent that adoration must have been: My Lord and my God behold your servant! No one can describe the adoration of this noble soul. He saw nothing, yet he believed; his faith had to pierce the virginal veil of Mary. So likewise with you! Under the veil of the Sacred Species your faith must see our Lord. Ask Saint Joseph for his lively, constant faith.
When later he carried the Child in his arms, acts of loving faith welled up constantly in his heart. It was a worship that pleased our Lord more than that which he receives in heaven. Picture to yourself Saint Joseph, adoring the little Child in his arms as his God. He tells of his readiness to die for Christ, of all his plans to promote Christโs glory, and to win more souls to his love. No lover builds more scintillating plans for his loved one than a saint. The purer and simpler a soul, the more magnificent its love and adoration. Adore the Word present on the altar, born as a little Child for you; no matter what you do, your adoration will never equal in worth that of Saint Joseph. Join with his merits. A soul that loves God offers everything to Him in love and God listens to such a soul, for she is worth a thousand others.
“The Bread of angels has become the Bread of mankind; This heavenly Bread puts an end to all images; O wonderful reality! The poor, the slave, and the humble can eat the Lord.” – St. Thomas Aquinas, Panis Angelicus |
“Adorers are among those towards whom Saint Joseph tends to be partial. They can count on him first of all because they are seeking a master who will teach them how to offer worship to God and share his function of helper of the Universal Church as they kneel before the Blessed Sacrament. Then there are points of similarity between the lowly and hidden life of Christ with Mary and Joseph and the mode of being Christ assumes in the Eucharist. When living in Nazareth, ‘though he was divine (Christ) did not cling to his equality with God’ (Ph. 2:6) but appeared like other human beings without glory to which he was entitled and the power inherent of his divinity.”
“Here in the Eucharist His very humanity is concealed. ‘Truly God is hidden with you, the God of Israel, the saviour’ (Is 45:15). Adorers can remain hours before the Blessed Sacrament or as happens in many centres return in relays to maintain the perpetuity of adoration. All they see is the appearance of bread, a substance that has ceased to exist. What a difference between the inertness of the Host and the infinite power compressed as it were in the invisible reality of Christ’s Body! To Saint Joseph the lowliness of the Species is a reminder of a hidden life which he shared with Jesus and Mary. And it is because adorers have so much in common with him that he feels impelled to make their aspirations and difficulties his own,”
“More than this. Because our function as adorers is so reminiscent of his lifework and mission, he recognizes in us a potential which he does not hesitate to seize upon: just as he was the incarnation of the Father’s love of the Incarnate Word, so does he count on us to incarnate his own love of and his complete dedication to the same Christ present in the Eucharist. We thus prolong Saint Joseph’s presence on earth by reproducing his sentiments. Like Saint Peter Julian the adorer can look upon himself as the ‘Joseph of the Eucharist.'”
– from the article “Saint Joseph and the Adorer” by Fr. Roland Huot
The eternal spring is hidden in this living bread for our life’s sake, although it is night. It is here calling out to creatures; and they satisfy their thirst, although in darkness, because it is night. This living spring that I long for, I see in this bread of life, although it is night. – St. John of the Cross |
“My Lord Jesus Christ, who, for the love You bear to mankind, do remain night and day in this Sacrament, full of pity and love, awaiting, calling, and receiving all who come to visit You; I believe that You are present in the Sacrament of the Altar; I adore You from the depths of my own nothingness; I thank You for the many graces You have given me, and especially for having given me Yourself in this Sacrament…,”
– St. Alphonsus Ligouri
“Without [these] lights and [this] little throne our Lord cannot come out of His tabernacle. We give them to Him, and we say to Him: ‘Thou are on a beautiful throne. It is we that have erected it for Thee. It is we that have opened the door of Thy prison and rent the cloud that hid Thee, O Sun of Love. Dart Thy rays now on every heart,'”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“Blessed be Thou, my Lord Jesus Christ, who didst foretell Thy death before the time, and in the Last Supper didst wonderfully consecrate Thy precious Body of material bread, and also charitably gave it to Thy Apostles, in memory of Thy most worthy Passion,”
– St. Bridget
“Just as the divine Redeemer, dying on the Cross, offered Himself as Head of the whole human race to the eternal Father, so also in this “clean oblation” (Mal 1:2), He, as Head of the Church, offers not only Himself but, in Himself, all His mystical members.”
“In this manner [Eucharistic adoration] the faithful testify to and solemnly make evident the Faith of the Church according to which the Word of God and the Son of the Virgin Mary who suffered on the Cross, who lies present hidden in the Eucharist, and who reigns in heaven are believed to be identical.”
– Pope Pius XII
If the Word of God is living and powerful, and if the Lord does all things whatsoever he wills; if he said, “Let there be light”, and it happened; if he said, “let there be a firmament”, and it happened; …if finally the Word of God himself willingly became man and made flesh for himself out of the most pure and undefiled blood of the holy and ever Virgin, why should he not be capable of making bread his Body and wine and water his Blood?… God said, “This is my Body”, and “This is my Blood.”
– St. John of Damascus
The King Of Love My Shepherd Is St. Columba (Celtic Hymn) The King of Love my Shepherd is, Whose goodness fails me never; I nothing lack if I am His, and He is mine forever. Where streams of living water flow With gentle care He leads me, And where the verdant pastures grow With Heav’nly food He feeds me. Perverse and foolish I have strayed But yet in love He sought me, and on His shoulder gently laid, and home, rejoicing brought me. In death’s dark vale I fear no ill With You, dear Lord, beside me, Your rod and staff my comfort still, Your Cross before to guide me. You spread a table in my sight, Your saving grace bestowing; And O what joy and true delight From Your pure chalice flowing! And so through all the length of days Your goodness fails me never; Good Shepherd, may I sing Your praise Within Your house forever. |
“O outstanding miracle! O marvelous and most divine Sacrament!… What the priest takes up is not what he replaces on the altar. That which is taken up and placed down seems to be the same in appearance, colors and taste. Completely different, however, is that which appears from that which lies within. Common bread is lifted up from the altar; the immortal Flesh of Christ is set down upon it. What was natural food has become spiritual food. What was the momentary refreshment of man has been made the eternal and unfailing nourishment of angels,”
– Stephen, Bishop of Autun (1139)
O Blessed Joseph, happy man, to whom it was given not only to see and to hear that God Whom many kings longed to see, and saw not, to hear, and heard not; but also to carry Him in your arms, to embrace Him, to clothe Him, and guard and defend Him.
V. Pray for us, O Blessed Joseph.
R. That we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ.
O God, Who hast given us a royal priesthood, we beseech Thee, that as Blessed Joseph was found worthy to touch with his hands, and to bear in his arms, Thine only begotten Son, born of the Virgin Mary, so may we be fit, by cleanness of heart and blamelessness of life, to minister at Thy holy altar; may we, this day, with reverent devotion partake of the Sacred Body and Blood of Thine only begotten Son, and may we in the world to come be accounted worthy of receiving an everlasting reward. Through the same Christ our Lord.
Amen.
Jesus Christ finds means to console a soul that remains with a recollected spirit before the Most Blessed Sacrament, far beyond what the world can do with all its feasts and pastimes. Oh, how sweet a joy it is to remain with faith and tender devotion before an altar, and converse familiarly with Jesus Christ, who is there for the express purpose of listening to and graciously hearing those who pray to him; to ask his pardon for the displeasures which we have caused him; to represent our wants to him, as a friend does to a friend in whom he places all his confidence; to ask him for his graces, for his love, and for his kingdom; but above all, oh, what a heaven it is there to remain making acts of love towards that Lord who is on the very altar praying to the Eternal Father for us, and is there burning with love for us. Indeed that love it is which detains him there, thus hidden and unknown, and where he is even despised by ungrateful souls! But why should we say more? “Taste and see.”
– St. Alphonsus Ligouri
Nothing can compare with the ardor and power of a soul as it seeks its Beloved and longs for Him; it finds its happiness in longing for Him and seeking Him. The God of the Eucharist conceals Himself in order to be desired, veils Himself in order to become an object of contemplation; He wraps Himself in mystery in order to spur on and perfect the soul’s love. The Holy Eucharist thus becomes food ever new, ever powerful over the heart it inflames. Something akin to what happens in heaven then takes place: a hunger and thirst for God ever keen and ever satisfied; the loving soul penetrates the depths of divine love and never ceases discovering new riches therein; Jesus manifests Himself by degrees to the soul to draw it ever more purely and strongly to Himself,”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“The devotion which leads the faithful to visit the Blessed Sacrament draws them into an ever deeper participation of the Paschal Mystery. It leads them to respond gratefully to the gift of him who through his humanity constantly pours divine life into the members of his body. Dwelling with Christ our Lord, they enjoy his intimate friendship and pour out their hearts before him for themselves and for their dear ones, and pray for the peace and salvation of the world. They offer their entire lives with Christ to the Father in the Holy Spirit, and receive in this wonderful exchange an increase in faith, hope and charity. Thus they nourish those right dispositions which enable them with all true devotion to celebrate the memorial of the Lord and to receive frequently the bread given to us by the Father,”
– from Vatican Council II
“Devotion to the Blessed Sacrament is the queen of all devotions. It is the central devotion of the Church. All others gather round it, and group themselves there as satellites; for others celebrate his mysteries; this is Himself. It is the universal devotion. No one can be without it, in order to be a Christian. How can a man be a Christian who does not worship the living Presence of Christ?,”
– Fr. Faber
“I place myself in the presence of Him, in whose Incarnate Presence I am before, I place myself there.
I adore Thee, O my Saviour, present here as God and man, in soul and body, in true flesh and blood.
I acknowledge and confess that I kneel before that Sacred Humanity, which was conceived in Mary’s womb, and lay in Mary’s bosom; which grew up to man’s estate, and by the Sea of Galilee called the Twelve, wrought miracles, and spoke words of wisdom and peace; which in due season hung on the cross, lay in the tomb, rose from the dead, and now reigns in heaven.
I praise, bless, and give myself wholly to Him, who is the true Bread of my soul, and my everlasting joy,”
– Venerable John Henry Newman
The ‘yes’ of Mary gave us the Holy Eucharist, as the body of Jesus was formed from the Immaculate Heart of His Mother, from whose flesh Jesus took the flesh He gives us in the Blessed Sacrament.
The joy of the Annunciation continues to sound in our ears today, because the good news of the Gospel is God’s love for us, “The Virgin shall give birth to a Son and they shall call Him Emmanuel, a name which means ‘GOD IS WITH US’ This is our joy today! Jesus chose the name ‘Emmanuel’ BECAUSE OF HIS INFINITE DESIRE TO DWELL WITH US ALWAYS IN THIS MOST BLESSED SACRAMENT, as absolute proof of HIS EVERLASTING LOVE and CONSTANT AFFECTION for each of us.
– from the book Come to Me in the Blessed Sacrament
The following is a meditation written by Melito of Sardis, a Second Century Monk:
He came on earth from heaven for suffering man, becoming incarnate in a virgin’s womb from which he came forth as man; he took on himself the sufferings of suffering man through a body capable of suffering, and put to an end the sufferings of the flesh, and through his spirit incapable of death he became the death of death which is destructive of man.
For led like a lamb, and slaughtered like a sheep, he ransomed us from the slavery of the world of Egypt, and loosened us from the slavery of the devil as from the hand of Pharaoh, and sealed our souls with his own spirit, and our bodily members with his own blood.
This is the one who covered death with the garment of reproach, who put the devil in mourning garb as Moses did Pharaoh. This is he who smote lawlessness and rendered injustice bereft of children as Moses did Egypt.
This is the one who rescued us from slavery to liberty, from darkness to light, from tyranny to the kingdom of eternity (who made us a new priesthood, a people chosen, eternal).
This is he who is the Passover of our salvation; this is he who suffered many things in many men. This is he who in Abel was slaughtered, in Jacob was exiled, in Joseph was sold, in Moses was exposed, in the lamb was immolated, in David was persecuted, in the prophets was maltreated. This is he in whom the virgin was made incarnate, on the cross was suspended, in the earth was buried, from the dead was resurrected, to the highest of heaven was lifted up.
This is the lamb without voice, this is the lamb slaughtered, this is the lamb born of the fair ewe this is he who was taken from the flock, and dragged to immolation, and at evening slaughtered, and by night buried.
This is he who on the cross was not broken, and in the earth did not decay, but from the dead rose again, and raised up man from the depths of the tomb.
“At the Last Supper, on the night he was betrayed, our Savior instituted the Eucharistic sacrifice of his Body and Blood. This he did in order to perpetuate the sacrifice of the Cross throughout the ages until he should come again, and so to entrust to his beloved Spouse, the Church, a memorial of his death and resurrection: a sacrament of love, a sign of unity, a bond of charity, a paschal banquet in which Christ is consumed, the mind is filled with grace, and a pledge for future glory is given to us,”
– Vatican Council II
| THE RESURRECTION “Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive honor, glory and praise!” (Rev. 5:12) THE GLORY OF FAITH “Indeed, this is the Will of My Father, that everyone who looks upon the Son and believes in Him shall have eternal life. Him I will raise up on the last day.” (JN 6:40) The glorious resurrection of Our Lord continues in the glory of this most Blessed Sacrament BECAUSE THIS IS WHERE OUR RISEN SAVIOR DWELLS, pouring out His life, His light, and His love to all who come into His presence. We pray through the Immaculate Heart of Mary that You help our parish and all parishes to become a faith community by responding to Your appeal to be loved day and night in this most Blessed Sacrament, where You call us to “pray without ceasing”, for this is where You, Our Risen Savior, dwell, helping us by the power flowing from You resurrection to share in the pattern of Your sufferings, that we may share also in the glory of Your resurrection. “ALL I WANT IS TO KNOW CHRIST JESUS…” – from “Come to Me” |
“The voice of my Beloved knocking: Open to Me, My sister, My love, My dove, My undefiled” (Song 5:2).
Such are the words which Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament speaks to those who love and desire him. Open to me, he says, O soul, thy heart, and there I will come to unite myself to thee; so that, being one with me, thou mayst become my sister by resemblance, my friend by participation in my riches, my dove by the gift of simplicity, my undefiled by the gift of purity, which I shall communicate to thee. And then he goes on to say, “Open to me, for my head is full of dew and my locks the drops of the night.” As if he said: Consider, my beloved, that I have waited for thee all the night of the bad life thou has led in the midst of darkness and error. Behold, now, instead of bringing scourges to chastise thee, I come in the Blessed Sacrament, with my hair full of heavenly dew, to extinguish in thee all impure desires towards creatures, and to kindle in thee the happy fire of my love. Come, then, O my beloved Jesus, and work in me what Thou wilt.
– St. Alphonsus Ligouri
“This worship, given therefore to the Trinity of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, above all accompanies and permeates the celebration of the Eucharistic liturgy. But it must fill our churches also outside the timetable of Masses. Indeed, since the Eucharistic mystery was instituted out of love, and makes Christ sacramentally present, it is worthy of thanksgiving and worship. And this worship must be prominent in all our encounters with the Blessed Sacrament, both when we visit our churches and when the sacred species are taken to the sick and administered to them,”
– Pope John Paul II
| A Third or Fourth Century prayer to our Eucharistic Lord: Today we have seen our Lord Jesus Christ on the altar. Today we have gained possessions of the burning coal in whose shadow the cherubim sing. Today we have heard a voice say, sweet and strong: This body burns the thorns of sin. This body gives light to the souls of all believers. This body the woman touched that had the flux of blood, and gone was her bitter anguish… See, children, what a body we have eaten, see what blood we have drunk, what a covenant we have made with our God. O to be proof against shame on the day of requital. We can sufficiently praise the mystery of your grace? We have been enabled to take our share of the gift; may we keep it safe to the end, that so we may come to hear the blessed voice, the sweet, the holy, saying: Come, you that have received a blessing from my Father; take possession of the kingdom that awaits you. |
| “O Jesus! on this day, you have fulfilled all my desires. From now on, near the Eucharist, I shall be able To sacrifice myself in silence, to wait for Heaven in peace. Keeping myself open to the rays of the Divine Host, In this furnace of love, I shall be consumed, And like a seraphim, Lord, I shall love You.” – from St. Therese of Lisieux’s poem, “Canticle of a Soul Having Found the Place of Its Rest!…” |
When Christ manifested Himself to Margaret Mary, and declared to her the infinitude of His love, at the same time, in the manner of a mourner, He complained that so many and such great injuries were done to Him by ungrateful men โ and we would that these words in which He made this complaint were fixed in the minds of the faithful, and were never blotted out by oblivion: “Behold this Heart” โ He said โ “which has loved men so much and has loaded them with all benefits, and for this boundless love has had no return but neglect, and contumely, and this often from those who were bound by a debt and duty of more special love.” In order that these faults might be washed away, He then recommended several things to be done, and in particular the following as most pleasing to Himself, namely that men should approach the Altar with this purpose of expiating sin, making what is called a Communion of Reparation โ and that they should likewise make expiatory supplications and prayers, prolonged for a whole hour โ which is rightly called the “Holy Hour.” These pious exercises have been approved by the Church and have also been enriched with copious indulgences.
– Pope Pius XI
| O Mary, Immaculate Virgin, Pure crystal for my heart, You are my strength, O sturdy anchor! You are the weak heart’s shield and protection. O Mary you are pure, of purity incomparable; At once both Virgin and Mother, You are beautiful as the sun, without blemish, And your soul is beyond all comparison. Your beauty has delighted the eye of the Thrice-Holy One. He descended from heaven, leaving His eternal throne, And took Body and Blood of your heart And for nine months lay hidden in a Virgin’s Heart. O Mother, Virgin, purest of all lilies, Your heart was Jesus’ first tabernacle on earth. – St. Faustina Kowalska of the Blessed Sacrament |
From the Diary Divine Mercy in My Soul, by St. M. Faustina Kowalska of the Blessed Sacrament:
The mercy of God, hidden in the Blessed Sacrament, the voice of the Lord who speaks to us from the throne of mercy: Come to Me, all of you…
Behold, for you I have established a throne of mercy on earth โ the tabernacle โ and from this throne I desire to enter into your heart. I am not surrounded by a retinue of guards. You can come to me at any moment, at any time; I want to speak to you and I desire to grant you grace.
…You left us Yourself in the Sacrament of the Altar, and You opened wide Your mercy to us. There is no misery that could exhaust You; You have called us all to this fountain of love, to this spring of God’s compassion. Here is the tabernacle of Your mercy, here is the remedy for all our ills. To You, O living spring of mercy, all souls are drawn; some like deer, thirsting for Your love, others to wash the wound of their sins and still others, exhausted by life, to draw strength.
O Jesus, concealed in the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar, my only love and mercy, I commend to You all the needs of my body and soul. You can help me, because You are Mercy itself. In You lies all my hope.
| Be adored, O God, in the work of Your mercy, Be blessed by all faithful hearts On whom Your gaze rests, In whom dwells Your immortal life… In Your inconceivable love, You allowed Your most holy side to be opened, And streams of Blood and Water gushed forth from Your Heart. Here is the living fountain of Your mercy, Here souls receive consolation and refreshment. In the Blessed Sacrament, You left us Your mercy; Your love deigned to arrange it so, That, going through life, suffering and toil, I might never doubt of Your goodness and mercy… |
| Prayer of St. Catherine of Siena (Third Order Dominican and Doctor of the Church) O boundless charity! Just as you gave us yourself, wholly God and wholly man, so you left us all of yourself as food so that while we are pilgrims in this life we might not collapse in our weariness but be strengthened by you, heavenly food. O mercenary people! And what has your God left you? He has left you himself, wholly God and wholly man, hidden under the whiteness of this bread. O fire of love! Was it not enough to gift us with creation in your image and likeness, and to create us anew to grace in your Son’s blood, without giving us yourself as food, the whole of divine being, the whole of God? What drove you? Nothing but your charity, mad with love as you are! |
“Come, blessed soul! enter the kingdom prepared for you before the foundation of the world. It is Himself. If we saw Him eat fish and honeycomb by the lake, we could not be more sure. O how He is drawing our soul to Him! Sweet compulsion, which makes the will more free than ever! beautiful constraint, that emancipates by its captivity! whence come these attractions that are now drawing us to themselves? They come from the altar-throne, and from the Human Soul and Body that are there. I will draw them, says He in the monstrance, with cords of Adam, the bands of love.
“Ah Lord Jesus! we spoke of Thee as in heaven and lo! Thou art here, and all heaven is with Thee here. O Blessed Sacrament! Thou makest all life now like one continued walk to Emmaus. Our hearts burn, and it is not that we know not why, but that we will not remember why. “I was like a foster-father to Ephraim: I carried them in my arms; and they knew not that I healed them.” But how long shall these things be. O that our hearts were modelled upon Thee as creation was, and crowned by Thee as creation is, and that since thou hast our nature, we might participate more abundantly in Thy grace, and that as Thou wilt lead us to glory hereafter, so now Thy hidden Sacramental presence might already be our glory here!”
– Fr. Faber
| Jesus, My Lord, My God, My All Fredrick W. Faber 1814-1863 Tune: Sweet Sacrament Jesus, my Lord, my God, my All, How can I love Thee as I ought? And how revere this wondrous gift, So far surpassing hope or thought? Sweet Sacrament, we Thee adore! O make us love Thee more and more! O make us love Thee more and more. Had I but Mary’s sinless heart, To love Thee with, my dearest King O! with what bursts of fervent praise, Thy goodness, Jesus would I sing! Sweet Sacrament, we Thee adore! O make us love Thee more and more! O make us love Thee more and more! O make us love Thee more and more! |
The following excerpt was taken from the writings of Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta:
Like Mary, let us be full of zeal to go in haste to give Jesus to others. She was full of grace when, at the annunciation, she received Jesus. Like her, we too become full of grace every time we receive Holy Communion. It is the same Jesus whom she received and whom we receive at Mass. As soon as she received Him she went with haste to give Him to John. For us also, as soon as we receive Jesus in Holy Communion, let us go in haste to give Him to our sisters, to our poor, to the sick, to the dying, to the lepers, to the unwanted, and the unloved. By this we make Jesus present in the world today.
We cannot separate our lives from the Eucharist; the moment we do, something breaks. People ask, “Where do the sisters get the joy and energy to do what they are doing?” The Eucharist involves more than just receiving; it also involves satisfying the hunger of Christ. He says, “Come to Me.” He is hungry for souls. Nowhere does the Gospel say: “Go away,” but always “Come to Me.”
Our lives must be woven around the Eucharist. Ask Jesus to be with you, to work with you that you may be able to pray the work. You must really be sure that you have received Jesus. After that, you cannot give your tongue, your thoughts, or your heart to bitterness.
Put your sins in the chalice for the precious blood to wash away. One drop is capable of washing away all the sins of the world.
When communicating with Christ in your heart – the partaking of Living Bread – remember what Our Lady must have felt when the Spirit overpowered her and she, who was full of grace, became full with the body of Jesus. The Spirit was so strong in her that she immediately rose in haste to go and serve.
Each Holy Communion, each breaking of the Bread of Life, each sharing should produce in us the same, for it is the same Jesus who came to Mary and was made flesh. We, too, should be in haste to give this life of Jesus…
“The Most Holy Sacrament is a gift which has proceeded from pure love. For our salvation it was necessary, according to the decree of God, that the Redeemer should die, and, by the sacrifice of his life, satisfy divine justice for our sins; but what necessity was there that Jesus Christ, after having died for our redemption, should leave himself to us for our food? But this his love wished to do. He, says, St. Laurence Justinian, instituted the Eucharist for no other purpose than to show his great charity, for no other purpose than to make us understand the immense love which he bears us. This is precisely what St. John has written: Jesus, knowing that His hour was come that He should pass out of this world to the Father: having loved His own, He loved them to the end. (JN 13:1) Knowing that the time of his departure from this earth had arrived, he wished to give us the greatest proof of his love, by bequeathing to us this gift of the Most Holy Sacrament. This is the precise meaning of the words, He loved them to the end; that is, according to Theophilactus and St. John Chrysostom, ‘he loved them with an extreme love.'”
– St. Alphonsus De Ligouri
“May Mary, who in the freedom of her ‘Fiat’ and her presence at the foot of the cross, offered to the world, Jesus, the Liberator, help us to find him in the Sacrament of the altar,”
– Pope John Paul II
“The Bread that we need each day to grow in eternal life, makes of our will a docile instrument of the Divine Will; sets the Kingdom of God within us; gives us pure lips, and a pure heart with which to glorify his holy name, “
– Edith Stein
| The following reflection was taken from the Diary of St. Faustina Kowalska of the Blessed Sacrament, titled “Divine Mercy in My Soul”: To stay at Your feet, O hidden God, Is the delight and paradise of my soul. Here, You give me to know You, O incomprehensible One, And You speak to me sweetly: Give Me, give ME your heart. Silent conversation, alone with You, Is to experience what heavenly beings enjoy, And to say to God, “I will, I will give You my heart, O Lord,” While You, O great and incomprehensible One, accept it graciously. Love and sweetness are my soul’s life, And Your unceasing presence in my soul. I live on earth in constant rapture, And like a Seraph I repeat, “Hosanna!” O You Who are hidden, body, soul and divinity, Under the fragile form of bread, You are my life from Whom springs an abundance of graces; And, for me, You surpass the delights of heaven. |
| At the Visitation, Mary is called ‘Blessed’ by Elizabeth BECAUSE OF HER PERFECT TRUST IN GOD: “Blest is she who trusted.” (Lk 1:46) Perfect trust is based not on ourselves but on the INFINITE PERFECTIONS OF GOD: His infinite mercy, His infinite justice, His infinite goodness, His infinite compassion, His infinite power, His infinite love. As Mary reached out to Elizabeth in her time of need, so now Mary reaches out to us with her Divine Son, Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament. This is the joy of the Visitation mystery: “in the tender compassion of our God” He continues to visit us in the Holy Eucharist that we may come to Him with confidence. As John the Baptist recognized Jesus hidden in the womb of Mary, the first tabernacle of the Lord, so now we recognize Jesus hidden in the Blessed Sacrament, the mystery of our faith. Elizabeth leaped for joy in His presence then, as we rejoice in His presence now for here Jesus pours out His Spirit upon us in this Sacrament of infinite love. – from the book “Come to Me” |
“This food we call the Eucharist, of which no one is allowed to partake except one who believes that the things we teach are true, and has received the washing for forgiveness of sins and for rebirth, and who lives as Christ handed down to us. For we do not receive these things as common bread or common drink; but as Jesus Christ our Savior being incarnate by God’s Word took flesh and blood for our salvation, so also we have been taught that the food consecrated by the Word of prayer which comes from him, from which our flesh and blood are nourished by transformation, is the flesh and blood of that incarnate Jesus.”
– St. Justin Martyr, 2nd Century
“Let us pause to consider the unsurpassed munificence of the providence of God Who sustains the life of our souls by means of the greatest Sacrament. Compare it with the food which nourished Adam in the state of innocence and you will see how superior it is. God had put many trees at the disposal of Adam in the Garden of Eden. But among them there was one which bore a fruit which taken from time to time had property of preserving life for ever. In like manner in the Garden of the Church one finds a variety of foods that sustain the life of the soul. But above all there is the Divine Sacrament which stands out as the tree of life inasmuch as it is the bread of eternal life. It is infinitely superior to the other tree which was earthly because drawn from the earth. The Eucharist which comes from heaven is heavenly since it gives life to the soul while the fruit of the tree of life gave life to the body.”
– Luis de la Puente (d. 1624)
“Lord Jesus, Who in the Eucharist make your dwelling among us and become our traveling companion, sustain our Christian communities so that they may be ever more open to listening and accepting your Word. May they draw from the Eucharist a renewed commitment to spreading in society, by the proclamation of your Gospel, the signs and deeds of an attentive and active charity,”
– Pope John Paul II
“It is invaluable to converse with Christ, and leaning against Jesus’ breast like his beloved disciple, we can feel the infinite love of his Heart. We learn to know more deeply the One who gave Himself totally, in the different mysteries of his divine and human life, so that we may become disciples and in turn enter into this great act of giving, for the glory of God and the salvation of the world… Through adoration, the Christian mysteriously contributes to the radical transformation of the world and to the sowing of the Gospel. Anyone who prays to the Saviour draws the whole world with him and raises it to God. Those who stand before the Lord are therefore fulfilling an eminent service. They are presenting to Christ all those who do not know him or are far from him; they keep watch in his presence on their behalf,”
– from Our Holy Father, Pope John Paul II’s 1996 letter to the Bishop of Liege, written on the occasion of the 750th anniversary of the first celebration of the Feast of Corpus Christi
Corpus Christi and the Sacred Heart
The feast day of Corpus Christi [The Body of Christ] was requested by Our Lord Himself. It was not a feast day that the Church in its wisdom decided to include in the liturgical calendar. It was a feast day, rather, that Jesus requested through extraordinary means by appearing to his servant Saint Juliana, and showing her a moon that He said was symbolic of the liturgical calendar. And the moon had a dark spot in which He said was symbolic of the feast day that was needed, that He wanted, that He requested, the feast day of Corpus Christi. And Saint Juliana said, “But Jesus, we have a feast day, Holy Thursday.”
And Our Lord explained to her that Holy Thursday is also a feast day that celebrates the institution of the holy priesthood, along with the institution of the Holy Eucharist. He wanted one special feast day set aside in honor of His Real Presence in the Most Blessed Sacrament. For He said as the Church progressed in time, faith in His Real Presence would diminish to the point where it would need a feast day to remind the people that He is really here. That the Eucharist is the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Christ. That this is not a symbol of Jesus, but the reality of Jesus Himself. The same Jesus born in Bethlehem two thousand years ago, the same Jesus who died on the cross for our sins, and the same Jesus that rose again on Easter Sunday is really truly, bodily, personally present in the Most Blessed Sacrament.
This month we celebrate the feast day of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Why do we celebrate Corpus Christi on Sunday and the feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus on Friday? Again this its because this is what Our Blessed Lord specifically requested. Through His servant Saint Margaret Mary He requested a feast day in honor of the Sacred Heart, within the octave of the feast day of Corpus Christi, because He wanted to spot light, high light, focus, emphasize, dramatize: the Blessed Sacrament is the Sacred Heart of Jesus living and loving in our midst today!
The message of the Sacred Heart is Eucharistic. Devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus is Eucharistic. He appeared to Saint Margaret Mary in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament. And His first words, “Please look at this Heart which has loved mankind so much, consumed itself for love of man, and yet is so little loved in return. I thirst with such a terrible thirst to be loved in this Most Blessed Sacrament.” His request to her was an appeal to mankind to be loved in the Blessed Sacrament, the same request that goes back to the Gospel. “Could you not watch one hour with Me?”
For the heart of Christ, as He Himself described it, is a burning furnace of Love. When Saint Margaret Mary looked at the Heart of Christ, it was like a million burning suns on fire with love, for each and every one of Godโs children. How can we truly believe in the Real Presence of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, knowing that the Holy Father is right when He says that Jesus waits for us in this Sacrament of Love, with a love that no human tongue can tell โ for the Lord loves us as no one else loves us โ and not be moved to come to Him every single day?
Recommit yourself to the love of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament. By expressing it in the way that He has asked you to express it, your willingness to spend time with Him in the Most Blessed Sacrament. Our love is measured by our willingness to spend time with the Beloved… When our Lord shows the world His glory, when He has won the victory, we may be able to rejoice that much more in His victory, for it will be the love of His friends that will have moved His Heart to show His glory to this broken world in order that He Himself may heal it.
– The above excerpts were taken from the audio tape “Perpetual EucharisticAdoration.”
A series of Reflections from St. Peter Julian Eymard on the
Feast of Corpus Christi
Every day comes from God. They unfailingly succeed one another through His loving kindness. God allows man six days of the week for his labor and his needs, but the seventh He reserves for Himself. Sunday is therefore more particularly the day of the Lord. But of all the days there is one which is, in a more excellent manner, the day of God and is called the day of God: Fete-Dieu, as the French put it, which, done literally into English, would read God’s Feast Day. That is truly the day which the Lord has made for Himself, for His own glory, and for the manifestation of His love. Corpus Christi! God’s Feast Day! What a beautiful name! God’s Feast Day and ours also! Let us see in what way.
This feast day of God, which the Church calls Festum sacratissimi Corporis Christi, “Feast of the most sacred Body of Christ,” is the only day dedicated exclusively to the honor of His adorable Person, of His living presence in our midst. The other feasts commemorate some mystery of His past life; they are beautiful; they glorify God; and they are a rich source of graces for us. But after all they are only reminders, anniversaries of an already distant past, which relives only in our piety and devotion. Our Savior is no longer personally present in those mysteries; He accomplished them once for all and left only His grace in them. But Corpus Christi is an actual mystery; the object of this feast is our Lord’s Person, living and present in our midst. That is why the celebration of it has a character all its own. No relics or symbols of the past are exposed, but the very object of the feast, which is living. In the countries where God is free, see how all the people proclaim His presence, how they prostrate themselves before Him! The impious themselves tremble and bow the head; God is there! How glorious for our Lord’s presence is this feast, on which all men acknowledge His presence and adore Him!
…
Corpus Christi is also the most lovable of feast days. We were not present at all the mysteries of our Savior’s life and death which we celebrate in the course of the year. We find joy in them because they are sources of grace. But on the feast of Corpus Christi we participate in the mystery itself, which takes place under our eyes. This mystery is for us. There is a relation of life between Jesus living in the Sacrament and ourselves living in the midst of the world: a relation of body to body. For that reason this feast is not called simply the feast of our Lord, but the Feast of the Body of our Lord: Corpus Christi. Through this Body we touch Him; through it He is our Food, our Brother and our Guest. Feast of the Body of Jesus Christ: a name as full of love as it is unpretentious and well adapted to our misery! Our Lord asked for this feast so as to draw still closer to us, just as a father is desirous of being wished a happy birthday by his child in order to have a reason for giving him a more ardent proof of his paternal affection, and for granting him some special favor.
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Let this feast therefore be one of joy, and let us expect from it the most abundant blessings. All the hymns and canticles of this solemnity express the thought that on this day our Lord will show Himself more graciously than ever. The Church, it seems, should have celebrated Corpus Christi on Holy Thursday, since the Eucharist was instituted on that day. But she could not have duly expressed her joy on that day of mourning; the Passion begins on Holy Thursday, and it is impossible to rejoice at the thought of death which predominates during the solemn days of Holy Week. Corpus Christi was also postponed until after the Ascension because sad farewells had still to be bidden and a painful separation effected. It was put off until after Pentecost so that, filled with the graces and joys of the Holy Ghost, we might be able to celebrate with all possible splendor the feast of the divine Bridegroom Who dwells among us.
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Corpus Christi is the most solemn feast of the Church. The Church is the Bride of our Lord in all His risen glory, not of Jesus Christ at His birth or His death; when these last two mysteries took place the Church was not yet in existence. Of course she follows her divine Bridegroom to the Crib and accompanies Him in His sufferings, but of these mysteries she has only the remembrance and grace.
But Jesus Christ lives with His Church in His Sacrament. People who have never set foot inside one of her churches think she is widowed. They look upon her as a corpse, and upon her temples as places where only death and suffering are spoken of. But today the very ones who never attend her solemn festivals will see her in all her wealth and beauty, in a natural attractiveness which God, her Bridegroom, will enhance with His presence. What magnificence in the processions as they pass by! What reverence in the faithful as they kneel down! The Church shows to everyone her Bridegroom in the radiant monstrance. Ah! Who today will presume to say she is widowed? Her friends are in adoration and her enemies tremble. Jesus shows Himself to all men; He gives His blessing to the good; He looks on sinners with compassion; He calls them and draws them to Himself. The Council of Trent calls this feast the triumph of faith, and rightly so. It is also the triumph of the Church through her divine Bridegroom.
…
Lastly, Corpus Christi is our feast, we who are adorers of the Blessed Sacrament. The Congregation of the Blessed Sacrament together with its affiliated societies exists for the sole purpose of honoring Jesus Christ with a continual feast of Corpus Christi. To prolong this feast throughout the entire year is the object of our life and happiness. We leave to other children of the Church the care of the poor, the healing of the physical and moral ills of afflicted humanity, and the administration of the Sacraments. We are called only to perpetuate the feast of Corpus Christi. It is therefore the special feast of us religious. It is also your feast, my dear brethren. Have you not consecrated yourselves entirely to the service of the Most Blessed Sacrament? At night you withdraw and leave us to watch with our Lord. The proprieties demand it. But you leave your hearts at the feet of the divine King, and we can say that you spend your life here. Besides, when you receive Communion, do you not really celebrate Corpus Christi in your hearts? Oh! You know the joy and happiness Jesus brings with Him! I will go further and say that for souls who know how to receive Communion, there is only one feast day, that is Communion day. They find therein the object of all the mysteries, the Being Who makes these mysteries and in Whose honor they are celebrated, whereas most Christians recall them only in a vague manner.
More than that! I say that if our Lord were not living in His Sacrament, all our Christian feast days would be nothing but a series of funeral services. The Eucharist is the sun that gives light, life and joy to the feasts of the Church.
Someone has rightly called the soul that communicates well and often perpetual banquet, juge convivium. To live with Jesus in us, to live of Jesus and through Jesus is to be a tabernacle and a precious ciborium. Oh! What a joy is that of these souls, a pure and unchanging joy!
Come! Learn how to single out these days from all the others. Our Lord has His royal feast days; today is one of them. A king is a bounteous giver. Pay homage to our Lord, and He, in return, will give you everything; He will give you His very Self with a greater abundance of His graces. He discriminates among His friends; He knows those who are deserving of His favors. My desires and wishes for you on this beautiful day are not that you become saints weighted down with magnificent and extraordinary virtues โ when would that ever be? โ but that you be very happy in the service of God, and also that our Lord give Himself to you with more of His kindness and love. If you feel that He loves you more, you will give yourself to Him more entirely; and the result of these two loves will be perfect union. Therein lie holiness and perfection. Pray with confidence to attain it. Give Him your whole heart. Jesus is a tender Father; act towards Him as loving children. He is a tender Friend; delight in His love. Oh! I fear for the salvation of the one who has never tasted the goodness of God! Penetrate into that infinite goodness! Sentite de Domino in bonitate. “Think of the Lord in goodness.”
“Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament is the Living Heart of each of our parishes,”
– Pope Paul VI
“The Lord โhath set His tabernacle in the sun,โ says the Psalmist. The sun is Maryโs heart.”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard (in speaking of Our Lord in the Most Blessed Sacrament)
In his book “Jesus Our Eucharistic Love”, Fr. Stefano Manelli, O.F.M. Conv., S.T.D. writes that Our Lady is “inseparably united with Jesus in the Host. Jesus is always the Son she adores. He is Flesh of her flesh and Blood of her blood.”
A series of reflections from St. Peter Julian Eymard on the
Sacred Heart of Jesus in the Most Blessed Sacrament
Saint Paul expressed a wish to the Ephesians that, through the grace of the Father from Whom proceeds every gift, they should know the charity of Jesus Christ for men, “which surpasseth all knowledge.” He could not wish them anything holier, or better, or more important. To know the charity of Jesus Christ, to be filled with the fullness of it, that is the reign of God in man. And that reign is the fruit of devotion to the Heart of Jesus, living โ and loving us โ in the Most Blessed Sacrament. This devotion is the sovereign worship of love. It is the soul and center of all religion; for religion is merely the law, the virtue, and the perfection of love; and the Sacred Heart is the grace, the model, and the life of it. Let us study this love close to the fire where it consumes itself for us.
Devotion to the Sacred Heart has a twofold object: it honors first with adoration and public worship the Heart of flesh of Jesus Christ, and secondly the infinite love with which this Heart has burned for us since its creation, and with which it is still consumed in the Sacrament of our altars.
…
Of all the noble faculties of the human body, the noblest is the heart. It is placed in the center of the body like a king in the center of his dominions. Immediately surrounding it are its most important members, which are, so to speak, its ministers. It sets them in motion and makes them function by imparting to them the vital warmth of which it is the reservoir. It is the fountainhead from which there gushes forth with impetuosity the blood that flows into all the parts of the body, and bathes and refreshes them. Weakened by this function, the blood returns from the extremities of the body to the heart to rekindle its ardor and receive a new supply of life-giving energy.
What is true of the human heart in general is also true of the adorable Heart of Jesus Christ. It is the noblest part of the body of the Man-God, united hypostatically to the Word and deserving thereby the supreme worship of adoration which is due God alone. It is important that in our veneration we should not separate the Heart of Jesus from the divinity of the Man-God; for it is united to the divinity with indissoluble bonds, and the worship we pay to the Heart has not its final end in that Heart, but in the adorable Person Who possesses it and Who has united it to Himself forever.
Whence it follows that we may direct to this divine Heart the prayers, praises, and adorations we offer to God Himself. And it also follows that they are mistaken who, on hearing the words “The Heart of Jesus,” think only of the material organ and look on this Heart only as a lifeless and loveless member, much as they would a holy relic. They again are mistaken who imagine that this devotion divides Jesus Christ and restricts to His Heart alone a worship that ought to be offered to His whole Person. They overlook the fact that to honor the Heart of Jesus is not to ignore the rest of the divine body of the God-Man; for when we honor His Heart, we mean to praise all the actions and the whole life of Jesus Christ, which are but an outpouring of His Heart.
…
Just as it is in the sun that are formed and from it that issue forth the warm rays which fertilize the earth and give life to everything that lives, so it is from the heart that come forth the strong and gentle impulses which carry vital warmth and vigor into all the members. If the heart weakens, the whole body weakens with it. If the heart suffers, all the members suffer with it; nothing functions well, and the organic system soon stops working. The function of the Heart of Jesus was then to quicken, to strengthen, and to sustain all His members, all His organs, and all His senses by its constant action; so that it was the principle of the actions, affections, virtues and of the whole life of the Word made flesh.
For the heart, according to the opinion of ancient philosophers, is the seat of love; and since the prime motive of the whole life of Jesus was love, we must look upon His Heart as the source of all His mysteries and virtues. “Just as it is natural for fire to burn,” says Saint Thomas, “so it is natural for the heart to love; and because the heart is the primary organ of feeling in man, it is fitting that the act which is commanded by the first of all the commandments should be felt by the heart.”
…
Just as the eyes see and the ears hear, so the heart loves. It is the organ of the soul in the production of affection and love. In the vernacular, heart and love are interchangeable terms; heart means love, and vice versa. The Heart of Jesus was, therefore, the organ of His love; it was the principle and seat of it. It experienced all the impressions of love that can touch a human heart, with this difference, however, that since the soul of Jesus Christ loved with an unparalleled and infinite love, His Heart is a real furnace of love for God and for us. From it are constantly darting forth the most ardent and purest flames of divine love. This love inflames His Heart from the first moment of His conception until His last breath and, since His Resurrection, has not ceased nor will ever cease doing so. His Heart made and is daily making countless acts of love, a single one of which gives more glory to God than all of the acts of love of the angels and saints. Of all material creatures, His Heart is then the one that contributes the most to the glory of the Creator and that is the most deserving of the love and worship of angels and men.
…
Everything that pertains to the Person of the Son of God is infinitely worthy of veneration. The least portion of His Body, the tiniest drop of His blood is deserving of the adoration of heaven and earth. The most worthless things become worthy of veneration by mere contact with His flesh, as was the case with the Cross, the nails, the thorns, the sponge, the lance and all the instruments of His death. How much greater veneration, therefore, ought we to offer to His Heart, the excellence of which is founded on the nobleness of the functions it performs, on the perfection of the sentiments it gives rise to, and of the actions it inspires! For if Jesus was born in a stable, lived as a poor man at Nazareth, and died for our sake, we owe it to His Heart; it is in the sanctuary of His Heart that were formed all the heroic resolutions and all the plans which inspired His life. His Heart must therefore be honored as the Crib in which the faithful soul sees Jesus being born into the world, poor and forsaken; as the pulpit from which the Lord Jesus preaches His commandment to her: “Learn of Me that I am meek and humble of heart”; as the Cross on which she sees Him rise glorious and immortal; and as the everlasting Gospel by which she is taught to imitate all the virtues of which this Heart is the accomplished model.
A soul devoted to the Sacred Heart will, however, apply herself in a special manner to the practice of divine love, because this Heart is above all the seat and the symbol of this love. And since the Most Blessed Sacrament is the sensible and permanent token of divine love, it is there the soul will find the Heart of Jesus; from His Eucharistic Heart she will learn to love.
…
Since Jesus Christ desires to be loved unceasingly by man, He must show him an unceasing love; and as God, in order to overcome and conquer our hearts, had to become a man whom we could feel and touch, so in order to make His conquest secure, He must continue to make man feel a sensible and humanized love. The law of love is perpetual, and so also must be the grace of it. This sun of love must never set on the heart of man; if it does, a chill will settle on man’s heart, and the coldness of death and of neglect will kill it. The human heart gives itself only to life and unites itself only to an actual love which is felt and which furnishes actual proofs of its reality.
Well, all the love of the Savior in His mortal life, His love as a child in the Crib, His zealous love as an apostle of His Father in His preaching, His love as a Victim on the Cross, all these loves are gathered together and are triumphant in His Heart, glorious and living in the Blessed Sacrament. That is where we should seek this Heart and nourish ourselves with its love. It is also in heaven, but for the angels and saints. It is in he Eucharist for us. Our devotion to the Sacred Heart must therefore be Eucharistic; it must concentrate in the divine Eucharist as in the only personal and living center of the love and the graces of the Sacred Heart for men.
…
Why separate the Heart of Jesus from His body and divinity? Is it not through His Heart that He lives in the Blessed Sacrament, and that His body is alive and animated? Having risen from the dead, Jesus dies no more; why separate His Heart from His Person and try to make Him die, so to speak, in our mind? No, no! This divine Heart is living and palpitating in the Eucharist, no longer of a passible and mortal life, subject to sadness, agony, and pain, but of a life risen and consummated in blessedness. This impossibility to suffer and die diminishes in no way the reality of His life; on the contrary, it makes that life more perfect. God has never known death, and still He is the source of perfect and eternal life.
The Heart of Jesus therefore lives in the Eucharist, since His body is alive there. It is true that we can neither feel nor see that divine Heart, but things are pretty much the same for all men. This principle of life must be mysterious and veiled; to uncover it would kill it. We can conclude to its existence only from the effects it produces. A man does not ask to see the heart of a dear friend; one word is enough to tell him of his love. But how will the divine Heart of Jesus make itself known? It manifests itself to us by the sentiments with which it inspires us; that should suffice. Besides, who could contemplate the beauty and the goodness of the divine Heart? Who could stand the brightness of its glory, the consuming and devouring flames of this fire of love? Who would dare look at this divine Ark, on which is written its gospel of love in letters which its love has its throne, and its goodness all its treasures? Who would want to penetrate into the very sanctuary of the Godhead? The Heart of Jesus! Why, it is the heaven of heavens, in which God Himself dwells and finds His delights!
No! We do not see the Eucharistic Heart of Jesus! But we possess it; it is ours!
…
Do you want to know what is its life? It is divided between His Father and us. This Heart watches over us; while our Savior, enclosed in the frail Host, seems wrapped in impotent sleep, His Heart remains awake. Ego dormio, et Cor meum vigilat. “I sleep, and My Heart watcheth.” It watches over us whether we think of it or not; it knows no rest; it pleads with the Father to forgive us. Jesus shields us with His Heart and wards off the blows of divine wrath provoked by our repeated offenses. His Heart is there, as on the Cross, opened and letting flow upon our heads torrents of grace and love.
It is there to defend us against our enemies, just as a mother to save her child from danger presses it to her heart so that one cannot strike the child unless he strikes the mother first. “And even if a mother could forget her child,” Jesus tells us, “I will never forsake you.”
The other concern of the Heart of Jesus is for His Father. He adores His Father through His unspeakable humiliations, through His adoration of self-abasement; He praises Him and thanks Him for the blessings He bestows upon men, His brothers; He offers Himself as a Victim to the justice of His Father; He prays incessantly for the Church, for sinners, and for all the souls He has redeemed.
O God the Father, look down with complacency on the Heart of Thy Son, Jesus! See His love, listen to His prayers, and may the Eucharistic Heart of Jesus be our salvation!
…
The reasons for which the feast of the Sacred Heart was instituted and the manner in which Jesus manifested His Heart teach us that we ought to honor it in the Eucharist, and that we shall find it therein with all its love.
Saint Margaret Mary received the revelation of the Sacred Heart before the Blessed Sacrament exposed. Jesus manifested Himself to her in the Host, showing her His Heart and saying to her these adorable words, the most eloquent commentary on His presence in this Sacrament: “Behold this Heart which has so loved men!”
And our Lord, appearing to Venerable Mother Mechtilda (1614-1698), foundress of a society of women-adorers (The Benedictines of Perpetual Adoration), commanded her to love ardently and honor as much as she could His Sacred Heart in the Blessed Sacrament. And He gave it to her as a pledge of His love, to be her refuge in life and her consolation at the hour of death.
…
The purpose of the feast of the Sacred Heart is to honor with more fervor and devotion the suffering love of Jesus Christ as He instituted the Sacrament of His Body and Blood.
To enter into the spirit of devotion to the Heart of Jesus, we must therefore honor the past sufferings of the Savior and make reparation for the ingratitude with which He is daily overwhelmed in the Eucharist.
Great indeed were the afflictions of the Heart of Jesus! Every kind of trial fell upon Jesus. He was weighted down with humiliations; He was assailed with the most revolting calumnies and disgraced in every possible way; He was loaded down with opprobrium and crushed with every form of contempt. But, in spite of everything, “He offered because it was His own will, and He opened not His mouth.” His love was stronger than death, and torrents of desolation could not quench its flame. His sufferings are now over; but since Jesus bore them for our sake, our gratitude must have no end. Our love must honor them as if they were taking place before our eyes. The Heart which endured them with so much love is here in the Blessed Sacrament; it is not dead, but living and active; not insensible, but still more affectionate.
…
Jesus can no longer suffer, it is true; but alas! man can still be guilty towards Him of monstrous ingratitudes. These ingratitudes toward God Who is present and living among us to win our love, are the greatest offense to the Heart of Jesus in the Most Blessed Sacrament.
Man is indifferent to this supreme gift of love of Jesus for him. He does not take account of it; or if he must occasionally think of it, โ when, for instance, Jesus tries to shake him out of his torpor โ he does so only to drive out such a troublesome thought. He does not care for the love of Jesus Christ.
More than that! When urged on by his faith, by the remembrance of his Christian education, and by the God-sent impulse in his heart to adore Jesus Christ as his Lord in the Eucharist and to return to His service, impious man rebels against this dogma, the most lovable of all. He will even deny the truth of it and apostasize so as to be freed from the obligation of adoring it, of sacrificing to it some idol or passion, of breaking shameful bonds.
…
We see Christians despise Jesus in the Most Blessed Sacrament and show contempt for the Heart which has so loved them and which consumes itself with love for them. To spurn Him freely they take advantage of the veil that hides Him.
They insult Him with their irreverences, their sinful thoughts, and their criminal glances in His presence. To express their disdain for Him they avail themselves of His patience, of the kindness that suffers everything in silence as it did with the impious soldiery of Caiphas, Herod, and Pilate.
They blaspheme sacrilegiously against the God of the Eucharist. They know that His love renders Him speechless.
They crucify Him even in their guilty souls. They receive Him. They dare take this living Heart and bind it to a foul corpse. They dare deliver it to the devil who is their lord!
No! Never even in the days of His Passion has Jesus received so many humiliations as in His Sacrament! Earth for Him is a Calvary of ignominy.
In His agony He sought a consoler; on the Cross He asked for someone to sympathize with His afflictions. Today, more than ever, we must make amends, a reparation of honor, to the adorable Heart of Jesus. Let us lavish our adorations and our love on the Eucharist. To the Heart of Jesus living in the Most Blessed Sacrament be honor, praise, adoration, and kingly power for ever and ever!
“When you awake in the night, transport yourself quickly in spirit before the Tabernacle, saying: ‘Behold, my God, I come to adore You, to praise, thank, and love you, and to keep you company with all the Angels,’ “
– St. John Vianney
“As Mary is the treasurer and dispenser of the gifts and graces of the Most High God, she reserves a choice portion, indeed the choicest portion, to nourish and sustain her children and servants. They grow strong on the Bread of Life; they are made joyful with the wine that brings forth virgins. They are carried at her breast. They bear with ease the yoke of Christ scarcely feeling its weight because of the oil of devotion with which she has softened its wood,”
– from St. Louis de Montfort’s True Devotion to Mary
“Put your sins in the chalice for the precious blood to wash away. One drop is capable of washing away the sins of the world. “The Eucharist is connected with the Passion. If Jesus had not established the Eucharist we would have forgotten the crucifixion. It would have faded into the past and we would have forgotten that Jesus loved us. There is a saying that to be far away from the eyes is to be far away from the heart. To make sure that we do not forget, Jesus gave us the Eucharist as a memorial of his love,”
– Blessed Mother Teresa
“Our Redeemer ever present in the most Blessed Sacrament, extends His hands to everyone. He opens His heart and says, ‘Come to Me, all of you.'”
– St. Raphael Kalinowski, O.C.D.
“Peter, James and John witnessed the Transfiguration of Christ on Mount Tabor. The whole world will witness the glorious transfiguration of Christ in the Blessed Sacrament. It will have the exact opposite effect of the bombing of Nagasaki. At the transfiguration of Christ in the Blessed Sacrament, there will be an explosion of divine energy which will release the power of His love and renew the face of the earth. Then the world will see Real Power! All will be made well. All will belong to His Heart. All will be made one.
“In the meantime, there are five graces we receive each time we visit Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament. By His glorious wounds we are the ones who are transfigured and changed through His healing love. Restoration, sanctification, transformation, reparation and salvation are the graces being poured out graciously upon us with each holy hour we make.
“Like Peter… this is why we should exclaim in His Divine Presence, ‘Lord, how good it is for us to be here!'”
– from the book Letters To A Brother Priest
“He who receives Communion is made holy and Divinized in soul and body in the same way that water, set over a fire, becomes boiling… Communion works like yeast that has been mixed into dough so that it leavens the whole mass; …Just as by melting two candles together you get one piece of wax, so, I think, one who receives the Flesh and Blood of Jesus is fused together with Him by this Communion, and the soul finds that he is in Christ and Christ is in him,”
– St. Cyril of Alexandria
“Once the army of men who hated Christ came to Assisi. They meant to destroy the city. St. Clare carried the Blessed Sacrament outside the convent. Only her sisters were around her. But the great army saw her coming. They turned and fled in panic.”
– Rev. Daniel A. Lord, S.J.
“The Eucharist is that love which surpasses all loves in Heaven and on earth,”
– St. Bernard
“The Eucharist is the Sacrament of Love; It signifies Love, it produces Love,”
– St. Thomas Aquinas
“In the Eucharist is all the power that created the universe and all the love that redeemed it!”
– Msgr. Franklin Hurd
“Adorned with heavenly power you shine forth like the sun among the saints.”
– Responsory for the Office of Readings, Feast of the Assumption
“It was Mary who first adored the Incarnate Word. He was in her womb, and no one on earth knew of it. Oh! how well was our Lord served in Mary’s virginal womb! Never has He found a ciborium, a golden vase more precious or purer than was Mary’s womb! Mary’s adoration was more pleasing to Him than that of all the Angels. The Lord โhath set His tabernacle in the sun,โ says the Psalmist. The sun is Maryโs heart,” and “Mary is the aurora of the beautiful Sun of Justice.”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“Happy are you, holy Virgin Mary, and most worthy of all praise, from your womb Christ the Sun of Justice has risen.”
– Responsory for the Office of Readings, Feast of the Assumption
“Let us give ourselves to the Immaculata [Mary]. Let her prepare us, let her receive Him [Jesus] in Holy Communion. This is the manner most perfect and pleasing to the Lord Jesus and brings great fruit to us.” Because “the Immaculata knows the secret, how to unite ourselves totally with the heart of the Lord Jesus… We do not limit ourselves in love. We want to love the Lord Jesus with her heart, or rather that she would love the Lord with our heart.”
– St. Maximilian Maria Kolbe
“All for the Eucharist; nothing for me,”
– St. Margaret Mary Alacoque
“Father, I am hungry; for the love of God give this soul her food, her Lord in the Eucharist,”
– St. Catherine of Siena
“My aim is to institute perpetual adoration,” spoke St. Maximilian Maria Kolbe, Franciscan priest and founder of the Knights of the Immaculata. For he said that this is “the most important activity,” and “if half of the Brothers would work, and the other half pray, this would not require too much.”
– St. Maximilian Maria Kolbe
“To keep me from sin and straying from Him, God has used devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament. My life vows destined to be spent in the light irradiating from the tabernacle, and it is to the Heart of Jesus that I dare go for the solution of all my problems,”
– Pope John XXIII
“…Such visits are a proof of gratitude and expression of love, an acknowledgment of the Lord’s presence.”
– Pope Paul VI, on Adoration
“My eyes, I have filled with Jesus upon Whom I have fixed them at the Elevation of the Host at Holy Mass and I do not wish to replace Him with any other image,”
– St. Colette
“O Sisters, if we would only comprehend the fact that while the Eucharistic Species remain within us, Jesus is there and working in us inseparably with the Father and the Holy Spirit and therefore the whole Holy Trinity is there…,”
– St. Mary Magdalene di Pazzi
“…Mary continues to stand alongside her Redeemer-Son in the sacrament of the altar. It is consoling to recall that she who bears the title ‘Mother of Fair Hope’ keeps perpetual vigil before the Blessed Sacrament, ever ready to encourage her pilgrim children en route to the glorious world of the resurrection. In the Salve Regina we ‘poor banished children of Eve’ hail the New Eve, mother of the Eucharist, as ‘our life, our sweetness and our hope.’ And we implore her to ‘show us, after this exile, the blessed fruit’ of her womb.
“This our heavenly mother will certainly do, lovingly and graciously. But already here and now, that is, during our exile in this ‘vale of tears,’ she untiringly shows us the blessed fruit of her womb integrally present in the sacrament of the altar. As his handmaid and herald she urges us to draw ever closer to him. For not only is He the source of life and holiness; He is the pledge and pattern of our bodily resurrection when the new world finally dawns.”
– Fr. Richard Foley, S.J.
“Only through the Eucharist is it possible to live the heroic virtues of Christianity: charity, to the point of forgiving one’s enemies; love for those who make us suffer; chastity in every age and situation of life; patience in suffering and when one is shocked by the silence of God in the tragedies of history or of one’s own personal existence. You must always be Eucharistic souls in order to be authentic Christians,”
– Pope John Paul II
“The Eucharist is the consummation of the whole spiritual life,”
– St. Thomas Aquinas
“The holy Eucharist contains the whole spiritual treasure of the Church, that is, Christ himself…. He who is the living bread, whose flesh, vivified by the Holy Spirit and vivifying, gives life to men,”
– Vatican II
“O King of glory, though you hide your beauty, yet the eye of my soul rends the veil. I see the angelic choirs giving you honor without cease,”
– St. Faustina Kowalska
“Do you wish to learn the secret of true Eucharistic prayer? Consider, then, all the mysteries in the light of the Blessed Sacrament. It is a divine prism through which they can all be studied. The Holy Eucharist is, indeed, ‘Jesus Christ, yesterday, and today, and the same forever’ (Heb 13:8). In this Sacrament He glorifies all the mysteries of His life and prolongs, as it were, the exercise of all His virtues. The Eucharist is, in a word, the great Mystery of our faith to which all Catholic truths lead,”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“I beg you to show the greatest possible reverence and honor for the most holy Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom all things, whether on earth or in heaven, have been brought to peace and reconciled with Almighty God,”
– Words of St. Francis of Assisi in a letter to the priest friars on the Holy Eucharist
“It is the Sacrament of Love that excites the soul to ardent prayer. It stirs up the virtue of impetration and, as it were, forces God to grant our petition. It deepens the abyss of humility, above all it enkindles the flame of love in the heart; hence the Sacrament is the Gift of gifts, and the Grace of graces,”
– – St. Angela Foligno
“All my sermons are prepared in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament. As recreation is most pleasant and profitable in the sun, so homiletic creativity is best nourished before the Eucharist. The most brilliant ideas come from meeting God face to face. The Holy Spirit that presided at the Incarnation is the best atmosphere for illumination. Pope John Paul II keeps a small desk or writing pad near him whenever he is in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament; and I have done this all my life โ I am sure for the same reason he does, because a lover always works better when the beloved is with him.”
– Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen
“O God-Man present in this sacrament for me โ what a comfort, what a privilege to know I kneel before God! And to think that this God loves me!… Mary, my mother, help me to love him in return,”
– St. Alphonsus Liguori
Following is an excerpt from Therese and Lisieux, by Pierre Descouvemont and Helmuth Nils Loose, about St. Therese, the Little Flower:
“On her return to Lisieux [from her visit with the Pope in Rome], she sent her gold bracelet to the chaplains of Montmartre so it could be melted into part of a great monstrance โ a gesture that clearly expressed Thereseโs desire to keep watch day and night close to Jesus in the Eucharist.” The monstrance was built and placed in Le Sacre Coeur in Paris where Jesus in the Most Blessed Sacrament is adored perpetually โ day and night โ to this day.
“O Trinity, eternal Trinity! Fire, abyss of love… Was it necessary that you should give Even the Holy Trinity as food for souls?… You gave us not only your Word Through the Redemption and in the Eucharist, But you also gave yourself In the fullness of love for your creature.” – St. Catherine of Siena |
“Beneath the Eucharist’s sacramental veils is the living fruit of Mary’s womb,”
– Fr. Richard Foley, S.J.
“We have him [God] before our eyes, masked in the sacred Host,”
– Gerard Manley Hopkins
“O most sacred, most loving heart of Jesus, thou art concealed in the Holy Eucharist, and thou beatest for us still…. Thou art the heart of the Most High made man…. Thy Sacred Heart is the instrument and organ of Thy love. It did beat for us. It yearned for us. It ached for our salvation. It was on fire through zeal, that the glory of God might be manifested in and by us…. In worshipping thee I worship my incarnate God, my Emmanuel,”
– John Henry Cardinal Newman
“The many wonders of creation can only fill us with astonishment and admiration. But when we speak of the most holy Eucharist we can say that here is to be found the miracle of divine love for us…. Has there been, or will there ever be, a nobler or more magnanimous love than that which He has shown us in the sacrament of love?”
– St. John Vianney
“Mary found again in the adorable Host the adorable fruit of her womb… and began in the Cenacle her new maternity at the feet of Jesus in the Eucharist,”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“She who received the seed of eternal glory Now dispenses grace, the seed of glory-to-come. My womb was the chalice of the impenetration of God That became the Incarnation of God and man,”
– Catherine de Hueck Doherty
Pope Leo XIII says that the Eucharist is “a most divine gift proceeding from the very Heart of the Redeemer.”
“Evangelization through the Eucharist, in the Eucharist, and from the Eucharist โ these are three inseparable aspects of how the Church lives the mystery of Christ and fulfills her mission of communicating it to all people…. In addition to the preaching of the message, the consummation of evangelization consists in the building up of the Church, which has no real existence without the sacramental life culminating in the Blessed Eucharist,”
– Pope John Paul II
“He who made thee is made in thee. He is made in thee through whom you were made…. Give milk, O mother, to him who is our food; give milk to the bread that comes down from heaven.”
– St. Augustine
“The Eucharist is source and pledge of blessedness and glory, not for the soul alone, but for the body also…. In the frail and perishable body that divine Host, which is the immortal body of Christ, implants a principle of resurrection, a seed of immortality, which one day must germinate,”
– Pope Leo XIII
“When you look at the crucifix, you understand how much Jesus loved you. When you look at the Sacred Host you understand how much Jesus loves you now. This is why you should ask your parish priest to have perpetual adoration in your parish. I beg the Blessed Mother to touch the hearts of all parish priests that they may have perpetual Eucharistic adoration in their parishes, and that it may spread throughout the entire world,”
– Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta
St. Francis of Assisi led his brothers in prostrating themselves and in proclaiming before every Church where Jesus in the Most Blessed Sacrament dwelt: “We adore Thee most holy Lord Jesus Christ, here in all Thy Churches, which are in the whole world, because by Thy holy cross, Thou hast redeemed the world.”
“The Eucharist flows from the Passion of Christ. When we come to the Blessed Sacrament WE COME TO THE CROSS. During our holy hour we lift up to the Eucharistic Heart of Jesus those souls in the most need of His mercy.
“During our holy hour, those in most need of His mercy are stamped and marked with the Precious Blood of Jesus. This includes those who are to die that day. Stamped with the Precious Blood of Jesus, they are saved…
“If we only knew the value of a holy hour we would never miss a single day without making one… Because the Cross is infinite in merit, there is no limit to the value of a holy hour.”
– Excerpts from Letters To A Brother Priest
“Hail, O cross, consecrated by the body of Christ;
his members have made your wood more noble than precious pearls,”
– Responsory, Office of Readings, The Triumph of the Cross
“Every Mass is a memorial of that one sacrifice and that passover which restored life to the world. Every Mass puts us into intimate communion with her, the mother, whose sacrifice ‘becomes present’ just as the sacrifice of her Son ‘becomes present’ at the words of consecration….. At the root of the Eucharist is the virginal and maternal life of Mary,”
– Pope John Paul II
Of Perpetual Eucharistic Adoration Pope St. Pius X has said, it is “the devotion which surpasses all others.”
“We pay the Blessed Sacrament the supreme homage of divine adoration and worship (latria), because He who is there present is the God of heaven and earth, the all-holy Word-made-flesh, our first beginning and our last end,”
– Fr. Richard Foley, S.J.
“If the poison of pride is swelling up in you, turn to the Eucharist; and that Bread, Which is your God humbling and disguising Himself, will teach you humility. If the fever of selfish greed rages in you, feed on this Bread; and you will learn generosity. If the cold wind of coveting withers you, hasten to the Bread of Angels; and charity will come to blossom in your heart. If you feel the itch of intemperance, nourish yourself with the Flesh and Blood of Christ, Who practiced heroic self-control during His earthly life; and you will become temperate. If you are lazy and sluggish about spiritual things, strengthen yourself with this heavenly Food; and you will grow fervent. Lastly, if you feel scorched by the fever of impurity, go to the banquet of the Angels; and the spotless Flesh of Christ will make you pure and chaste,”
– St. Cyril of Alexandria
“You may be sure that of all the moments of your life, the time you spend before the divine Sacrament will be that which will give you more strength during life and more consolation at the hour of your death and during eternity,”
– St. Alphonsus
“If the Blessed Sacrament is Jesus all for us, is it not the most legitimate of conclusions that we should be all for Him? We should be all for Jesus, if Jesus is our all. And what does this mean? Surely, among other things, that the Blessed Sacrament should be to us just the single overpowering fact of the world. Our hands hold Him; our words make Him; our tongue rests Him; our body compasses Him; our souls feel Him; our flesh feeds upon Him, Him, the Infinite, the Incomprehensible, the Immense, the Eternal. Must not all life be looked at in this light, just as the whole Church lies in this light and has no other?”
– The Blessed Sacrament, by Fr. Frederick Faber
“Without the Holy Eucharist there would be no happiness in this world; life would be insupportable. When we receive Holy Communion, we receive our joy and our happiness. The good God, wishing to give Himself to us in the Sacrament of His Love, gave us a vast and great desire, which He alone can satisfy. In the presence of this beautiful Sacrament, we are like a person dying of thirst by the side of a river โ he would only need to bend his head; like a person still remaining poor, close to a great treasure โ he need only stretch out his hand. He who communicates loses himself in God like a drop of water in the ocean. They can no more be separated,”
– St. John Vianney
“Is not our Lord as meek and humble in the Blessed Sacrament as He was during His life on earth? Is He not always the Good Shepherd, the Divine Consoler, the Changeless Friend? Happy the soul that knows how to find Jesus in the Holy Eucharist, and in the Eucharist all things!,”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“A cloud of incense was rising on high; the people suddenly all bowed low; what could it mean? The truth flashed on him, fearfully yet sweetly; it was the Blessed Sacrament โ it was the Lord Incarnate who was on the altar, who had come to visit and bless his people. It was the Great Presence, which makes a Catholic Church different from every other place in the world; which makes it, as no other place can be โ holy.”
– John Henry Cardinal Newman, Loss and Gain: The Story of a Convert
“Jesus is present in the Most Blessed Sacrament to complete the work which His Father entrusts to Him. He is there to fill our soul with the love which led Him to die on the Cross for us. He is there to take over our hearts and to lead us to the love of God and neighbor. He is there to make us stronger and more resolute in loving Him,”
– Bishop Thomas V. Daily
“Our communal worship at Mass must go together with our personal worship of Jesus in Eucharistic adoration in order that our love may be complete,”
– Pope John Paul II, Redeemer of Man
“Perpetual Adoration, Eucharistic Adoration offers to our people the opportunity to join those in religious life to pray for the salvation of the world, souls everywhere and peace on earth. We cannot underestimate the power of prayer and the difference it will make in our world,”
– Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta
“God is as really present in the consecrated Host as He is in the glory of Heaven,”
– St. Paschal Baylon
“What does Jesus Christ do in the Eucharist? It is God who, as our Savior, offers himself each day for us to his Father’s justice. If you are in difficulties and sorrows, he will comfort and relieve you. If you are sick, he will either cure you or give you strength to suffer so as to merit Heaven. If the devil, the world, and the flesh are making war upon you, he will give you the weapons with which to fight, to resist, and to win victory. If you are poor, he will enrich you with all sorts of riches for time and eternity. Let us open the door of his sacred and adorable Heart, and be wrapped about for an instant by the flames of his love, and we shall see what a God who loves us can do. O my God, who shall be able to comprehend?”
– St. John Vianney
“United with the angels and saints of the heavenly Church, let us adore the most Holy Sacrament of the Eucharist. Prostrate, we adore this great mystery that contains Godโs new and definitive covenant with humankind in Christ,”
– Pope John Paul II
“The Lord Jesus himself proclaims, ‘This is My Body.’ Before the blessing of the heavenly words something of another character is spoken of; after consecration it is designated ‘body’. He himself speaks of his blood. Before the consecration it is spoken of as something else; after the consecration it is spoken of as ‘blood’. And you say, ‘Amen’, that is, ‘It is true.’ What the mouth speaks, let the mind within confess; what the tongue utters, let the heart feel.”
– St. Ambrose, Bishop of Milan (339-397)
Quotes of St Therese of Lisieux:
“By our little acts of charity practiced in the shade we convert souls far away, we help missionaries, we win for them abundant alms; and by that means build actual dwellings spiritual and material for our Eucharistic Lord.”
“It is not to remain in a golden ciborium that He comes down each day from Heaven, but to find another Heaven, the Heaven of our soul in which He takes delight.”
“You must open a little, or rather raise on high your corolla so that the Bread of Angels may come as divine dew to strengthen you, and to give you all that is wanting to you.”
“Living Bread, Heavenly Bread, Eucharist Divine
O Sacred Mystery! founded on Love’s play…
Jesus, my white Host, come in this heart of mine
If only for today.”
Glorious Guardian of my soul, You who shine in God’s beautiful Heaven As a sweet and pure flame Near the Eternal’s throne, You come down to earth for me, And enlightening me with your splendor, Fair Angel, you become my Brother, My Friend, my Consoler!… For you the Kingdom and the Glory, The Riches of the King of kings. For me the ciborium’s humble Host. For me the Cross’s treasure. With the Cross, with the Host, With your celestial aid, In peace I await the other life, The joys that will last forever. – Excerpts from the poem “To My Guardian Angel”, by St. Therese of Lisieux |
From the writings of St. Peter Julian Eymard:
“If the Christians continue to desert Jesus Christ in His temple, will not the Heavenly Father take away from them His well-beloved Son Whom they neglect?”
“The adoration of Jesus in the Most Blessed Sacrament is the end of the Church Militant, just as adoration of God in His glory is the end of the Church Triumphant. A holy rivalry, a concert of prayer, a harmony of divine service should exist between the heavenly court and the Eucharistic court here below, between the adorer and his mother the Church.”
Quotes of St. Francis of Assisi:
“…In this world I cannot see the Most High Son of God with my own eyes, except for His Most Holy Body and Blood.”
“What wonderful majesty! What stupendous condescension! O sublime humility! That the Lord of the whole universe, God and the Son of God, should humble Himself like this under the form of a little bread, for our salvation”
“We adore Thee most holy Lord Jesus Christ, here in all Thy Churches, which are in the whole world, because by Thy holy cross, Thou hast redeemed the world.”
“How sweet is the moment in which poor humanity, wearied and afflicted, may remain alone, with Jesus alone, in the Sacrament of Love; for there the Lord, with His flaming heart open, calls unto all, ‘You that are burdened and heavy laden, come unto Me and I will refresh you.’ Happy are those hearts that know how to satisfy the unquenchable hunger and thirst in this heavenly banquet!”
– Fr. M.J. Corcoran, O.S.A.
“If it were not for the Eucharist, if it were not for this marvelous manifestation of God’s love, if it were not for this opportunity to place ourselves in the very real presence of God, if it were not for the sacrament that reminds us of His love, His suffering and His triumph, which indeed perpetuates for us His saving sacrifice on the cross, I am sure that I could never face the challenges of my life, my own weakness and sinfulness and my own need to reach out to the Living God.”
– Archbishop Theodore McCarrick
“O Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, I would like to be filled with love for You; keep me closely united with You, may my heart be near to Yours. I want to be to You like the apostle John. O Mary of the Rosary, keep me recollected when I say these prayers of yours; bind me forever, with your rosary, to Jesus of the Blessed Sacrament. Blessed be Jesus, my love..,”
– Pope John XXIII, Journal of a Soul
The following reflection is from Pope John Paul II:
Together with praising Christ present in the mystery of the Eucharist, almost of necessity we recall the memory of the Mother of God.
It is thanks to her generous fiat that the Word of God was made flesh by the work of the Holy Spirit. She offered her own body to the Word so that He might take it upon himself and the miracle of the divine Incarnation would be accomplished. In her virginal womb Mary bore the incarnate Word, awaiting with love beyond all telling the birth of the Savior….
Every Holy Mass makes present in an unbloody manner the unique and perfect sacrifice, offered by Christ on the tree of the cross, in which Mary participated, joined in spirit with her suffering Son, lovingly consenting to His sacrifice and offering her own sorrow to the Father (c.f. Lumen Gentium, no. 58).
Therefore, when we celebrate the Eucharist, the memorial of Christ’s Passover, the memory of His Mother’s suffering is also made alive and present, this Mother, who, as an unsurpassable model, teaches the faithful to unite themselves more intimately to the sacrifice of her Son, the one Redeemer.
Through spiritual communion with the sorrowful Mother of God, believers share in a special way in the paschal mystery and are opened to this extraordinary action of the Holy Spirit that produces a supernatural joy because of communion with the glorious Christ, on the example of the joy granted to Mary in the glory of heaven, as the first person to share in the fruits of redemption.
“The soul hungers for God, and nothing but God can satiate it. Therefore He came to dwell on earth and assumed a Body in order that this Body might become the Food of our souls,”
– St. John Vianney
“The purpose of Eucharistic adoration is the Divine Person of Our Lord Jesus Christ present in the Most Blessed Sacrament.
“Let us remember that Our Lord is in the Host in all his different states, and in his entirety. He who does not realize that, lives in darkness; his faith is always weak and fails to make him happy.
“Let our faith be active and thoughtful; that is what will make us happy. Our Lord wants to bring us happiness all by Himself. No man can make us happy; even piety cannot do it of itself. We need a piety that has fed on the Eucharist; for happiness comes only from the possession of God.”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“And according as we say, “Our Father,” because He is The Father of those who understand and believe; so also we call it “our Bread,” because Christ is The Bread of those who are in union with His Body. And we ask that this Bread should be given to us daily, that we who are in Christ, and daily receive The Eucharist for the Food of Salvation, may not by the interposition of some heinous sin…be separated from Christ’s Body.”
– St. Cyprian (210?-258)
When we say “Give us this day our daily bread,” by “this day” we mean “at this time,” when we either ask for that sufficiency, signifying the whole of our need under the name of bread, which is the outstanding part of it, or for the sacrament of the faithful, which is necessary at this time for attaining not so much this temporal as that eternal happiness.”
– St. Augustine
“It is happiness to be in heaven, no doubt, because it is to be with Jesus; but have we not almost the same happiness here? Do we not possess Him in the Most Holy Sacrament? Did we but know how to profit by His Divine Presence, we should in some way have no reason to envy the inhabitants of the Heavenly City.”
– Marie Estelle Harpain (1814-1842)
Our Lord Jesus said to His disciples: “I am The Way, The Truth and The Life. Nobody can come to the Father except through Me. If you had recognized Me, you would have recognized My Father too. And from now on you will recognize Him, since you have seen Him.” Philip said to Him: “Lord, show us the Father and it is enough for us.” Jesus said to him: “Have I been so long a time with you and you have not learned who I am? Philip whoever sees Me, sees My Father too” (Jn. 14, 6-9).
Now, the Father dwells in light that cannot be penetrated (1 Tim. 6,16), and God is a spirit (Jn. 4, 24), and nobody has ever seen God (Jn 1, 18). Because God is a spirit, therefore He can be seen only by means of the spirit, for it is the spirit that gives life, where as the flesh is of no avail (Jn. 6, 64).
But since the Son is like the Father, he too is seen by nobody otherwise than the Father is seen or otherwise than the Holy Spirit is seen. And so it was that those who saw our Lord Jesus Christ only in a human way and did not see nor believe that He was the true Son of God, as the spirit and his Divine nature demand – they all stood condemned.
And so now with all those who see the Blessed Sacrament, sanctified by our Lord’s words on the altar, through the hands of the priest, in the form of bread and wine: if they do not see and believe, as the spirit and the Divine nature demand that it is truly the most holy Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, they stand condemned. For it is the Most High who bears witness to it. He says, “This is My Body, and the Blood of the New Testament” (Mk, 14, 22-24) and, “He who eats My Flesh and drinks My Blood, has life everlasting.” (Jn. 6, 55)
– from the writings of St. Francis of Assisi on The Blessed Sacrament
“Prayer is the best preparation for Holy Communion. Prayer is the raising of the mind to God. When we pray we go to meet Christ Who is coming to us. If our Creator and Savior comes from heaven with such great love, it is only fitting that we should go to meet Him. And this is what we do when we spend some time in prayer.”
– St. Bernadine of Siena (1380-1444)
Do you know what Mass is? In the Church it is what the sun in our world, it is the soul of our faith, the center of our religion, the end and center of all the ceremonies, rites and sacraments. In a word it is the summary of all that is beautiful and good in the Church of God.”
– St. Leonard of Port Maurice (1676-1751)
“In each of our lives Jesus comes as the Bread of Life – to be eaten, to be consumed by us. This is how He loves us. Then Jesus comes in our human life as the hungry one, the other, hoping to be fed with the Bread of our life, our hearts by loving, and our hands by serving. In loving and serving, we prove that we have been created in the likeness of God, for God is Love and when we love we are like God. This is what Jesus meant when He said, “Be perfect as your Father in heaven is perfect.”
– Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta
“And just as He appeared before the holy Apostles in true flesh, so now He has us see Him in the Sacred Bread. Looking at Him with the eyes of their flesh, they saw only His Flesh, but regarding Him with the eyes of the spirit, they believed that He was God. In like manner, as we see bread and wine with our bodily eyes, let us see and believe firmly that it is His Most Holy Body and Blood, True and Living.
For in this way our Lord is ever present among those who believe in him, according to what He said: “Behold, I am with you all days even to the consummation of the world.” (Mt. 28, 20)
– St. Francis of Assisi
“The humility of Jesus can be seen in the crib, in the exile to Egypt, in the hidden life, in the inability to make people understand Him, in the desertion of His apostles, in the hatred of His persecutors, in all the terrible suffering and death of His Passion, and now in His permanent state of humility in the tabernacle, where He has reduced Himself to such a small particle of bread that the priest can hold Him with two fingers. The more we empty ourselves, the more room we give God to fill us.”
– Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta
“Thus it is the spirit of the Lord, which dwells in those who believe in Him, that truly receives the most Holy Body and Blood of our Lord. All the rest, who have nothing of that spirit and presume to receive Him, eat and drink judgment to themselves (1 Cor. 11,29)
So, you children of men, how long is your sense going to stay dull? (Ps 4,3) Why do you not see in the truth and believe in the Son of God? (Jn. 9, 35) See, day after day He humbles Himself, as when He came down from His royal throne. (Wis. 18, 15) into the Virgin’s womb. Day by day He comes to us personally in this lowly form. Daily He comes down from the bosom of His Father on the altar into the hands of the priest.”
– from the writings of St. Francis of Assisi
Prayer of our Holy Father, Pope John Paul II, inaugurating Perpetual Eucharistic Adoration at St. Peter’s at the beginning of Advent 1981:
Lord stay with us. These words were spoken for the first time by the disciples of Emmaus. Subsequently in the course of the centuries they have been spoken, an infinite number of times, by the lips of so many of Your disciples and confessors, O Christ.
As Bishop of Rome and first servant of this temple, which stands on the place of St. Peter’s martyrdom, I speak the same words today.
I speak them to invite You, Christ, in Your Eucharistic Presence to accept the daily adoration continuing through the entire day, in this temple, in this basilica, in this chapel.
Stay with us today and stay, from now on, every day, according to the desire of my heart, which accepts the appeal of so many hearts from various parts, sometimes far away, and above all meets the desire of so many inhabitants of the Apostolic See.
Stay! That we may meet You in the prayer of adoration and thanksgiving, in the prayer of expiation and petition, to which all those who visit this basilica are invited.
Stay! You Who are at one and the same time veiled in the Eucharistic Mystery of Faith and are also revealed under the species of bread and wine, which You have assumed in this Sacrament.
Stay! That Your presence in this temple may incessantly be reconfirmed, and that all those who enter here may become aware that it is Your house, “the dwelling of God with men” (Rev. 21:3) and, visiting this basilica, may find in it the very source of life and holiness that gushes forth from Your Eucharistic Heart…
One day, O Lord, You asked Peter: “Do you love Me?” You asked him three times –
and three times the Apostle answered: “Lord, You know everything, You know that I love You.” (Jn 21:15-17)
May the answer of Peter, on whose tomb this basilica was erected, be expressed by this daily and day-long adoration which we have begun today.
May the unworthy successor of Peter in the Roman See – and all those who take part in the adoration of Your Eucharistic Presence – attest with every visit of theirs and make ring out again the truth contained in the Apostle’s words:
“Lord You know everything; You know that I love You.” Amen.
“How sweet it was, the first kiss of Jesus to my soul! Yes, it was a kiss of Love. I felt I was loved, and I too said: ‘I love Thee, I give myself to Thee forever!’ Jesus asked nothing of me, demanded no sacrifice. Already for a long time past, He and the little Therese had watched and understood one another… That day our meeting was no longer a simple look but a fusion. No longer were we two: Therese had disappeared as the drop of water which loses itself in the depths of the ocean, Jesus alone remained; the Master, the King! Had not Therese begged Him to take away from her, her liberty? That liberty made her afraid; so weak, so fragile did she feel herself that she longed to be united forever to Divine Strength.”
– from Story of A Soul, the Autobiography of St. Therese of Lisieux
Jesus Waits for us Here with Divine Longing
St. Peter Julian Eymard
Adore and visit Jesus, abandoned and forsaken
by men in His Sacrament of Love.
Man has time for everything
except for visits to His Lord and God,
WHO IS WAITING AND LONGING FOR US
in the Blessed Sacrament.
The streets and places of entertainment
are filled with people;
the House of God is deserted.
Men flee from it; they are afraid of it.
Ah! Poor Jesus!
Did you expect so much indifference
from those You have redeemed,
from Your friends, from Your children, from me?
Sympathize with Jesus Who is betrayed,
insulted, mocked, and crucified far more ignominiously
in His Sacrament of Love than He was
in the Garden of Olives, in Jerusalem, and on Calvary.
Those whom He has the most honored, loved,
and enriched with His gifts and graces
are the very ones who offend Him the most
by their indifference.
Offer up for this intention all that you have suffered
during the day or week
that Jesus may be loved and adored by all.
Because we ourselves are unable to atone for
so much wrong,
we unite ourselves
to the infinite merits of our Savior Jesus.
Receive His Divine Blood
as it mystically flows from His Holy Wounds,
and offer it to the Father
in perfect atonement for the sins of the world.
Take His sufferings
and His prayer on the Cross
and beg the Heavenly Father
for pardon and mercy for all.
Unite your reparation
to that of the most Blessed Virgin
at the foot of the Cross or the altar,
and from the love of Jesus for His Divine Mother
you will obtain everything.
With Mary Let us Adore Him!
St. Peter Julian Eymard
Mary devoted herself exclusively to the Eucharistic Glory of Jesus. She knew that it was the desire of the Eternal Father to make the Eucharist known, loved and served by all men; that need of Jesusโ Heart was to communicate to all men His gifts of grace and glory. She knew, too, that it was the mission of the Holy Spirit to extend and perfect in the hearts of men, the reign of Jesus Christ, and that the Church had been founded only to give Jesus to the world.
All Maryโs desire, then, was to make Him known in His Sacrament. Her intense love for Jesus felt the need of expanding in this way, of consecrating itself – as a kind of relief, as it were – because of her own inability to glorify Him as much as she desired.
Ever since Calvary, all men were her children. She loved them with a Motherโs tenderness and longed for their supreme good as for her own; therefore, she was consumed with the desire to make Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament known to all, to inflame all hearts with His love, to see them enchained to His loving service.
To obtain this favor, Mary passed her time at the foot of the Most Adorable Sacrament, in prayer and penance. There she treated the worldโs salvation. In her boundless zeal, she embraced the needs of the faithful everywhere, for all time to come, who would inherit the Holy Eucharist and be Its adorers… Her prayers converted countless souls, and as every conversion is the fruit of prayer, and since Maryโs prayer could meet no refusal, the Apostles had in this Mother of Mercy their most powerful helper. “Blessed is he for whom Mary prays!”
Eucharistic adorers share Maryโs life and mission of prayer at the foot of the Most Blessed Sacrament. It is the most beautiful of all missions, and it holds no perils. It is the most holy, for in it all the virtues are practiced. It is, moreover, the most necessary to the Church, which has even more need of prayerful souls than of powerful preachers; of men of penance rather than men of eloquence. Today more than ever have we need of men who, by their self-immolation, disarm the anger of God inflamed by the ever increasing crimes of nations. We must have souls who by their importunity re- open the treasures of grace which the indifference of the multitude has closed. We must have true adorers; that is to say, men of fervor and of sacrifice. When there are many such souls around their Divine Chief, God will be glorified, Jesus will be loved, and society will once more become Christian, conquered for Jesus Christ by the apostolate of Eucharistic prayer.
“Every member of the Church must be vigilant in seeing that this sacrament of love shall be at the center of the life of the people of God so that through all the manifestations of worship due to it, Christ shall be given back ‘love for love,’ and truly become the life of our souls,”
– Holy Father, Pope John Paul II
“Today solemn exposition of the Blessed Sacrament is the grace and need of our time. Society will be restored and renewed when all its members group themselves around our Emmanuel.”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“Although God is all powerful, He is unable to give more; though supremely wise, He knows not how to give more; though vastly rich, He has not more to give.”
– St. Augustine, on the Holy Eucharist
“And in any preaching you do, admonish the people concerning repentance, and that nobody can be saved except he who receives the most holy Body and Blood of our Lord. And when It is sacrificed on the altar by the priest or borne anywhere, let all the people on bended knees render praise, glory and honor to the True and Living Lord God.”
– from a letter written by St. Francis of Assisi
“Perpetual Eucharistic Adoration is our Lady’s ‘Peace Plan.’ I am absolutely certain that through Perpetual Eucharistic Adoration, peace will come to our country and to the whole world. When we do on earth what is done in heaven, adore God perpetually, then there will be ‘a new heaven and a new earth.’ The only name, the only power, the only love that will bring an everlasting peace on the face of the earth, is The Name, The Power, and The Love of Jesus in the Most Blessed Sacrament.”
– Rev. Msgr. Josefino S. Ramirez
“Harness the fire hidden in The Eucharist to bring about a true brotherhood and unity.”
– Cardinal Jaime Sin
Our Lord Jesus Christ joined together on the same day the paschal lamb of the Jews and the True Manna when blessing the bread and the wine He said: “This is My Body, this is My Blood.”
– St. Cyril of Alexandria
“How can this come about?” Mary asked. “The Holy Spirit will come upon you,” the angel answered, “and the power of the Most High will cover you with its shadow.” And now you are the one who puts the question: “How can bread become Christ and wine His Blood?” I answer: “The power of the Holy Spirit will be at work to give us a marvel which surpasses understanding.”
– St. John Damascene (d. 749)
“If I can give you any advice, I beg you to get closer to the Eucharist and to Jesus… We must pray to Jesus to give us that tenderness of the Eucharist.”
– Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta
“As the body cannot be sustained without corporeal food, nor continue in natural life, so without this life-giving food the soul cannot persist in the spiritual life of grace.”
– Dionysius the Carthusian
“It would be easier for the world to survive without the sun than to do so without the Holy Mass.”
– Padre Pio
The First Friday Devotion and St. Margaret Mary Alacoque
Every first Friday of the month she saw the favours, once already received, renewed and the Heart of Jesus was being shown to her as a luminous sun, whose rays, united together in the manner of inflamed darts, were reflected in her heart.
Then she felt herself lit up by a fire so alive, that it seemed it should have turned to ashes, as the Saviour deigned to tell her all that which He wished of her; ever more manifesting to her His Sacred Heart.
One time He Himself wished to prescribe the practices with which she should worthily honour Him, and conceded to her other favours which the saint recounted to us as follows:
“Once when the Blessed Sacrament was exposed, my soul being absorbed in extraordinary recollection, Jesus Christ, my sweet Master, presented Himself to me. He was brilliant with glory; His five wounds shone like five suns. Flames darted forth from all parts of His Sacred humanity but especially from His adorable breast, which resembled a furnace, and which, opening, displayed to me His loving and amiable Heart, the living source of these flames”.
Whilst Margaret was contemplating Him, “He unfolded to me”, she says, “the inexplicable wonders of His pure love, and to what an excess He had carried it for the love of men, from whom He had received only ingratitude. ‘This is’, He said, ‘much more painful to Me than all that I suffered in My Passion. If men rendered to Me some return of love, I should esteem as little all I have done for them, and should wish, if such could be, to suffer it over again; but they meet My eager love with coldness and rebuffs. Do you, at least’, said He, ‘console and delight Me, by supplying as much as you can for their ingratitude'”.
“‘Fear nothing’, the Lord said to me, ‘I shall be thy strength. Listen only to what I desire of thee so as to prepare thee for the accomplishment of My designs.’ Then the Lord requested of me that I, ‘communicate every first Friday of the month, so as to make honourable reparation'”.
“I wish I could pass my life at the foot of the holy tabernacles in which our adorable Saviour dwells.”
– St. Eugene de Mazenod
“O eternal Trinity, You are a deep sea in which the more I seek the more I find, and the more I find, the more I seek to know You. You fill us insatiably, because the soul, before the abyss which You are, is always famished; and hungering for You, O eternal Trinity, it desires to behold truth in Your light. As the thirsty hart pants after the fount of living water, so does my soul long to leave this gloomy body and see You as You are, in truth.
“O unfathomable depth! O Deity eternal! O deep ocean! What more could You give me than to give me Yourself? You are an ever-burning Fire; You consume and are not consumed. By Your fire, You consume every trace of self-love in the soul. You are a Fire which drives away all coldness and illumines minds with its light, and with this light You have made known Your truth. Truly this light is a sea which feeds the soul until it is all immersed in You, O peaceful Sea, eternal Trinity! The water of this sea is never turbid; it never causes fear, but gives knowledge of the truth. This water is transparent and discloses hidden things; and a living faith gives such abundance of light that the soul almost attains to certitude in what it believes.
“You are the supreme and infinite Good, good above all good; good which is joyful, incomprehensible, inestimable; beauty exceeding all other beauty; wisdom surpassing all wisdom, because You are Wisdom itself. Food of angels, giving Yourself with fire of love to men! You are the garment which covers our nakedness; You feed us, hungry as we are, with Your sweetness, because You are all sweetness, with no bitterness. Clothe me, O eternal Trinity, clothe me with Yourself, so that I may pass this mortal life in true obedience and in the light of the most holy faith with which You have inebriated my soul.”
– St. Catherine of Siena
“When we go before Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament we represent the one in the world who is in most need of Godโs Mercy.” We “Stand in behalf of the one in the world who does not know Christ and who is farthest away from God and we bring down upon their soul the Precious Blood of The Lamb.”
– Pope John Paul II
“People ask me: ‘What will convert America and save the world?’ My answer is prayer. What we need is for every parish to come before Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament in Holy Hours of prayer.”
– Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta
“Especially from The Eucharist, grace is poured forth upon us as from a fountain”
– Sacrosanctum Concilium
“At the end of the liturgical cycle in which we commemorate the mysteries of the Savior, the Church, who like a good Mother knows that our spiritual life cannot subsist without Jesus, leads us to Him, really and truly present in the Most Holy Sacrament of the Altar. The solemnity of the Corpus Domini is not just the simple memorial of an historical event which took place almost two thousand years ago at the Last Supper; rather, it recalls us to the ever present reality of Jesus always living in our midst. We can say, in truth, that He has not “left us orphans,” but has willed to remain permanently with us, in the integrity of His Person in the fullness of His humanity and His divinity. “There is no other nation so great,” the Divine Office enthusiastically sings, “as to have its gods so near as our God is present to us.” (RB). In the Eucharist, Jesus is really Emmanuel, God with us.”
– from Divine Intimacy, by Fr. Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalen, O.C.D.
“The Eucharist is not only Jesus actually living among us, but it is Jesus become our Food. This is the chief aspect under which today’s liturgy presents the mystery to us; there is no part of the Mass which does not treat of it directly, or which does not, at least, make some allusion to it. The Introit refers to it when it mentions the wheat and honey with which God once fed the Hebrews in the desert, a miraculous food, and yet a very poor representation of the Living, Life-giving bread of the Eucharist. The Epistle (I Cor II, 23-29) speaks of it, recalling the institution of this Sacrament, when Jesus “took bread, and giving thanks, broke, and said, ‘Take ye, and eat; this is My Body’ “; the Gradual chants, “The eyes of all hope in You, O Lord, and You give them meat in due season.” The very beautiful sequence Lauda Sion, celebrates it at length, and the Gospel (Jn 6, 56-59), echoing the Alleluia, cites the most significant passage of the discourse when Jesus Himself announced the Eucharist “My Flesh is meat indeed, and My Blood is drink indeed.” The Communion Hymn repeats a sentence of the Epistle, and reminds us that we receive the Body of the Lord worthily. Finally, the Postcommunion tells us that Eucharistic Communion is the pledge of Eternal Communion, in Heaven. But, in order to have a better understanding of the immense value of the Eucharist, we must go back to the very words of Jesus, most opportunely recalled in the Gospel of the day, “He that eateth My Flesh and drinketh My Blood, abideth in Me and I in him.”
– from Divine Intimacy, by Fr. Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalen, O.C.D.
“My soul, if you wish to penetrate the depths of this Mystery, your gaze must be illumined by Love! You need to see and understand! Contemplate the Last Supper: see Jesus Who knows that He will soon be separated from the body of His humanity, and yet wishing to be united to us forever; contemplate the Love by which He institutes this Sacrament which permits Him to be corporeally and forever united to mankind. O Inextinguishable Love! O Love of Christ! O Love of the human race! What a true Furnace of Love! O Jesus, You already saw the death which awaited You; the sorrows and atrocious tortures of the Passion were already breaking Your Heart, and yet You offered Yourself to Your executioners, and permitted them, by means of this Sacrament, to possess You forever as an Eternal Gift, O You, Whose delights are to be with the children of men!
“O my soul, how can you refrain from plunging yourself ever deeper and deeper into the love of Christ, who did not forget you in life or in death, but who willed to give Himself wholly to you, and to unite you to Himself forever?”
– St. Angela Foligno
“Hidden God, devoutly I adore Thee, truly present beneath these veils: all my heart subdues itself before Thee, since all before Thee faints and fails.”
– Adoro Te Devote
“Jesus made Himself our food in order to assimilate us to Himself, to make us live His life, to make us live in Him, as He Himself lives in His Father. The Eucharist is truly the Sacrament of Union and at the same time it is the clearest and most convincing proof that God calls us and pleads with us to come to intimate union with Himself.”
– Fr. Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalen, O.C.D.
“The eternal tide flows hid in Living Bread. That with its Heavenly Life too be fed…”
– St. John of the Cross
“There is such an intimate connection between the ‘Enthronement of the Sacred Heart of Jesus in the home’ and the Eucharist…
“The Enthronement was founded by Fr. Mateo Crawley, at the beginning of the century” and was instrumental in “bringing together a million faithful in the nocturnal adoration in the home, enthroning the Sacred Heart in millions of families.”
– from Pere Jean du Coeur de Jesus D’Elbee’s I Believe in Love
“The Enthronement of the Sacred Heart in the Home is the homage of adoration, of social reparation, and of fervent love, which the family as a cell of society renders to the Heart of Jesus, as the King of society. It never ceases to reconquer all of society for Jesus Christ by enthroning Him at the sources of life, nothing can resist the storm of passions. Authentic and lasting peace does not come, cannot come except by Him, the Prince of Peace. Jesus is the sole reality.
“Sooner or later all creatures fail us… He alone never deceives; He alone is faithful; He alone is the strength, the support, the unique Friend. Redouble your Eucharistic fervor! We must form profoundly Eucharistic families by the Enthronement in order to form strongly Christian societies, Christian not only on the surface and by custom, but in spirit and truth.
“Nocturnal adoration in the home constitutes the sinews of our holy war. Keep to it with all the ardor of your heart. Enthronement is living and lived primarily in this ardor.
“Love the Heart of Jesus, love Him foolishly, love him above all things, immersing all your affections in him without fear of sacrifice. The Heart of Jesus is an abyss that does not divide. We love more, we love better when we love Jesus.”
– Fr. Mateo Crawley
“Every member of the Church must be vigilant in seeing that this Sacrament of Love shall be at the center of the life of the people of God so that through all of the manifestations of worship due it, Christ shall be given back โlove for loveโ and truly become the life of our souls”
– Redemptor Hominis
“To be alone with Jesus in adoration and intimate union with Him is the Greatest Gift of Love – the tender love of Our Father in Heaven.”
– Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta
“Verbum caro factum est” (Jn, 1,14). [“And the Word became flesh”]. The Incarnation of the Word, the ineffable mystery of the merciful love of God, who so loved man that He became “flesh” for his salvation is, in a way, prolonged and extended through the ages, and will be until the end of time, by the Eucharist, the Sacrament by means of which the Incarnate Word became Himself our “food.”
– from Divine Intimacy by Fr. Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalen, O.C.D.
“What is this work of grace? The transformation of our souls into Jesus through love. St. Thomas shows us, after St. Augustine, that the Eucharist transforms our souls into Jesus through love. It is there that I find the definition of sanctity, the final word.”
– Pere Jean du Coeur de Jesus D’Elbee
Revelation of the Sacred Heart
A CONSUMING FIRE
Saint Alphonsus
Liguori
(1696-1787)
This (Blessed) Sacrament above all inflames the soul with divine love. “God is love (1Jn.IV,8)”. And He is the fire which consumes in our hearts all earthly affections: “The Lord thy God is a consuming fire (Dt.IV,24)”. Now the Son of God came precisely to kindle this fire of love: “I am come to cast fire in the earth”; and He added that He did not desire other that to see ignited this holy fire in our hearts: “and what will I, but that it be kindled? (Lk.XII,49)”. And oh what flames of divine love Jesus Christ ignites in each one who devoutly receives Him in this Sacrament!
“Let us never forget that an age prospers or dwindles in proportion to its devotion to the Holy Eucharist. This is the measure of its spiritual life and its faith, of its charity and its virtue.”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“The encouragement and the deepening of Eucharistic worship are proofs of the authentic renewal which the Council set itself as an aim and of which they are the central point.”
– Pope John Paul II, Dominicae Cenae
“When we ingest the Eucharist in reality we are ingesting the Godhead
…..because His Body and Blood are diffused through our members we become
partakers of the divine nature.”
– St. Cyril of Alexandria
God was not content with giving us His only Son once for all, willing Him to take flesh in the womb of a Virgin – flesh like ours, so that He might suffer and die for us on the Cross – but He wished Him to remain with us forever, perpetuating His real presence and His sacrifice in the Eucharist. Aided by the Gospel narrative we can reconstruct and relive in our heart the sweet mysteries of the life of Jesus. Had we nothing but the Gosepl, however, we would have only nostalgic memories; Jesus would no longer be with us, but only in heaven at the right hand of the Father, having definitively left the earth on the day of His Ascension. With what regret we would think of the thirty-three years of our Savior’s earthly life passed centuries ago! Oh, how different the reality! The Eucharist makes the presence of Jesus with us a permanent one.
– from Divine Intimacy by Fr. Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalen, O.C.D.
“What Christ gives us is quite explicit if his own words are interpreted according to their Aramaic meaning. The expression ‘This is my Body’ means this is myself”
– Karl Rahner
O Jesus, You are always with us, “yesterday and today, and the same forever!” (Heb 13, 8). Always the same in eternity by the immutablity of Your divine Person; always the same in time, by the Sacrament of the Eucharist.
– from Divine Intimacy by Fr. Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalen, O.C.D.
“Not as common bread or as common drink do we receive these…..We have been taught that the food that has been Eucharistized by the word of prayer, that food which by assimilation nourishes our flesh and blood, is the flesh and blood of the incarnate Jesus.”
– St. Justin Martyr
“Since Christ is the only way to the Father, in order to highlight His living and saving presence in the Church and the world, the International Eucharistic Congress will take place in Rome, on the occasion of the Great Jubilee. The Year 2000 will be intensely Eucharistic: in the Sacrament of the Eucharist the Savior, who took flesh in Mary’s womb twenty centuries ago, continues to offer Himself to humanity as the source of Divine Life.”
– Pope John Paul II, Tertio Millennio Adveniente
In the consecrated Host we find the same Jesus whom Mary brought into the world, whom the shepherds found wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger; whom Mary and Joseph nurtures and watched over as He grew before their eyes; the Jesus who called the apostles to follow Him, who captivated and taught the multitudes, who performed the most startling miracles; who said He was the “light” and “life” of the world, who forgave Magdalen and raised Lazarus from the deas; who for love of us sweat blood, received the kiss of a traitor, was made one enormous wound, and died on the Cross; that same Jesus who rose again and appeared to the Apostles and in whose wounds Thomas put his finger; who ascended into heaven, who now is seated in glory at the right hand of His Father, and who, in union with the Father, sends us the Holy Spirit.
– from Divine Intimacy by Fr. Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalen, O.C.D.
“Father Col, an intrepid defender of the Faith during the French Revolution and the pastor of Bourg-d’Oisans where these good people were married [M/M Eymard], had foretold to them that they would have a son who would become a priest and founder of the Order of the Blessed Sacrament.
During the months she bore Peter Julian, Mrs. Eymard used to visit the parish church and offer him to the hidden God of the tabernacle.”
– from Saint Peter Julian Eymard: Apostle of the Eucharist
“We discovered, like infants opening their eyes for the first time, that God’s coming upon earth out of love for us had radically changed the world, because he had remained with us.
“As we walked about the city, or traveled to different cities and countries, it was not the beautiful and interesting things around us that attracted us. Not even Rome’s wonderful monuments and precious relics seemed so important. Rather, what gave a sense of continuity to our journeying through the world for Jesus, was His Eucharistic presence in the tabernacles we found wherever we went.”
– from May They All Be One, by Chiara Lubich, founder of the Focolare movement
“Upon reception of the Communion Host, we are in Christ and Christ is truly within us. Upon receiving Communion, we have all power over the enemy. As one of the documents from Vatican II proclaimed: ‘From this it follows that every liturgical celebration, because it is an action of Christ the Priest and of His Body, which is the Church, is a sacred action surpassing all others. No other action of the Church can equal its efficacy by the same title and to the same degree (SC 7). From the liturgy, therefore, and especially from the Eucharist, grace is poured forth upon us as from a fountain, and the sanctification of men in Christ and the glorification of God to which all other activities of the Church are directed, as toward their end, are achieved with maximum effectiveness’ (SC 10).”
– Michael H. Brown, Secrets of the Eucharist, p.46.
“The temples of those who deny the Real Presence are like corpses. The Lord was taken away and we do not know where they have laid Him.”
– Francois Mauriac
This begins a series of short letters written by Mother Agnes of Jesus (St. Therese of Lisieux’s sister Pauline) to St. Therese in preparation for her First Communion.
February 1884
Jesus!
My Theresita,[1]
This morning I promised Marie to give you the little note-book [2] by the beginning of March. I do hope that my Benjamin [one of St. Therese’s nicknames] is also working hard at cultivating her little plot. If such lovely flowers as those in this note-book are to be sown in it, she must not leave a single blade of grass… Oh, to think that in three months Jesus will come and dwell in a child’s heart, in my Theresita’s heart…
Darling, you must leave nothing undone to make your heart into a heaven where Jesus will want to stay forever! Even now let this beautiful Child be the King, the Love of your heart. What is there on this earth lovelier than Jesus? Jesus in His cradle, Jesus sleeping in Theresita’s heart among the flowers!
Your Agnes.
[1] The Carmelites called Therese by this name in memory of a niece of the Great St. Teresa of Avila’s, who had entered one of the first reformed monasteries at an early age.
[2] A little collection of prayers and devotions composed by Mother Agnes of Jesus and called: Two months and nine days of preparation for my First Communion.
Letter from Mother of Agnes of Jesus to St. Therese (her sister) in preparation for First Communion:
February 1884
Darling,
I imagine you are still busy turning up the ground in your heart. You must, for we shall begin planting flowers in a few days. Just think, my Therese, barely three months and Jesus will come into your heart for the first time! And who is this little Jesus? The very same Child whom the Blessed Virgin held in her arms, wrapped in swaddling clothes, laid in the manger, cuddled on her lap! The same exquisitely beautiful Child who is now the delight of Heaven, the very same…
A First Communion day is the best day in one’s life, a day come down from Heaven! Just ask Celine [another of St. Therese’s sisters]… But if you want to enjoy it to the full, you must make your heart like an angel’s. Don’t forget that, my Benjamin…
Good-bye, darling. How lucky you are! I send you a hug.
Your Agnes.
From Mother Agnes of Jesus to St. Therese in preparation for her First Holy Communion
End of February 1884
Darling little Sister,
This is just to tell you that the note-book is arriving this evening. Just think! on Saturday morning, my Theresita will be beginning her great preparation. In two and a half months, Jesus will come into your heart for the first time! What a lot of work there is to do, what a lot of flowers have to be sown, and how little time there is to do it in! But look at Nature: on almost the same day as you, she will be beginning to make herself beautiful; you can see buds already on the trees in the garden, and soon the flowers will be there; by May, all will be lovely to look at. Nature is only doing it to please us, but couldn’t you do the same, Theresita of the Child Jesus, to welcome and delight the Beloved Child at His first awakening in your heart?
But I hear your answer, and I know that a good little heart like my darling’s has no need of urging. I feel that Jesus Himself is encouraging His little Sister from afar to work for Him, and beside Jesus’ own persuasive words, what value have your poor Agnes’s incitements?…
Good-bye Theresita, if there are lots of flowers in your garden, if everything is ready for the great day, you may be quite sure that Jesus will not come empty handed either! If you only knew what treasures are hidden in the tiny Host for a well-prepared First Communion! Thousands of kisses.
Excerpts from the Catholic Network’s biography of Blessed Kateri’s Tekakwitha:
“Every morning, even in bitterest winter, she stood before the chapel door until it opened at four and remained there until after the last Mass.”
“Out from her Caughnawaga cabin at dawn and straight-way to chapel to adore the Blessed Sacrament, hear every Mass; back again during the day to hear instruction, and at night for a last prayer or Benediction. Her neighbors sought to be near her when she received Holy Communion, as her manner excited devotion.”
LITANY OF BLESSED KATERI TEKAKWITHA
Lord, have mercy on us.
Christ, have mercy on us.
Lord, have mercy on us.
Christ, hear us.
Christ, graciously hear us.
God the Father of Heaven, have mercy on us.
God the Son, Redeemer of the World have mercy on us.
God the Holy Ghost, have mercy on us.
Holy Trinity, one God, have mercy on us.
Kateri, lily of purity, pray for us.
Kateri, consoler of the heart of Jesus, pray for us.
Kateri, bright light for all Indians, pray for us.
Kateri, courage of the afflicted, pray for us.
Kateri, lover of the cross of Jesus, pray for us.
Kateri, flower of fortitude for the persecuted, pray for us.
Kateri, unshakeable in temptations, pray for us.
Kateri, full of patience in suffering, pray for us.
Kateri, keeper of your virginity in persecutions, pray for us.
Kateri, leader of many Indians to the true faith through your love for Mary, pray for us.
Kateri, who loved Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, pray for us.
Kateri, lover of penance, pray for us.
Kateri, who traveled many miles to learn the faith, pray for us.
Kateri, steadfast in all prayer, pray for us.
Kateri, who loved to pray the rosary for all people, pray for us.
Kateri, example to your people in all virtues, pray for us.
Kateri, humble servant to the sick, pray for us.
Kateri, who by your love of humility, gave joy to the angels, pray for us.
Kateri, your holy death gave strength to all Indians to love Jesus and Mary, pray for us.
Kateri, whose scarred face in life became beautiful after death, pray for us.
Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world, spare us, 0 Lord.
Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world, graciously hear us, 0 Lord.
Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world, have mercy on us.
LET US PRAY
0 Jesus, who gave Kateri to the Indians as an example of purity, teach
all men to love purity, and to console your immaculate Mother Mary
through the lily, Kateri Tekakwitha, and your Holy Cross, Amen.
Kateri Tekakwitha, pray for us.
“Like Mary, let us be full of zeal to go in haste to give Jesus to others. She was full of grace when, at the annunciation, she received Jesus. Like her, we too become full of grace every time we receive Holy Communion. It is the same Jesus whom she received and whom we receive at Mass. As soon as we receive Jesus in Holy Communion, let us go in haste to give Him to our sisters, to our poor, to the sick, to the dying, to the lepers, to the unwanted, and the unloved. By this we make Jesus present in the world today.”
– Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta
Our Lady: Whosoever shall die wearing my Scapular shall not suffer the flames of Hell.
The Soul: My Dear Mother of Carmel, I thank thee for thy holy Scapular.
Flower of Carmel,
Blossoming Vine,
Splendor of Heaven,
Mother Divine,
None like to thee.
Mother of Our King,
Peerless and fair;
To thy children of Carmel,
Favors grant ever,
Star of the Sea.
“At the time of Holy Communion I sometimes picture my soul under the figure of a little child of three or four years, who at play has got its hair tossed and its clothes soiled. These misfortunes have befallen me in battling with souls. But very soon the Blessed Virgin hastens to my aid: quickly, she takes off my dirty little pinafore, smoothes my hair and adorns it with a pretty ribbon or simply with a little flower… and this suffices to render me pleasing and enables me to sit at the Banquet of Angels without blushing.”
– St. Therese of Lisieux, Counsels and Reminiscences
“This God who, as the psalmist said, built His tabernacles in the sun, now establishes Himself in the very core of the flesh and the blood.”
– Francois Mauriac
“The Bread of heaven puts an end to symbols.”
– Office for the Feast of Corpus Christi
“I will not allow myself to be so absorbed in the whirlwind of work as to forget about God. I will spend all my free moments at the feet of the Master hidden in the Blessed Sacrament. He has been tutoring me from my most tender years.”
– from St. Faustina Kowlaska of the Blessed Sacrament’s Diary Divine Mercy in My Soul
As St. Gertrude was about to receive the Sacred Host, she asked “O Lord, what gift are You going to grant me?”
And Jesus answered, “The gift of My Whole Being with My Divine nature, as formerly my Virgin Mother received it.”
“O Lord, how clear, how precise, how strong, how powerful are Your words. Hardly are the words pronounced: ‘Woman, you are cured’ – and she is cured immediately. ‘This is My Body’ – and it is His Body. ‘This is My Body’ – and it is His Body. ‘This is My Blood’ – and it is His Blood.”
“Who can speak in that manner if not the One Who holds everything in His hand? Who can be trusted if not the One for Whom doing and speaking are one and the same thing? My soul, accept these words without reservation: believe as firmly as the Lord spoke. Believe with as much humility as He shows authority and power. The Lord wants to find in your faith the same simplicity which He put in His words.”
– Bousset
“The faith of Francis beholds behind the crystal of the monstrance, on the linen of the altar, and on the tongue of the communicant, the hands and feet, the eyes and mouth, the flowing blood and throbbing heart, the majestic personality and the saving grace of Him who once walked the fields of Galilee and Judea, and to whom he himself had sworn allegiance as a knight of the cross.”
– from The Ideals of St. Francis by Fr. Hilarion Felder, O.M. Cap.
“I remember the devotion of your youth, how you loved Me as a bride, following Me in the desert, in a land unsown.” – Jeremiah 2:2
Remember when you first fell in love with Jesus? Remember what a joy it was to pray? How you loved to be with God and with His people! How you would praise Him!… Remember when…
Many, however, have lost their first love (Rv 2:4). They still believe; they still pray and serve the Lord. But it’s not the way it was… The Spirit is quenched (1 Thes 5:19). The flame is no longer burning bright.
Repent! Return! Revive! Renew! “The favors of the Lord are not exhausted, His mercies are not spent; they are renewed each morning, so great is His faithfulness” (Lam 3:22-23). There’s so much more, and eternity of “more” with Jesus.
The Lord is saying to you: “I will allure her; I will lead her into the desert and speak to her heart.” “She shall respond there as in the days of her youth” (Hos 2:16-17). Give in, fall into His arms, let Him love you as of old. “Greater will be the future glory…than the former” (Hg 2:9).
He calls: “Arise, My beloved, My beautiful one, and come! (Sg 2:10) Will you love Him again? Will you feel the touch of His nail-scarred hands?
“There is no greater love than this” (Jn 15:13). Live in His love (Jn 15:10).
– Excerpts from Presentation Ministries, “One Bread, One Body”
“O Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, I would like to be filled with love for You; keep me closely united with You, may my heart be near to Yours. I want to be to You like the apostle John. O Mary of the Rosary, keep me recollected when I say these prayers of yours; bind me forever, with your rosary, to Jesus of the Blessed Sacrament. Blessed be Jesus, my love, blessed be the Immaculate Virgin Mary.”
– Pope John XXIII, Journal of a Soul
“Being for every man the touchstone of faith and love, the Eucharist, like on the Cross, divided the minds as soon as it was announced… Nothing engages a man as much as does the Eucharist”…
…”The man who partakes in the breaking of the bread dares to build his house on the very core of love. He becomes, as it were, Godlike, but regardless of the strength he derives from it, his free will remains. We are always free to disown this immense grace, to abuse it. The Greatest Love may be betrayed. Fed on the Living Bread, we nevertheless conceal a part of ourselves which longs for swine’s food.”
“The Eucharist engages us unreservedly; it is a pact of love, an alliance signed in the deeper recesses of our being. All our potentialities are called upon to warrant the protection and fulfillment of this pact.”
– from Francois Mauriac’s Holy Thursday: An Intimate Remembrance
“Why did Jesus not limit His Eucharistic Presence to the solemn moments of Holy Mass? Why does He not continue it only during those hours when, amid lights and flowers, He receives the adoration and homage of His sons? Why does He remain also during the nights, even in tabernacles where He is abandoned and forgotten and sometimes subjected to sacrilegious profanation?”
“It would seem that this persistent miracle of the Real Presence of Jesus under the appearances of the consecrated bread, even in times of profanation, is an excessive prodigality, both useless and incompatible with the Divine Majesty.”
“And yet, this is the very reason why Jesus chose to do so; to love with a love that knows no measure and does not shrink from excess. This was the purpose for which He invented and instituted the Holy Eucharist as we have it: ‘He loved to the end.'”
– from The Holy Eucharist, by Jose Guadalupe Trevino
“At last there dawned the most beautiful day of all the days of my life. How perfectly I remember even the smallest details of those sacred hours! The joyful awakening, the reverent and tender embraces of my mistresses and older companions, the room filled with white frocks, like so many snowflakes, where each child was dressed in turn.”
– St. Therese
“Lord, I shall see you no more with the eyes of the flesh…”
– St. John of the Cross (to the Host which had been brought to him)
“As a man must be born before he can begin to lead his physical life, so he must be born to lead a Divine Life. That birth occurs in the Sacrament of Baptism. To survive, he must be nourished by Divine Life; that is done in the Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist.”
– Bishop Fulton J. Sheen
“We do not sin when we adore Christ in the Eucharist; we do sin when we do not adore Christ in the Eucharist.”
– St. Augustine
“Certainly amongst all devotions, after that of receiving the sacraments, that of adoring Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament holds the first place, is the most pleasing to God, and the most useful to ourselves. Do not then, O devout soul, refuse to begin this devotion; and forsaking the conversation of men, dwell each day, from this time forward, for at least half or quarter of an hour, in some church, in the presence of Jesus Christ under the sacramental species. Taste and see how sweet is the Lord.”
– St. Alphonsus Ligouri
Thirty years later, Father Eymard had tears in his eyes as he spoke of his first Holy Communion. “When I pressed Jesus to my heart, I said to Him: ‘I will be a priest. I promise You!’ …Oh, what graces Our Lord gave me then! Yes, I believe my conversion at that time was sincere and perfect.”
– from Saint Peter Julian Eymard: Apostle of the Eucharist
“Let us give ourselves to the Immaculata. Let her prepare us, let her receive Him in Holy Communion. This is the manner most perfect and pleasing to the Lord Jesus and brings great fruit to us.”
– St. Maximilian Kolbe
“How happy I will be if I keep my heart free from attachment to anyone, and chained to Jesus, my God, alone… I will devote all my efforts to this end… I will go before the Blessed Sacrament, and there sign these resolutions with my blood.”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
From The Cure of Ars: Patron Saint of Parish Priests, by Father Bartholomew O’Brien:
A man who lived near the church wondered what the new Cure was doing in there so very early each morning. One morning, long before dawn, when the man saw a tiny candle making it way from the rectory through the darkness across the cemetery, he sneaked over to the church and peeked in to find out for himself. There was the pastor, pouring out his heart to Jesus hidden in the Blessed Sacrament! “Ah,” said the man, “he is not like other men!” What did the Cure say to his blessed Jesus? Henri Ghoen has given us his version of the Cure’s prayer. Prostrate on the floor or kneeling with outstretched hands, the Cure thus prayed or groaned or wept out his heart:
“My God, my all, You see how I love You, and I do not love You enough.
My God, You have given me all; behold the little that I give You. Give me the strength to give more.
My God, here is all – take all; but convert my parish. If You do not convert it, it will be because I have not deserved it.
My God, I count my merits as nothing, but Yours are infinite. May they win for me the grace of suffering.
My God, I consent to suffer all that You may wish for all my life…for a hundred years…and the most bitter suffering, but convert them…”
(The Secret of the Cure D’Ars, Henri Gheon, p. 53)
“The Eucharist is the heart of the Church. Where Eucharistic life flourishes, there the life of the church will blossom.”
– Pope John Paul II
“And since so few people now hear the words, ‘Come to Me, all you who labor and are burdened,’ let each of us, when he approaches the Holy Table, look upon himself as the delegate of all those he loves or has loved, living or dead. When God makes His way into our souls, He does not find us alone. All those from whom we proceed and who have gone to sleep before us may receive, in Purgatory, some benefit of grace pervading us, their living children, when we pray for them. And all our friends who are kept away from the Source of grace by sin, indifference, ignorance, and incredulity – those who have helped us and those we have harmed – are present in our thoughts in this ineffable instant.”
– Francois Mauriac
“When I give way to the kindness of My Heart,” said Christ to St. Gertrude, “When I humble Myself in the Sacrament of Life to be united to a soul which is free from mortal sin, all those who dwell in heaven, on earth, and in Purgatory receive inestimable favors.”
“I want to shine like a little candle before His altar.”
– St. Therese of Lisieux
It pleases me to consider Mary Magdalen, the divinely enamored of the Gospels, as the precursor of Eucharistic souls who are daily increasing in number and becoming more and more select and inflamed with love. Did not Magdalen, in utter disregard of scorn and criticism, feel and follow a special attraction to honor the Body of Christ, the same body we venerate under the sacramental species?
It happened the first time in Galilee, on the day of her conversion, at the dining hall of a wealthy Pharisee, amid the noise and merriment of a banquet. Wrapped in folds of luxurious cloak, she made her way through the guests to the feet of Jesus, who was “reclining at table.” Kneeling down, she embraced and kissed those sacred feet, and wiped them with the mass of her loosened hair. To express her profound contrition and obtain forgiveness, her lips uttered not one word: she spoke only with the silent language of the heart, so well understood by my beloved Christ, namely, her tears.
– from The Holy Eucharist by Fr. Jose Guadalupe Trevino
“When the army of Frederick II was devastating the valley of Spoleto some of the soldiers placed a ladder against the convent wall. St. Clare caused herself to be carried to a window, and holding the monstrance with the Blessed Sacrament in sight of the enemies, she prostrated herself before the Eucharistic God. Her prayer was heard, and the enemies, struck with a sudden panic, fled in terror.”
– Hoever
“The brothers and sisters who would like to work for the conversion of souls, should try to participate every day in the sacrifice of the Mass. Let them remember that Mass is both Christmas and Calvary. A single Mass gives more glory to God than the martyrdom of the whole of humanity, united with the praises of all the angels and the saints. Where you have the Blessed Sacrament, there you have the living God, the Saviour, as really as when he was living in Galilee and Judea, as really as when he is now in heaven. Never lose a Communion by your own fault. Communion is more than life, more than all the goods of this world, more than the entire universe. It is God Himself, it is Jesus. Can you prefer anything else? If you love Jesus sincerely, can you willfully lose the grace of his coming within you? Jesus asks you to love him with all the energy and the simplicity of your heart.”
– Charles de Foucauld
“Sister Briege McKenna, O.S.C. speaks about a young priest who had cancer of the throat and expected to have his voice box removed in three weeks. “Father,” she told him, “every single day at Mass… when you take the sacred Host, you meet Jesus.. you ask Jesus to heal you.” He followed Sister’s advice. Three weeks later he did not need surgery. The doctors realized the cancer had gone and that the young priest had brand new vocal cords.”
– Roland Huot, S.S.S.
“Niepokalanow is a home like Nazareth. The Father is God the Father, the mother and mistress of the home is the Immaculata, the firstborn son and our brother is Jesus in the most Holy Sacrament of the altar. All the younger brothers try to imitate the elder Brother in love and honor towards God and the Immaculata, our common parents, and from the Immaculata they try to love the divine elder Brother, the ideal of sanctity who deigned to come down from heaven to be incarnated in her and to live with us in the tabernacle…
“The whole world is a large Niepokalanow where the Father is God, the mother the Immaculata, the elder brother the Lord Jesus in all the tabernacles of the world, and the younger brothers the people.”
“My aim is to institute perpetual adoration,” he said, for this is the “the most important activity.”
– from the writings of St. Maximilian Maria Kolbe
Our Lady and the Eucharist
A critic once said, “One cannot look at the Mother of God, with her pure, restful and happy countenance, without feeling impelled to fall down and join her in Adoration.”
“Each morning at Holy Mass, the Bread of Life will help the body as well as the soul, if we have faith. If we but touch the hem of His garment…and how much more have we than that! We can find Him, at every moment, on the altar. Be with Him there. Better than all books! Thank the Trinity over and over again for this Gift. Rest in His presence, and my guardian angel will adore Him for me. Silence.”
– Edel Quinn
“This Food which no hunger can expel,
This is the Bread which the Spirit has baked in a holy fire.
This is a liquid which no thirst can destroy,
This is the Wine which the grape of a virgin’s womb has brought forth.”
– Matthew of Riveaulx
“We cannot separate our lives from the Eucharist; the moment we do, something breaks. People ask, ‘Where do the sisters get the joy and the energy to do what they are doing?’ The Eucharist involves more than just receiving; it also involves satisfying the hunger of Christ. He says, ‘Come to Me.’ He is hungry for souls.”
– Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta
“A short time after his birth it became clear that a baby suffered from septicaemia. The doctors felt nothing could be done. The grandmother of the child attended the Mass offered at her request “for a special intention” in the Chapel of the Miraculous Medal in Paris. The following day she found out that at the very moment when she received Holy Communion her son and his wife stood dumbfounded before the child who had been so thoroughly cured that the disease left no trace.”
– from The Healing Power of the Eucharist by Roland Huot, S.S.S.
“Every act of reverence, every genuflection that you make before the Blessed Sacrament is important because it is an act of faith in Christ, and act of love for Christ. And every sign of the cross and gesture of respect made each time you pass a church is also an act of faith.”
– Pope John Paul II, Phoenix Park, Sept. 29, 1979
“If we did not have the adorable Eucharist here below, Jesus our God-with-us, this earth would be much too sad, this life too hard, and time too long. We must be grateful to the divine goodness for having left us this hidden Jesus, this pillar of cloud and fire in this desert,”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“Jesus asked, ‘Who touched me? I felt the power going out from Me.’ In the same way, because Christ is present on the earth in the Eucharist, He radiates grace. Grace emanates from Him – grace goes out from Him,”
– Fr. John Hardon, S.J.
“We cannot please God unless we resemble Jesus Christ, and the Blessed Sacrament [was] instituted for the very purpose of perfecting in us this likeness.”
– Edward Leen, CSSp.
“It is not the man who is responsible for the offerings as they become Christ’s Body and Blood; it is Christ Himself who was crucified for us. The standing figure belongs to the priest who speaks these words. The power and the grace belong to God. ‘This is My Body,’ he says. And these words transform the offerings.”
– St. John Chrysostom
How One Soul Coming Before the Blessed Sacrament Can Change the World
Saint Therese of the Child Jesus is the patroness of all missionaries, even though she never left her convent. She died at the early age of twenty-four but accomplished great things through the power of prayer. The Church made her the patroness of all missionaries to emphasize and dramatize this most important truth:
All conversions and all apostolic activities in the Church are accomplished by grace generated by prayer.
The Church teaches that the most efficacious form of prayer is prayer in the Presence of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament. Prayer in the Divine Presence of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament releases the power, the blessings, and the graces of God.
The best example of this is from Scripture. Jesus asked His Apostles who touched Him, because He felt power go out from Him. He was referring to the woman who made an act of faith by touching the hem of His garment, knowing that by doing so she would be healed. Another time, the Gospel tells us that everyone wanted to touch Him because power and graces flowed out from Him.
Each time that you go to Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, you touch His Heart with your faith. Each holy hour that you make in the Presence of Jesus releases His power and graces upon you, your family, your parish, your diocese, and the world. This is why our Holy Father, Pope John Paul II, said that “the Church and the world have a great need of Eucharistic Adoration.”
The Pope canonized Maximilian Kolbe, who made ten visits every day to the Blessed Sacrament during his adult life. The Pope beatified Sister Faustina, who wrote in her diary that each holy hour of prayer so pleases the Heart of Jesus that each man, woman, and child on the face of the earth receives a new effect of Godโs goodness and love because of the value of a single holy hour made in His Presence.
The Pope also beatified Dina Belanger because of her devotion to Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament. Jesus revealed to Dina the power of the holy hour in making reparation. One form of reparation is the ability to make up for what is lacking in the life of another. One day before her holy hour, Jesus showed Dina a multitude of souls on the precipice of hell. After her holy hour, Jesus showed the same souls in the hands of God. He told her that through holy hours of prayer a multitude of souls go to heaven who otherwise would have gone to hell as one person can make up for what is lacking in the lives of others by winning precious efficacious graces for their salvation. In other words, Eucharistic Adoration is the outpouring of Godโs Divine Mercy on the world!
This is one reason why in the past there were so many religious communities and monasteries devoted to Perpetual Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament. Now most of them no longer exist. God did not cause this, but He allowed it to happen because this is the age of the laity. Contemplative vocations that were once plentiful among the religious are now given to lay people.
A growing number of lay people are experiencing a call to make a holy hour, not just weekly but daily. Bishop Fulton Sheen was the great apostle of the importance of the daily holy hour. I am convinced that if it were humanly possible to fully understand the value of a holy hour, everyone would either find time or make time to do it. The difficulty of finding time in todayโs busy world makes the daily holy hour that much more precious and meritorious in the eyes of God.
For those who make a daily holy hour, or as a result of this article are inspired to do so, I ask you to please pray for the spread of Perpetual Adoration throughout the world. At the forty-fifth International Eucharistic Congress in June 1993 in Seville, Spain, Pope John Paul II prayed that the fruit of the Congress be the established of Perpetual Adoration in every parish throughout the world.
The daily holy hour generates the graces necessary for the spreading of Perpetual Adoration.
How to Find Christmas Peace
Bishop Fulton J. Sheen
How to find Christmas peace in a world of unrest? You cannot find peace on the outside but you can find peace on the inside, by letting God do to your soul what Mary let Him do to her body, namely, let Christ be formed in you. As she cooked meals in her Nazarene home, as she nursed her aged cousin, as she drew water at the well, as she prepared the meals of the village carpenter, as she knitted the seamless garment, as she kneaded the dough and swept the floor, she was conscious that Christ was in her; that she was a living Ciborium, a monstrance of the Divine Eucharist, a Gate of Heaven through which a Creator would peer upon creation, a Tower of Ivory up whose chaste body He was to climb “to kiss upon her lips a mystical rose.”
As He was physically formed in her, so He wills to be spiritually formed in you. If you knew He was seeing through your eyes, you would see in every fellowman a child of God. If you knew that He worked through your hands, they would bless all the day through. If you knew He spoke through your lips, then your speech, like Peter’s, would betray that you had been with the Galilean. If you knew that He wants to use your mind, your will, your fingers, and your heart, how different you would be. If half the world did this there would be no war!
“The Piety of the Christian people has always very rightly sensed a profound link between devotion to the Blessed Virgin and worship of the Eucharist: this is a fact that can be seen in the liturgy of both the West and East, in the traditions of religious families, in the modern movements of spirituality, including those of youth and in the pastoral practice of Marian Shrines. Mary guides the faithful to the Eucharist,”
– Pope John Paul II
“King of Kings yet born of Mary
As our Lord on earth He stood
Lord of Lords in human vesture
In the body and the blood
He will give to the faithful
His own self for heavenly food,”
– from “Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silent” (French Carol)
What is better: The visit Our Lady gave to Juan Diego, or one hour in the presence of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament?
Roses bloomed in the snow. A poor garment is imprinted with an image of Our Blessed Mother. It has lasted for centuries and no scientist can figure out how the image is on the cloth. She is the woman clothed with the sun. The sun is symbolic of her Eucharistic Son. Both hearts beat as one.
Look at her request to the Bishop. Build a chapel. Who is in the chapel? Her Eucharistic Son! Mary brings all of her children to the Eucharist.
During our holy hour of prayer there is always the beauty of Guadalupe. No matter how cold our heart, the roses of holiness bloom. The fragrance of sanctity will last for all eternity. Each moment we spend in His presence we grow, we bloom, we blossom like roses in the snow.
And with each holy hour there is a new and special image indelibly imprinted on our soul. This image is far more beautiful than the one here at the shrine, where people come from all over the world and look with awe-inspiring amazement.
All the angels of heaven gaze in ecstasy at the image left on your soul, dear Thomas, after each holy hour you make in the presence of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament.
– from Letters To A Brother Priest
“The Eucharist began at Bethlehem in Mary’s arms. It was she who brought to humanity the Bread for which it was famishing, and which alone can nourish it. She it was who took care of that Bread for us. It was she who nourished the Lamb whose life-giving Flesh we feed upon,”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“When we worship you in the form of bread… we always see you as an adult. But every year at Christmas, you reveal yourself to us as a child born in a crib. We stand in silent amazement…
In silent adoration we stand before the mystery, like Mary when the shepherd came and told her what they had seen and heard: ‘She kept all these things, pondering them in her heart.’
– Chiara Lubich
“The shepherds – simple souls – came to adore the Infant Savior. Mary rejoiced at seeing their homage and willing offerings they made to her Jesus… How happy is the loving soul when it has found Jesus with Mary, His Mother! They who know the Tabernacle where He dwells, they who receive Him into their souls, know that His conversation is full of divine sweetness, His consolation ravishing, His peace superabundant, and the familiarity of His love and His Heart ineffable,”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“In the final address of the Bishops at the Extraordinary Synod held to celebrate the Second Vatican Council, the whole Church was reminded of the need to keep the cross at the center of the Christian life. The Pope himself has said that the Catholic’s point of contact with the cross is the Eucharist. This cross is the cross of sacrificial love, and it is precisely this love which will renew the Church…”
“The power of the Eucharist, whether it be for healing, renewal, spiritual growth or the creation of peace and justice comes from who, and not only “what” the Eucharist is. In the Eucharist Christ feeds His Church with His own sacrificial love…”
“Adore the mystery who is Christ Himself, the reality, the beauty and the power of love,”
– Rev. John Abberton
“My sweetest Joy is to be in the presence of Jesus in the holy Sacrament. I beg that when obliged to withdraw in body, I may leave my heart before the holy Sacrament. How I would miss Our Lord if He were to be away from me by His presence in the Blessed Sacrament!”
“The Eucharist is a never-ending sacrifice. It is the Sacrament of love, the supreme love, the act of love.”
“Christ wishes the Christian Community to be a body that is perfect because we work together towards a single end, and the higher the motive which actuates this collaboration the higher, no doubt, will be the union. Now the end in question is supremely exalted: the continuous sanctification of the Body for the glory of God and the Lamb that was slain [Jesus in the Most Blessed Sacrament].”
– from the writings of St. Katherine Drexel, the first Sister of the Blessed Sacrament
Virgin Immaculate, you are the perfect model of adorers of the Blessed Sacrament. You adored Jesus in the little white Host with the same faith, reverence and wonder with which you adored Him on the first Christmas night and during all the years you lived with Him. Teach us not to forget that the small white Host is truly our God, infinite, eternal and omnipotent. Help us to conduct ourselves at all times in His presence with the modesty and reverence we owe to our God…
Virgin Immaculate, perfect lover of Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament, we ask you to obtain for us the graces we need to become true adorers of our Eucharistic God. Grant us, we beg of you, to know Him better, to love Him more, and to center our lives around the Eucharist, that is, to make our whole life a constant prayer of adoration, thanksgiving, reparation, and petition to Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament. Amen.
V. Pray for us, O Virgin Immaculate, Our Lady of the Most Blessed Sacrament.
R. That the Eucharistic Kingdom of Jesus Christ may come among us!
– from “Treasury of Prayer: Our Lady of the Most Blessed Sacrament“
“Bishops are testifying,” Archbishop Justin Rigali of St. Louis, Missouri writes, “to the clear relationship between Eucharistic devotion and an increase of vocations to the priesthood and religious life.”…
“Recently I learned that a chapel for perpetual adoration of the Blessed Sacrament has been inaugurated in one of our parishes. Particularly encouraging was the spirit of collaboration which has characterized this initiative which includes more than 600 people from six parishes, all of whom have committed themselves to one hour of prayer in the chapel each week.”
“There are already a number of parishes in the Archdiocese which have offered the opportunity for perpetual adoration of the Blessed Sacrament…”
“Young people, the sick, mothers and fathers of families and many other categories of Godโs people have discovered anew in prayer before the Blessed Sacrament a wonderful opportunity for โpraying the Lord of the harvest to send laborers into his harvest.โ”
“For this reason I have asked that every parish participate…”.
– “Signs of the Times“, Archbishop Justin Rigali, St. Louis Review, December 15, 1995, p.6
“Where is the new-born King of the Jews?” inquired the three Magi of Herod, king of Jerusalem. “Where is He?” they repeat in their great desire to find Him. “We have seen His star in the East, and we have come to adore Him. Ah, tell us where He is; we desire so much to see Him; we have made so long a journey in order to become acquainted with Him!”…
But now there is no need of traveling far or of making many inquiries to find Him. He is, as we know by faith, in our churches, not far from our homes. The Magi could find Him in one place only; we can find Him in every part of the world, wherever the Blessed Sacrament is kept. Are we then not happier than those who lived at the time of our Saviour Himself?
– from The Blessed Eucharist, by Fr. Michael Muller, C.S.S.R.
This is the joy of the Visitation mystery:
“in the tender compassion of our God” He continues to visit us
in the Holy Eucharist that we may come to Him with confidence.
As John the Baptist recognized Jesus hidden in the womb of Mary,
the first tabernacle of the Lord,
so now we recognize Jesus hidden in the Blessed Sacrament,
the mystery of our faith.
Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit
and John leaped for joy in His presence then,
as we rejoice in His presence now
for here Jesus pours our His Spirit upon us
in this Sacrament of infinite love.
– Excerpts from the book Come to Me
“It is this Real Presence, and the witnessing to it that inflames every page of the Gospel. At the birth of Christ, nothing could blind the inner eyes of the evangelists from seeing invisible realities, and penetrating the Real Presence.
Luke saw angels coming down from heaven, singing and dancing in the very place where their Lord and Master was seen in human flesh. He heard the song of the angels: Glory to God in the highest and peace on earth (Luke 2:14).
The invisible God now is visible; impossible events become realities. This is celebration!
Matthew was seized by this Real Presence turned into celebration when he saw kings coming from the farthest corners of the earth to adore their King. There are here more miraculous events then the miracle itself. Matthew saw the stars and galaxies send one of their own, a special Orion, to illuminate the roads of the earth, and light the way to Christ, so that the world could see the face of God and not die.”
– Excerpts from an article by Archbishop Joseph Raya
Bethlehem
Bishop Fulton J. Sheen
The little town of Bethlehem is taken from two Hebrew words which mean “House of Bread.” He Who called Himself “the Living Bread descended from Heaven” was born in the “House of Bread” and was laid in the place of food, the manger. The first temptation Christ had in the beginning of His public life was to become a bread King, and to win men by supplying them with food. On one occasion when they attempted to make Him King after multiplying the bread, He fled into the mountains. Rome once rang with the cry: “Bread and circuses.” But the Bread that was brought at Bethlehem was an entirely different kind: “Not by bread alone does man live.”
The body has its bread. Shall not the soul have its food too? Those who have nourished themselves solely on the bread of the stomach and ignored the Bread of the soul have cried out with some of the bitter disappointment of the Lord Chesterfield: “I have seen the silly rounds of business and pleasure, and have done with them all. I have enjoyed all the pleasures of the world and consequently know their futility, and do not regret their loss. Their real value is very low; but those who have not experienced them always over-rate them. For myself, I by no means desire to repeat the nauseous dose.”
“If He is within me
And I am in Him
Then where is the mystery
In the bread and the wine?
If He could become a child
Be human and yet divine
Then where is the mystery
In the bread and the wine?,”
– from the song “He Is Truly Present“, sung by Mary Welch Rogers
“God was not content with giving us His only Son once for all, willing Him to take flesh in the womb of a Virgin – flesh like ours, so that He might suffer and die for us on the Cross – but He wished Him to remain with us forever, perpetuating His real presence and His sacrifice in the Eucharist. Had we nothing but the Gospel… we would have only nostalgic memories; Jesus would no longer be with us, but only in heaven at the right hand of the Father… With what regret we would think of the thirty-three years of our Savior’s earthly life passed centuries ago! Oh, how different the reality! The Eucharist makes the presence of Jesus with us a permanent one.”
– from Divine Intimacy by Fr. Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalen, O.C.D.
Jesus, what made You so small? LOVE!
– St. Bernard of Clairvaux (1090-1153)
St. T. Benedicta, Edith Stein:
“‘And the Word became flesh’. That truth became a reality in the manger at Bethlehem. But it was to be fulfilled in yet another form: ‘Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood, has eternal life.’ The Savior, who knows that we are human beings and will remain human beings who have to struggle daily with weaknesses, comes to our assistance in a truly divine manner. Just as the human body is in need of daily bread, so also does the divine life in us require constant nourishment.”
“Whoever really takes this as his daily bread, experiences EACH DAY the mystery of Christmas, the Word made flesh.”
“And that is doubtless the surest way to maintain constant union with God, to grow each day more firmly and deeply into the mystical Body of Christ. I am well aware that for many that is an all too radical request. In a practical sense, it will mean for most–when they first start–a complete change in their external and internal life. But that’s exactly what it is supposed to be! To make room in our life for the Eucharistic Lord, so that he can change our life into His, is that asking too much? One has time for so many useless things: all sorts of stupid stuff gathered from books, newspapers and magazines; sitting around in bars and gabbling on the street for a quarter-or half-hour; all these are diversions which waste time and energy like crumbs. As a challenge to the whole day, should it not be possible to put aside a morning hour in which one is not distracted but recollected, in which energy is not wasted but gained? “But, of course, this requires more than just one hour. From one such hour to the next, one must so live that it may come again. It is no longer possible to ‘let yourself go’, even if only for a time. One cannot escape the judgment of those with whom one daily associates. Even if no word is spoken, one senses how the others feel towards him.”
“He may try to adapt himself to his companions, and if it is not possible, their common life becomes a torture. “It’s the same in our daily encounter with the Lord. One becomes more and more sensitive to that which pleases Him or not.”
“If, on the whole, one was previously quite satisfied with himself, it will now take a different turn. One will find much that is bad and will change it as far as he chooses.”
“And he will discover many things he cannot consider well and good, but which are nevertheless hard to change. Then gradually, he becomes very small and humble; he grows patient and indulgent toward the splinter in strange eyes because the beam in his own is brought into being; and, finally, he also learns to be patient with himself in the inexorable light of the divine Presence and to surrender himself to the divine mercy which can take care of all that ridicules our energy. The road is long from the smugness of a ‘good Catholic’ who ‘does his duty’, reads a ‘good newspaper’, ‘does the right thing’, etc. but on the other hand does what he pleases, “to a life in God’s hand, in the simplicity of a child and the meekness of the tax collector. BUT WHOEVER HAS ONCE WALKED IT, WILL NOT GO BACK AGAIN.”
– “Who can sleep on the night that God became man?” St. T. Benedicta, Edith Stein
Merry Christmas! A holy night, a silent night with Mother and child, all is calm, all is bright. This inspiring hymn came to us because an organ in Germany broke down about one hundred years ago.
Without an organ the parish priest in this small country church said it would be a “Silent Night”. The organist would compose a melody. The priest would write the lyrics and the choir would just sing the soft praises of this hymn for midnight Mass.
That is all it was meant to be, just a simple hymn sung once and forgotten. Then a snowstorm prevented the man who fixed the organ from coming until the snow melted in the spring. After he finished he noticed the music left on the organ since Christmas night and took it back to Munich. The rest is history. “Silent Night” has reverberated throughout the ages. With its quiet sounds of love and peace it has inspired millions and millions, touching the lives of countless people.
It is the same with a holy hour. We leave it in the chapel like the music to “Silent Night,” and God turns our hour of prayer into a never-ending stream of graces for His people. A single holy hour of prayer touches more hearts through Godโs grace, than all the people who have ever been touched by “Silent Night”. From a single holy hour of prayer Godโs graces reverberate throughout the world until the end of time and will continue for all eternity.
This is because of the divine appreciation God has for those who love His Son in the Blessed Sacrament. The Father will spend all eternity thanking you and loving you in heaven because you have honored His Son on earth in the Blessed Sacrament. The Blessed Sacrament is the continuation of Christโs Incarnation on earth.
Coming to the Blessed Sacrament we find the same humility and gentleness that the shepherds found in “the babe lying in a manger”. (LUKE 2:15). The hunger in the heart of God for the love of man is expressed in the profound humility of these two words, Baby Jesus.
How great is Godโs desire for intimacy with man! Jesus came as a Babe, because no one is ever afraid to come close to a baby. A baby is lovable in its vulnerability. A baby reaching our for love with open arms is irresistible.
The Sacred Host embodies the Divine Tenderness of the Incarnation. So gentle and humble, so loving and small and vulnerable, the Blessed Sacrament is Jesus saying “Come to Me…for I am gentle and humble of Heart”. (Mt. 11:30).
Only the humble hear His voice. Only those with a childlike heart seek His Heart in the Blessed Sacrament. This is why Jesus says: “Let the children come to Me; do not prevent them for the Kingdom of God belongs to such as these.” (Mk 10:13).
– Excerpts from Letters To A Brother Priest
The Birth of Jesus in Bethlehem
“The Word became flesh and made His dwelling among us, and we have seen His glory: the glory of an only Son coming from the Father, filled with enduring love.” (Jn 1:14)
The Joy of Adoration
“My spirit finds joy in God my Savior.” (Lk 1:47)
The Holy Eucharist is the continuation of Christโs incarnation on earth. The mystery of the Eucharist gives us the joy of having Christmas everyday. When we come to the Blessed Sacrament we come to Bethlehem, a name which means โhouse of breadโ.
Jesus chose to be born in Bethlehem because He would dwell with us forever as the “Living Bread” come down from heaven. When the shepherds and Magi came to adore Him, they brought Him so much joy with their humble visit to Bethlehem that their visit has been praised and retold down through the centuries. God has never stopped honoring them for honoring His Son in Bethlehem. So too, your humble visit to Jesus today in the Blessed Sacrament brings Him so much joy that it will be retold for all eternity and bring the world closer to His promise of peace on earth.
We are as privileged in being called to adore Him today as were Mary, Joseph, the shepherds and Magi then, because here Jesus continues His incarnation on earth. Here Jesus loses His Heart to us in love. Love expresses itself to the object of its affection; the Eucharist is the continual expression of Godโs perfect, unselfish love for man. The Word again becomes flesh and dwells among us, veiled under the Species of the Sacred Host, where the same Jesus born two thousand years ago as a little babe in Bethlehem is truly, really, bodily, and personally present to us in this Most Blessed Sacrament.
The greatest love story ever told is contained in the Sacred Host. Here we see His glory in the depth of His humility, for God Who created the whole world and Whom the whole world cannot contain, contains Himself in the Blessed Sacrament for love of us, to be our Good Shepherd who โleads us to life-giving watersโ, to be our Divine Physician who โheals the brokenheartedโ, to be our Divine Companion in our pilgrimage throughout life. Here you behold His glory IN THE MIRACLE OF HIS LOVE, for He becomes small in the Sacred Host that He may give Himself to you where “you are filled with the fullness of God.”
Jesus becomes poor in the Blessed Sacrament, “emptying Himself” of His glory and majesty, that He may make you rich with the abundance of His grace, “transforming you from glory to glory” and making your soul everlastingly more beautiful with each communion and each visit you make to Him in the Blessed Sacrament. “For your sake He made Himself poor though He was rich, so that you might become rich by His poverty.”
The Eucharist is Divine Love made visible in the Sacred Host! This is why the angels continue to sing to Him here as they did in Bethlehem: “Glory to God in the highest and peace to men of good will.” COME LET US ADORE HIM for here Jesus continues to come to us “filled with enduring love” as the Word becomes flesh in the Holy Eucharist and makes His dwelling among us. “IT IS HE WHO IS OUR PEACE.”
– from Rosary Meditations from Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta , Loving Jesus With the Heart of Mary
“The Bethlehem of that night…has never passed away. It lives a real life, – not the straggling Christian village on which the Mussulman yoke seems to sit so lightly, on its stony ridge, but the old Bethlehem of that momentous hour when the Incarnate God lay on the ground amid the Cattle in the Cave. It lives not only in the memory of faith, but in faith’s actual realities as well. It lives real, unbroken, unsuspended life, not in history only, or in art, or in poetry, or even in energetic fertile worship and fleshly hearts to the faithful, but in the worshipful reality of the Blessed Sacrament. Round the tabernacle, which is our abiding Bethlehem, goes on the same world of beautiful devotion which surrounded the new-born Babe, real, out of real hearts, and realized by God’s acceptance.”
– from Bethlehem by Fr. Frederick William Faber
“Let every knee bend before Thee, O greatness of my God, so supremely humbled in the Sacred Host. May every heart love Thee, every spirit adore Thee and every will be subject to Thee!”
– from the writings of St. Margaret Mary Alacoque
Quotes of St. Therese of Lisieux, The Little Flower:
“By our little acts of charity practiced in the shade we convert souls far away, we help missionaries, we win for them abundant alms; and by that means build actual dwellings spiritual and material for our Eucharistic Lord.”
“My patrons in Heaven and my chosen favorites are those who have stolen it – like the Holy Innocents and the Good Thief. The great Saints have earned it by their works; as for me, I will imitate the thieves, I will have it by ruse, a ruse of Love which will open its gates to me and to poor sinners. The Holy Ghost encourages me, saying in the Book of Proverbs: “O little one, come, learn subtilty of Me.” (Prov. 1:4)”
– from Counsels and Reminiscences
“The Christ of Bethlehem
is the Christ of Galilee,
is the Christ of the Crucifixion,
is the Christ of the Resurrection,
is the Christ of the Eucharist,”
– John Cardinal O’Connor
…”The Eucharist completes the restoration begun in the Crib. Make merry therefore on this beautiful day, on which the sun of the Eucharist is rising. Let your gratitude never separate the Crib from the Altar, the Word made flesh from the God-Man made Bread of Life in the Most Blessed Sacrament,”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
We say a person has a “sense of humor” if he can “see through things”… God made the world with a “sense of humor,” in the sense that we were to see Him through His creation: to see His Power in the mountains, His Beauty in the sunset, His Wisdom in a snowflake, His Love in the human heart. Poets have inherited this sense of humor for, like Thompson, they can look at the sun and see in it the Host that is raised in Benediction over the world, and at night set in the Flaming Monstrance of the west. Saints must have a sense of humor, so as to be able to see a resurrection through the trials and sorrows of life.
Man loses his sense of humor through sin. He begins to take money seriously, flesh seriously, business seriously, food seriously. These have no other purpose than just to satisfy him. Now Christmas Day was the restoration of humor, and those who displayed it most were the shepherds and the wise men. They came to this little Babe and “saw through Him” – God Himself. His Flesh was the Sacrament of His Divinity. When the Babe grew, He taught parables in or with a sense of Divine Humor. Salt and camels, sheep and goats, patches on old clothing, wine in old bottles, businessmen, traders, were not to be taken seriously. All were telltale of something else. Christmas then is a romance and a joy only to those who have a sense of humor, whose vision is not opaque when they look at a Babe, but can see through Him all the problems of life answered in the vision of God Who appeared as a Man. They who pass through this life with that sense of humor, which is faith, will one day be rewarded by the one thing that will make heaven Heaven – His Smile.
– Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen
“Happy is the soul that knows how to find Jesus in the Eucharist, and the Eucharist in all things!,”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“But God loved us so much that He was not satisfied with looking upon us only in a divine manner. In order to adapt Himself to our weakness and conform Himself to the demands of our own way of loving, He wanted to look upon us also with human eyes like ours, with eyes that can radiate joy, reflect sadness, and shed tears, revealing all the tenderness of a heart as sensitive as ours.”
“The gaze of Jesus! Who could describe its wonderful sweetness, its great tenderness, its endearing gentleness, its inscrutable depth and irresistible attraction?”
“When Jesus was a little babe, His eyes radiated treasures of candor, innocence, and purity, enough to wrap the whole world in their brilliancy. When they were mirrored in the immaculate Mary’s eyes, the radiance of the two purest souls the world has ever known was merged in one, and the flame burning in the two most loving hearts the world has ever known united in one great blaze of love.”
“The eyes of the boy Jesus reflected His grace and wisdom more and more every day. And the eyes of Jesus, the man – with what kindness and compassion they rested on children, on the sick, on the afflicted, and on sinners!”
“Emboldened by the friendly glance of His eyes, the little ones would climb up on His knees and nestle against His breast; and He would look upon them with deep tenderness, caress them, and enfold them in His arms…”
“Those who love and see each other feel irresistibly attracted to each other; they cannot bear to be separated. This, we may believe, was one of the reasons why Jesus invented the Eucharist. He wanted to shorten the distance; to look on us, not alone from far-off heaven, but from near by, so near that, if the sacramental veils of the Mystery were rent, we should be able to hear His throbbing Heart and see ourselves mirrored in the pupils of His eyes.”
– from The Holy Eucharist, by Jose Guadalupe Trevino
New Year Wishes to Our Eucharistic Lord
St. Peter Julian Eymard
May Thy kingdom come! May it spread far and wide; may it gain prestige; may it progress in every way! That is what we must wish our Lord on this New Year’s Day. May He be known and loved by those who neither know or love Him! May everyone complete in himself the work of the Incarnation and of the Redemption!
And where is our Lord known and loved? Ah! How very small is the kingdom of Jesus Christ! So many of His rights and those of His Church have either been taken away or curtailed during the last three centuries! They drive out our Lord and deprive Him of His people and His churches. How numerous are these Eucharistic ruins!
So many nations have never had the Faith! How will our Lord establish His kingdom among them? One saint could do it. Wish our Lord some good priests, some real apostles. That ought to be the constant object of our prayer…
To work for the preservation of the Faith, speak the language of a Christian, the language of faith. Transform the speech of the world. Through a sinful tolerance, we have allowed our Lord to be banished from customs, laws, and good manners; in a mixed social gathering one would not dare speak of Jesus Christ. Even among practical Christians we should seem peculiar if we spoke of Jesus Christ in the Blessed Sacrament… There may be talk about religious art, moral truths, the beauties of religion; but about Jesus Christ, about the Eucharist, never.
Well, change all that. Profess your faith openly. Be bold enough to say, “Our Lord Jesus Christ,” never just “Christ”! We must prove our Lord’s right to live and to rule in the language of society. It is a disgrace for Catholics to keep our Lord under a bushel the way that they do. We must manifest Him everywhere. The one who professes his faith boldly and dares speak out the name of Jesus Christ, places himself in the power of His grace. In public, everybody must know what we believe.
…Finally, may the kingdom of our Lord come within you, in your soul. Our Lord is in you, but He has much to do before He can reign completely therein. You have been barely vanquished; our Lord’s kingdom of peace and love is not yet established in you; the boundary lines are not yet all His; and what sovereign can rule supreme if he does not control all the frontiers of his state?
Get to know our Lord better. Study His life, His sacrifices, and His virtues in the Most Blessed Sacrament. Study His love. Instead of always remaining within ourselves, let us go up to Him; it is all very well to see ourselves in Him, but to see Him in us is better. Instead of attending to yourself, attend to our Lord and make Him grow in you. Think of Him; study Him in Himself; penetrate into Him. You will find the food of your life in Him; for He is great and infinite. That is the broad and royal road to holiness and the way to the ennobling of our lives.
Moreover, you must console our Lord. He expects consolation from you and will receive it with pleasure. Ask Him to prepare good priests for Himself; priests who are apostolic and zealous for the salvation of souls; priests who are the glory of their age and who present God with kingdoms. Beg Him to take ownership of everything, and to be not only a Savior, – that supposes nothing but sacrifice, – but a King, and a King of peace with absolute power. Console Him for His being so little treated as a King in His own kingdom. Alas! Our Lord is vanquished! In heaven He is an all-powerful Ruler Who commands saints and angels and is faithfully obeyed. Not so here below. Men, – the children He ransomed, – have got the best of Him. He no longer rules over Catholic peoples. Let us establish His kingdom in us at least, and work at restoring it everywhere.
Fine monuments mean much less to our Lord than do our hearts. And since the nations have driven Him out, let us raise Him a throne on the altar of our hearts… Let us proclaim Jesus Eucharistic our King by lifting Him up on our hearts and by serving Him with fidelity and devotedness.
Ah! How fond our Lord is of our hearts! How He longs for them! He pleads for them like a beggar! He begs, He implores, He insists. He has already been refused a hundred times; it does not matter; He keeps holding out His hand. …What outrages He submits to in His quest for our hearts! He seeks in a special way the Catholics, the devout souls, the religious who do not want to give Him their whole heart. Our Lord wants the whole of it. His love for us is the only reason for this ardent quest and the only interest He has in it. Out of two hundred million Catholics, how many love Him with the affection of a friend? How many live of His love, of a love that springs from the heart?
Let us then love Him for our own sakes. Let us love Him for those who do not love Him, for our relatives and our friends. Let us pay our familyโs debt and our countryโs. That is what all the saints do; they thus imitate our Lord Who loves His Father for all men and becomes surety for the whole world.
May our Lord, the gentle Savior Who loves us so much, become at long last the King, the Master, and the Spouse of our soul!
“Come, let the kingdom of Jesus Christ be established in you! Public Exposition of the Most Blessed Sacrament is God’s last grace to man. After Exposition, there is only heaven or hell. Man is attracted to what glitters. Our Lord has ascended a throne; He can be seen and is radiant. We no longer have any excuse. If we forsake our Lord, if we pass by Him without amending our lives, our Lord will go away, and we shall be done for forever. “Serve our Lord, therefore, and console Him; light the fire of His love wherever it is not yet burning; work at the establishment of His reign of love. Adveniat regnum tuum, regnum amoris. “May Thy kingdom come, Thy kingdom of love!”
The following reflection was taken from the book The Holy Eucharist, by Jose Guadalupe Trevino:
“Did you ever consider well, dear Christian soul, that, when the Sacred Host is publicly exposed, Jesus is not on His Eucharistic throne to receive the adorations of the angels and to enjoy the company of the blessed? These He finds in heaven. But He is on His Eucharistic throne to receive your adorations, to listen to your confidences, and to console and alleviate your sorrows and trials.
Come, then, and adore that Holy Host. When Jesus is offended everywhere, when His royal dignity is mocked and His sovereignty denied, it behooves noble souls to come and acknowledge publicly that He is our beloved Sovereign and divine King, and that to Him all praise, honor, and glory are due.
Come and adore that Host of mercy and peace. Show Him your wounds, tell Him your faults, expose to Him your miseries. You do not insult Him who shed His blood for all the sins of the world, when you tell Him your sins to obtain forgiveness. Whatever their number and grievousness, in proportion to His infinite mercy they are less than a grain of sand lost in the immensity of an ocean.
Come close to that loving Host and pour out your heart’s bitterness into His heart. Let your tears flow freely in His presence as if you were upon His breast. The sorrows of your exile, the faithlessness of your friends, the loneliness of your heart, and the disillusions of your life, all find an echo in that heart, which has known from experience what it means to suffer.
There you will find peace in your worries, light in your difficulties, and firmness in the execution of your good resolutions. There your thirst for affection will be satisfied. You will learn the science of hidden sacrifice, of constant abnegation, of tireless meekness, and of perfect joy.
Do not say that you have no time. Rather, acknowledge that you do not love Him enough. If you did, you would leave everything, in order to visit Him.
Do not say that you do not know what to tell Him. Rather, admit that you do not love Him. If you loved Him, your lips would speak out of His heart’s abundance; and, if your lips stayed silent, it would be because hearts that understand each other need not words: silence is enough.
Do not look for other excuses. Try it, and find out by your own experience. Do not wait until tomorrow. Today, go and spend a few moments with Jesus, whether He is within the tabernacle or exposed in the monstrance. Let your weary and wounded heart be penetrated by the peaceful atmosphere of the sanctuary and your soul be bathed in the light streaming forth from the Eucharistic Sun. And, tomorrow, I am sure, you will return.”
The following reflection is from the writings of Dorothy Day:
“And if you and I love our faulty fellow-human beings, how much more must God love us all? If we as human parents, can forgive our children any neglect, any crime, and work and pray patiently to make them better, how much more does God love us?
You may say perhaps: “How do we know He does, if there is a He!” And I can only answer that we know it because He is here present with us today in the Blessed Sacrament on the altar, that He never has left us, and that by daily going to Him for the gift of Himself as daily bread, I am convinced of that love. I have the Faith that feeding at that table has nourished my soul so that there is life in it, and a lively realization that there is such a thing as the love of Christ for us.
It took me a long time as a convert to realize the presence of Christ as Man in the Sacrament. He is the same Jesus Who walked on earth, Who slept in the boat as the tempest arose, Who hungered in the desert, Who prayed in the garden, Who conversed with the woman by the well, Who rested at the house of Martha and Mary, Who wandered through the cornfields, picking the ears of corn to eat.
Jesus is there as Man. He is there, Flesh and Blood, Soul and Divinity. He is our leader Who is always with us. Do you wonder that Catholics are exultant in this knowledge, that their Leader is with them? “I am with you all days, even to the consummation of the world.””
“That same Jesus is with us in our churches who at His birth was laid on straw and adored by the Magi, who fled into Egypt, who was sought for by the Blessed Virgin and found in the Temple, who changed water into wine, who restored sight to the blind, made deaf to hear and the dumb to speak. Beloved Christian, you esteem Simeon happy in having been permitted to take the Infant Jesus in his arms; and were you to receive a grace like him, no doubt you would exclaim: ‘Now dost Thou dismiss Thy servant in peace: because my eyes have seen Thy salvation.’
“You consider Zacheus happy because Our Lord vouchsafed to enter his house and eat with him; you deem St. John happy because he rested on the breast of our Saviour at the Last Supper; and, above all, you regard St. Joseph and the Blessed Virgin Mary so very happy because they nourished and supported Our Dear Lord. But are you not as happy as they? Are you not even happier? You do not hold Our Lord in your arms as Simeon did, but you receive Him into your heart in Holy Communion; you do not rest on the bosom of St. John, but the Saviour rests in your heart after Holy Communion; you do not nurse and support Our Lord like St. Joseph and the Blessed Virgin, but you have a still greater happiness, for the Saviour Himself nourishes you and gives Himself to you as your food. O Love! O Love! O who can understand the love of God for men!”
– from The Blessed Eucharist, by Fr. Michael Muller, C.S.S.R.
“This [Perpetual Eucharistic Adoration] truly is a work of grace. By means of perpetual Adoration of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, families, parishes and neighborhoods will grow in love of God and one another and will help to bring peace on earth,” Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta.
“The Eucharistic Sacrament, venerable brothers, is the sign and the cause of the unity of the Mystical Body, and it inspires an active ‘ecclesial’ spirit in those who venerate it with greater fervor. Therefore, never cease to persuade those committed to your care that they should learn to make their own the cause of the Church, in approaching the eucharistic mystery to pray to God without interruption to offer themselves to God as a pleasing sacrifice for the peace and unity of the Church, so that all the children of the Church be united and think the same, that there be no divisions among them, but rather unity of mind and purpose, as the Apostle [St. Paul] insists,”
– from the encyclical letter Mysterium Fidei, the Mystery of Faith, by Pope Paul VI
One day a rather worldly friend asked him [St. Francis of Assisi]: “Father what do you do during those long hours before the Blessed Sacrament?” “My son in return I ask you what does the poor man do at the rich man’s door, the sick man in presence of his physician, the thirsty man at a limpid stream? What they do, I do before the Eucharistic God. I pray. I adore. I love,”
– from Nesta de Robeck’s The Life of St. Francis of Assisi
“God is everywhere, in the very air I breathe, yes everywhere, but in His Sacrament of the Altar He is as present actually and really as my soul within my body; in His Sacrifice daily offered as really as once offered on the Cross,”
– St. Elizabeth Ann Seton
“By a beautiful paradox of Divine love, God makes His Cross the very means of our salvation and our life. We have slain Him; we have nailed Him there and crucified Him; but the Love in His eternal heart could not be extinguished. He willed to give us the very life we slew; to give us the very Food we destroyed; to nourish us with the very Bread we buried, and the very Blood we poured forth. He made our very crime into a happy fault; He turned a Crucifixion into a Redemption; a Consecration into a Communion; a death into Life Everlasting,”
– from Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen’s This is the Mass
“Every time I hear anyone speak of the Sacred Heart of Jesus or of the Blessed Sacrament I feel an indescribable joy. It is as if a wave of precious memories, sweet affections and joyful hopes swept over my poor person, making me tremble with happiness and filling my soul with tenderness. These are loving appeals from Jesus who wants me wholeheartedly there, at the source of all goodness, his Sacred Heart, throbbing mysteriously behind the Eucharistic veils… I love to repeat today ‘Sweet Heart of my Jesus, make me love You more and more.'”
– Pope John XXIII, Journal of a Soul
At the Feet of Christ in the Eucharist
from the Diary of St. Faustina Kowalska of the Blessed Sacrament
O Jesus, Divine Prisoner of Love, when I consider Your love and how You emptied Yourself for me, my sense deaden. You hide Your inconceivable majesty and lower Yourself to miserable me. O king of Glory, though You hide Your beauty, yet the eye of my soul rends the veil. I see the angelic choirs giving You honor without cease, and all the heavenly Powers praising You without cease, and without cease they are saying: Holy, Holy, Holy.
Oh, who will comprehend Your love and Your unfathomable mercy toward us! O Prisoner of Love, I love up my poor heart in this tabernacle that it may adore You without cease night and day. I know of no obstacle in this adoration: and even though I be physically distant, my heart is always with You. Nothing can put a stop to my love for You. No obstacles exist for me…
O Holy Trinity, One and Indivisible God, may You be blessed for this great gift and testament of mercy. Amen.
I adore You, Lord and Creator, hidden in the Most Blessed Sacrament. I adore You for all the works of Your hands, that reveal to me so much wisdom, goodness and mercy, O Lord. You have spread so much beauty over the earth and it tells me about Your beauty, even though these beautiful things are but a faint reflection of You, incomprehensible Beauty. And although You have hidden Yourself and concealed your beauty, my eye, enlightened by faith, reaches You and my souls recognizes its Creator, its Highest Good, and my heart is completely immersed in prayer of adoration.
My Lord and Creator, Your goodness encourages me to converse with You. Your mercy abolishes the chasm which separates the Creator from the creature. To converse with You, O Lord, is the delight of my heart. In You I find everything that my heart could desire. Here Your light illumines my mind, enabling it to know You more and more deeply. Here streams of grace flow down upon my heart. Here my soul draws eternal life. O my Lord and Creator, You alone, beyond all these gifts. give Your own self to me and unite Yourself intimately with Your miserable creature.
O Christ, let my greatest delight be to see You loved and Your praise and glory proclaimed, especially the honor of Your mercy. O Christ, let me glorify Your goodness and mercy to the last moment of my life, with every drop of my blood and every beat of my heart. Would that I be transformed into a hymn of adoration of You. When I find myself on my deathbed, may the last beat of my heart be a loving hymn glorifying Your unfathomable mercy. Amen.
Moreover, in the Blessed Sacrament Our Lord Himself is the light which manifests Him as our model and reveals His beauties to us. He is Himself His light, His means of being known, just as the sun is itself its own proof. To make Himself known, He has only to show Himself. Recognition of Him need not come from its being reasoned out. A child does not have to discourse with himself to recognize his parents. Our Lord reveals Himself through His presence, just as parents do. But as we grow to know His voice better and as our hearts become more sympathetic to Him in emptying themselves of what is not him, our Lord manifests Himself in a clearer and more intimate manner, which only those know who love Him. He gives the soul a divine conviction which overshadows the light of human reason. Look at Magdalen,: one word from Jesus and she recognizes Him. He acts the same way in the Blessed Sacrament: He says one word only, but it rings in our very hearts: “It is I!….” We sense His Presence; we believe in it more firmly than if we were to see Him with bodily eyes.”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“Godhead here in hiding, whom I adore Masked by these bare shadows, shape and nothing more, See, Lord, at thy service low lies here a heart Lost, all lost in wonder at the God thou art,” – from Adoro te devote, by St. Thomas Aquinas; tr. Gerard Manley Hopkins |
“Beneath the Sacred Host, Christ is contained, the Redeemer of the world,”
– from Redeemer of Man, Pope John Paul II
“God dwells in our midst in the Blessed Sacrament of the altar”
– St. Maximilan Kolbe
…”Here, in the Sacrament of the Altar, You are wholly present, my God, the Man Christ Jesus; here we freely partake the fruit of eternal salvation… No levity, curiosity, or sentimentality must draw us, but firm faith, devout hope and sincere love.
“O God, invisible Creator of the world, how wonderful are Your dealings with us! How sweetly and graciously You welcome Your chosen, to whom You give Yourself in this Sacrament! It passes all understanding, it kindles the love and draws the hearts of the faithful to Yourself. For Your faithful ones, who strive to amend their whole lives, receive in this most exalted Sacrament the grace of devotion and the love of virtue,”
– Thomas a Kempis, The Imitation of Christ
“Remember that in ascending to the Father You could not leave us orphans; And in making yourself a prisoner on earth You knew to veil all your divine rays. But the shadow of your veil is luminous and pure. Living Bread of faith, Celestial Food, O mystery of love! My daily Bread, Jesus, is You!… Jesus, it is you who, despite the blasphemies Of the enemies of the Sacrament of love, It is you who want to show how much you love me, Since you make your dwelling in my heart. O Bread of the exiled! Holy and Divine Host, It is no longer I who live, but I live on your life,” – from the poem Jesus, My Beloved, Remember!, St. Therese of Lisieux |
“The unique glory of the sanctuary of Lourdes resides in this fact, that people are attracted there from everywhere by Mary for the adoration of Jesus Christ in the Blessed Sacrament, so that this sanctuaryโat once the center of Marian devotion and the throne of the Eucharistic Mysteryโsurpasses in glory, it seems, all others in the Catholic world,”
– St. Pius X
“At Lourdes…each afternoon, in the procession of the Blessed Sacrament, the bishop or priest, carrying the monstrance, walks among the sick, blessing them. It is then that the cures and the miracles of grace usually take place. Mary brings her children to her divine Son and it is he who works the miracles, just as he did at Cana,”
– Fr. Paul Hinnebusch, OP.
From the writings of Fr. Rene Voillaume on the Blessed Sacrament and Charles de Foucauld:
“You will always be right in imitating the attitude of soulโwhich is so simple, so logical, so full of loveโof Frere Charles of Jesus towards the Blessed Sacrament. Our devotion to the Eucharist must be profound, honest, totally embraced as essential. When one has acquired the disposition of receiving this gift of God with the soul of a child, one is upset by the reasoning of certain people… who dispute the devotion towards the Eucharist and sometimes question its legitimacy on liturgical or historical grounds… Why not, in the simple logic of faith, love the Eucharist with all the love with which we love Jesus himself? That is what filled Father de Foucauld with the spontaneity of a child.”
Prayer of Charles de Foucauld:
“Oh Jesus present in the Blessed Sacrament in our churches, You give us solace and refuge; You give us faith, hope, love and hospitality. You build for us an inner retreat, an ardent repose. Help us to seek You and find You…”
“One cannot love without suffering. He [Jesus] showed us this very clearly upon the cross, where He was consumed for love of us. And it is still the same every day in the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar… Since love makes lovers one in likeness, if we love, let us model our lives on His.”
“Love keeps Him there [in the Blessed Sacrament] as a victim completely and perpetually delivered over to sacrifice for the glory of the Father and for our salvation. Unite yourself with Him, then, in all that you do. Refer everything to His glory. Set up your abode in this loving Heart of Jesus and you will there find lasting peace and the strength both to bring to fruition all the good desires He inspires in you, and to avoid every deliberate fault. Place in this Heart all your sufferings and difficulties. Everything that comes from the Sacred Heart is sweet. He changes everything into love.”
– from the letters of St. Margaret Mary Alacoque
“Mary lived in the divine Eucharist, the center of her love. All her thoughts, words, and actions sprang from It like the rays from the sun. The Eucharist was the oracle which she consulted, the grace which she followed.
“But Jesus Christ in His Sacrament lives the same life of love which consumed Him in His mortal days. In His sacramental state He continues to adore His Father by His depthless self-abasement. He is still the Mediator and Interceder with divine goodness for the salvation of men,”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“It is called the real presence, not in an exclusive sense, as though other forms of presence were not real, but by reason of its excellence. It is the substantial presence by which Christ is made present without doubt, whole and entire, God and man.”
– Pope Paul VI, quoted by the Bishops’ conference of England and Wales, Ireland and Scotland, in describing the Real Presence of Jesus Christ in the Eucharist
“O Holy angels, make me see God on the altar as you see Him in heaven,”
– Blessed Brother Andre
“The thought of the presence of God and the spirit of worship will in all my actions have as their immediate object Jesus, God and man, really present in the most holy Eucharist. The spirit of sacrifice, of humiliation, of scorn for self in the eyes of men, will be illuminated, supported and strengthened by the constant thought of Jesus, humiliated and despised in the Blessed Sacrament,”
– Pope John XXIII
“Eucharistic worship is not so much worship of the inaccessible transcendence as worship of the divine condescension, and it is also the merciful and redeeming transformation of the world in the human heart,”
– John Paul II, Dominicae Cenae
In order that our exile might be more endurable, that we might enjoy already on earth the inebriating perfume of the purity of paradise, that we might begin even in this place of trial to taste the happiness to be found in the possession of God, to satisfy His love and be our consolation, He created an earthly heaven: the Eucharist.
It is a veiled heaven, because we still are walking in the obscurities of faith; a transient heaven, like a flash of lightning in the night, or like the echo of a far off harmony; yet even so, a true heaven. There, hidden beneath the white appearances of the Sacred Host, Jesus is truly and personally present, the lovely Child of Bethlehem, the humble Carpenter of Nazareth, the gentle Wonder-Worker of Galilee, the Victim of Calvary. There is Jesus, the Man-God, in whom is the fullness of the Godhead, because He is the Word of God, and with the Word are always the Father and the Holy Spirit. What more shall we possess in heaven? The manner of the possession will be different, but its object is essentially the same. The Eucharist is the essence of heaven on earth.
– from The Holy Eucharist, by Jose Guadalupe Trevino
The presence of Jesus in the Eucharist is proof that his love for us has no sunset. He is the Desired of the everlasting hills, and he puts into our hearts the desire to live close to him. The stresses and hurts and partings of life often bear down on us, and we may tend to feel alone as when the sun has gone down. The words of St. Augustine can lift us “He neither rises nor sets because he abides always.” So our lives do not have to go down into the shadows. It was at evening time that the risen Lord restored the desolate spirits of two disciples by revealing his presence to them “in the breaking of the bread.” They pleaded with him “Stay with us, for it is towards evening.” (Lk 24,29). We too can plead with him, “Lord, be with us, both at sunrise and at sunset…
In the Holy Eucharist the only Son of God, Jesus Christ, fulfills his promise to be with us always. What consolation, how could we be lonely?
From all the sunsets to all the sunrises “He neither rises nor sets because he abides always.” (St. Augustine).
– from the writings of Msgr. John Moloney, P.P. Dublin, Ireland
The Lord will prepare a banquet for all peoples (cf. Is 25:6).
The Lenten journey prepares us for the celebration of Christโs Passover, the mystery of our salvation. Anticipating this mystery, there is the banquet which the Lord celebrates with his disciples on Holy Thursday, offering himself under the signs of bread and wine. In the Eucharistic celebration, as I wrote in the Apostolic Letter Dies Domini, “the Risen Lord becomes really, substantially and enduringly present. . . and the Bread of Life is offered as a pledge of future glory” (No. 39).
The banquet is a sign of joy, because in it we see the intense communion of all who take part. The Eucharist is therefore the realization of the banquet for all the peoples foretold by the Prophet Isaiah (cf. Is 25:6), and we cannot fail to see in it an eschatological meaning. Through faith, we know that the Paschal Mystery has already been accomplished in Christ; but it has still to be accomplished fully in each of us. In his Death and Resurrection, the Son of God has bestowed upon us the gift of eternal life, which begins in the Paschal Mystery but will have its definitive fulfillment in the eternal Easter of heaven. Many of our brothers and sisters can bear their situation of misery, discomfort and sickness only because they are certain that one day they will be called to the eternal banquet of heaven. Lent therefore directs our gaze beyond the present time, beyond history, beyond the horizon of this world, towards perfect and eternal communion with the Most Holy Trinity.
The blessing which we receive in Christ breaks down for us the wall of time and opens to us the door which leads us to a full share in the life of God. “Blessed are those invited to the wedding-banquet of the Lamb” (Rev 19:9): we cannot forget that in this banquet โ anticipated in the Sacrament of the Eucharist โ our life finds its final goal. Christ has gained for us not only new dignity in our life on earth, but above all the new dignity of the children of God, called to share eternal life with him. Lent invites us to overcome the temptation of seeing the realities of this world as definitive and to recognize that “our homeland is in heaven” (Phil 3:20).
– from Our Holy Father, Pope John Paul II’s, Message for Lent 1999
“…The Blessed Sacrament is a memorial of the passion and death of Jesus Christ, and (that) by means of it men share in its fruits and work out their salvation.”
“…The Holy Rosary, recited with the meditation on the sacred mysteries, is a sacrifice of praise to God for the great gift of our redemption and a holy reminder of the sufferings, death and glory of Jesus Christ,”
– St. Louis de Montfort
“Our Lord did not want to remain on earth only through His grace, His truth or His words; He remains in person. We possess the same Lord Jesus Christ Who lived in Judea, although under a different form of life. He has put on a sacramental garment, but He does not cease being Jesus, the Son of God and the Son of Mary.”
“The glory of His Father which our Lord sought above all else on earth is still the object of all His desires in the Blessed Sacrament. It is safe to say that Jesus Christ has clothed Himself with the sacramental state in order to continue honoring and glorifying His Father.”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
O Jesus! on this day, you have fulfilled all my desires.
From now on, near the Eucharist, I shall be able
To sacrifice myself in silence, to wait for Heaven in peace.
Keeping myself open to the rays of the Divine Host,
In this furnace of love, I shall be consumed,
And like a seraphim, Lord, I shall love you.
– from the poem “Canticle of a Soul Having Found the Place of Its Rest!…”, by St. Therese of Lisieux
“When our whole life is one faith, hope, love, prayer and silence, a consecrated life always bound up in the Eucharist, then the โurgeโ towards God springs…
“And so, like Moses (cf Ex 3, 5), in spirit we remove the shoes from our feet, on the threshold of the inner sanctuary that each of us must become as we meet the Lord.”
– Pope John Paul II, Sign of Contradiction
“Who is Jesus to me? Jesus is the Word made Flesh. Jesus is the Bread of Life. Jesus is the Victim offered for our sins on the cross. Jesus is the sacrifice offered at holy Mass for the sins of the world and for mine. Jesus is the Word – to be spoken. Jesus is the Truth – to be told. Jesus is the Way – to be walked. Jesus is the Light – to be lit. Jesus is the Life – to be lived. Jesus is the Love – to be loved,”
– Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta
“Out of the darkness of my life, so much frustrated, I put before you the one great thing to love on earth: the Blessed Sacrament….There you will find romance, glory, honor, fidelity, and the true way of all your loves upon earth, and more than that: death: by the divine paradox, that which ends life, and demands the surrender of all, and yet by the taste (or foretaste) of which alone can what you seek in your earthly relationships (love, faithfulness, joy) be maintained, or take on that complexion of reality, of eternal endurance, that every man’s heart desires,”
– J.R.R. Tolkien
“Being born he have himself as our Companion, Eating with us he gave himself as Food, Dying He became our Ransom, Reigning he gives himself as our Reward” – St. Thomas Aquinas, Verbum Supernum |
“The Wisdom of God creates poets. How evidently this is so can be seen by considering Mary of Nazareth. When she had given to the Lord of Hosts the Flesh that would become our Bread, Wisdom caused her to break into a poem of praise, a song repeated by more people than probably any other ever composed. The Presence within stirred her to exult and proclaim the One ‘who has filled the hungry with good things’. And the praise owed to the Presence of embodied Wisdom among us has never ceased in the Church from that day until this,”
– James T. O’Connor, The Hidden Manna
“What is the mark of a Christian? That he be purified of all defilement of the flesh and of the spirit in the Blood of Christ, perfecting sanctification in the fear of God and the love of Christ, and that he have no blemish nor spot nor any such thing; that he be holy and blameless and so eat the Body of Christ and drink His Blood; for ‘he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh judgement to himself.’ What is the mark of those who eat the Bread and drink the Cup of Christ? That they keep in perpetual remembrance Him who died for us and rose again.”
– “The Morals”, St. Basil the Great, Ch. 22
“Now consider which is more excellent, the bread of angels [i.e., the manna} or the Flesh of Christ which is indeed the Body of life. That manna was from heaven; this is from above the heavens. The former was from heaven, the latter from the Lord of the heavens; the former was subject to corruption if it was preserved for a second day, the latter foreign to all corruption so that whoever shall have piously tasted it will not be able to experience corruption. For the people of Israel water flowed from the rock; for you Blood flows from Christ. The water satisfied them for a while; Blood washes you for eternity,”
– St. Ambrose, Epistola
“In the Eucharistic Sacrifice the Church venerates the memory of Mary the ever Virgin Mother of God and the memory of Saint Joseph, because he fed Him whom the faithful must eat as the Bread of Life,”
– Pope John Paul II, Guardian of the Redeemer, no. 16
“Saint Joseph believed unhesitatingly in the mystery of the Incarnation, in the fruitful virginity and in the divine maternity of Mary. He believed without seeing the miracles that were to fill Judea with his glory and renown of his holy name. We too should recognize Jesus in the frail Host that is offered to us at the altar. Here he is even smaller than at Bethlehem, more hidden than in Saint Joseph’s workshop. Still it is he, ‘I believe all the Son of God has spoken, than Truth’s own word there is no truer token,'”
– Bishop Pichenot
“The time you spend with Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament is the best time you will spend on earth. Each moment that you spend with Jesus will deepen your union with Him and make your soul everlastingly more glorious and beautiful in Heaven, and will help bring about everlasting peace on earth,”
– Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta
“I adore and venerate you as much as ever I can, though my love is so cold, my devotion so poor. Thank you for the good gift of this your holy Body and Blood, which I desire to receive…,”
– St. Anselm (Archbishop and Doctor of the Church)
“When I was in Church waiting for confession, I saw the same rays (that is, as those depicted on the revealed image of the Divine Mercy) issuing from the monstrance and they spread throughout the church. This lasted all through the service. After the benediction (the rays came forth) on both sides and returned again to the monstrance. Their appearance was bright and clear as crystal. I asked Jesus that He deign to light the fire of His love in all souls that were cold. Beneath these rays a heart will be warmed even if it were like a block of ice; even if it were as hard as rock, it will crumble into dust,”
– St. Faustina Kowalska
| Meditation of St. Francis of Assisi Let everyone be struck with fear, the whole world tremble, and the heavens exult when Christ, the Son of the living God, is present on the altar in the hands of a priest! O wonderful loftiness and stupendous dignity! O sublime humility! O humble sublimity! The Lord of the universe, God and the Son of God, so humbles Himself that He hides Himself for our salvation under an ordinary piece of bread! See the humility of God, brothers, and pour out your hearts before Him! Humble yourselves that you may be exalted by Him! Hold back nothing of yourselves for yourselves, that He Who gives Himself totally to you may receive you totally! |
“My soul, if you wish to penetrate the depths of this Mystery, your gaze must be illumined by Love! You need to see and understand! Contemplate the Last Supper: see Jesus Who knows that He will soon be separated from the body of His humanity, and yet wishing to be united to us forever; contemplate the Love by which He institutes this Sacrament which permits Him to be corporeally and forever united to mankind. O Inextinguishable Love! O Love of Christ! O Love of the human race! What a true Furnace of Love! O Jesus, You already saw the death which awaited You; the sorrows and atrocious tortures of the Passion were already breaking Your Heart, and yet You offered Yourself to Your executioners, and permitted them, by means of this Sacrament, to possess You forever as an Eternal Gift, O You, Whose delights are to be with the children of men!
“O my soul, how can you refrain from plunging yourself ever deeper and deeper into the love of Christ, who did not forget you in life or in death, but who willed to give Himself wholly to you, and to unite you to Himself forever?”
– St. Angela Foligno
“Mary’s adoration was profound, interior, intimate. It was the gift of herself. She offered her whole self to the service of love of the Eucharistic God. For love lays down no conditions, makes no reservations; it thinks no longer of self, lives no longer for self; it is a stranger to itself and lives only for the God which it loves. Everything in Mary was directed to the Blessed Sacrament as Its center and end. A current of grace and love established itself between the Heart of Jesus-Hostia and the heart of Mary-Adoratrix. These hearts were like two flames blended into one. God was then perfectly adored by His creature,”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
When his excellency, Bishop Ott, spoke to Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta, he asked her “how she got so many women to join her religious order”. She explained: “We were just like other religious congregations with few vocations. Then at our chapter in the 1970s we made a decision to have a holy hour in all our convents each evening. Many blessings resulted from this Holy Hour the Bishop witnessed, for Blessed Mother Teresa continued, “We began to see more clearly our mission to serve the poor in Christโs name. We began to live a more fruitful family life among ourselves. We experienced double the number of vocations in our congregation. And we grew personally in our intimacy with the Lord present in the Eucharist.” The Bishop is “confident” that this will occur in his diocese too.
– “Bishopโs Notebook”, Stanley Joseph Ott, Bishop of Baton Rouge, “The Catholic Commentator”, August 5, 1992, p. 4
…”The great and generous thoughts of Catholic heroism are conceived, or rather inspired, at the altar where the Adorable Sacrament reposes; there, depend upon it, in silent prayer the noble damsel in heart rejects the world and its vanities, and plights her troth to the Spouse of her chaste heart; there the young ecclesiastic, bowing in meditation calm and sweet, muses on the triumphs of his schoolmates over the swords and red-hot pincers of Tonquin, and resolves to share in their crown of martyrdom; there whatever is planned for the Church of God that requires zeal and persevering energy is matured and resolved.”
– A Victorian reflection from the writings of Cardinal Nicholas Patrick Wiseman (1802-1865) on the Blessed Sacrament & Catholic Heroism
“O inestimable charity! Even as You, true God and true Man, gave Yourself entirely to us, so also You left Yourself entirely for us, to be our food, so that during our earthly pilgrimage we would not faint with weariness, but would be strengthened by You, our celestial Bread. O man, what has your God left you? He has left you Himself, wholly God and wholly Man, concealed under the whiteness of bread. O fire of love! Was it not enough for You to have created us to Your image and likeness, and to have recreated us in grace through the Blood of Your Son, without giving Yourself wholly to us as our Food, O God, Divine Essence? What impelled You to do this? Your charity alone. It was not enough for You to send Your Word to us for our redemption; neither were You content to give Him us as our Food, but in the excess of Your love for Your creature, You gave to man the whole divine essence…”
– St. Catherine of Siena
Perpetual Eucharistic Adoration
DOUBLES VOCATIONS
At St. John Fisher Seminary in Stamford, Connecticut there is a Perpetual Eucharistic Adoration chapel. According to the rector, Rev. Stephen M. DiGiovanni, the reason for beginning Perpetual Eucharistic Adoration was to “encourage young men of the community to find a vocation to the priesthood.” The enrollment at the seminary rose 50 percent within the first year that the chapel was founded.
– “Worshipers find solace in perpetual chapel”, Robin Denaro, “Connecticut Post”, Saturday, January 6, 1998, C2
Perpetual Eucharistic Adoration
TRIPLES VOCATIONS
Bishop John Magee of Cloyne in Eire, Ireland reports that vocations to the priesthood in his diocese have tripled since he started Perpetual Eucharistic Adoration. In 1990 there were 16 seminarians and by 1993 the number had risen to 45.
– “By Your Fruits”, Dr. J. F. Boyle. “The Link”, January 1996
“Mary adored Jesus as the Bridegroom of souls. Union is the final purpose of love. Jesus by the gift of His substance in the Eucharist unites Himself with our souls as with His dear spouses. As a Bridegroom, He gives them all His possessions, His name, His heart, His whole Self, but on the condition that the soul reciprocates. The soul, His spouse, shall live for Him only,”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
Jesus described the good shepherd as the one who does not run away but stays with his flock. In the Blessed Sacrament “Christ is truly the Emmanuel, that is: โGod is with usโ. Day and night He is in our midst, He dwells with us full of grace and truth.” (Mysterium Fidei)
He said: “I Myself am the Bread of life.” We pray “My Shepherd” because His love is a personal love. Though He loves everyone with an infinite love, He loves you as if your were the only one in the world. The Blessed Sacrament is Jesus, the Good Shepherd, who is present before you for no other reason than that He loves you. He is here to draw you closer to Himself, to deepen the love and friendship you have together with Him. This individual, personal love is described by Pope John Paul II when he said “Jesus waits for us in this Sacrament of Love.”
Because He gives us all we need, “there is nothing I shall want.” What He inspires in us is to want only Him and His holy Will. In this way, we “repose” in the divine love of His Eucharistic Heart.
The “fresh and green pastures” are the new graces He nourishes our spirit with. Leading us to the Blessed Sacrament, He invites us to drink from “restful waters,” the springs of salvation, flowing from His everlastingly glorious wounds, by which we are continually being healed.
In the Blessed Sacrament “He restores morality, nourishes virtues, consoles the afflicted, strengthens the weak.” (Mysterium Fidei)
“He is true to His Name” means He is always faithful to us and all the promises He made to us.
No evil to fear is a call to faith that God is in control of everything. Out of any evil allowed, He only brings a greater good. His staff is the strength He gives us in this Sacrament. He is infinitely more powerful than all the onslaught of hell put together.
The “banquet” is Jesus Himself who said “I Myself am the Bread of life.” Divine love is the food He serves us. The grace-filled love, peace and joy He offers us when we come before Him in the Blessed Sacrament was prepared for us on Calvary. Holy Thursday goes together with Good Friday, as the Eucharist is the gift of our Lordโs Passion. Like wheat crushed before coming bread, Jesus was crushed on the cross to become our spiritual nourishment, suffering torment to give us comfort, rejection to fill us with love, dying in darkness to bring us the light of hope, opened by a lance to pour out His peace.
An overflowing cup signifies that our Lord gives us incomparably more than we ask for, even though we may not always feel it. Whatever sacrifice we have made to come to make our holy hour, cannot in any way compare to what we receive now and in eternity.
“Goodness and kindness” describe the very name and personality of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, Who dwells with us “all the days of our life.” For this reason, our desire is to remain with Him “in the Lordโs own house.”
– from the Book “Come to Me in the Blessed Sacrament”
| You loved me from all eternity, therefore you created me. You loved me after you had made me, therefore you became man for me. You loved me after you became man for me, therefore you lived and died for me. You loved me after you had died for me, therefore you rose again for me. You loved me after you had risen for me, therefore you went to prepare a place for me. You loved me after you had gone to prepare a place for me, therefore you came back to me. You loved me after you came back to me, therefore you desired to enter into me and be united to me. This is the meaning of the Blessed Sacrament. The mystery of love. – Archbishop Goodier |
“It has been said, and rightly so, that between contemplation and adoration there is so close a union, so mutual a relationship, that they cannot be separated. We adore while contemplating and we contemplate while adoring. The saints in heaven live in perpetual adoration, because their joy is derived from eternal contemplation. On earth, where in some manner we must imitate the life of heaven, Christian devotion has striven to make the Sacred Host the center of perpetual contemplation and adoration, as far as human frailty permits. And both adoration and contemplation have called for perpetual exposition of the Blessed Sacrament.
“The Sacred Host perpetually exposed on its Eucharistic throne, and, before it, day and night, loving souls in adoration and contemplation! Is this not truly heaven on earth?,”
– from “The Holy Eucharist” by Jose Guadalupe Trevino
“Adoration will heal our Church and thus our nation and thus our world… Adoration touches everyone and everything… [because it touches the Creator, Who touches everything and everyone]… When we adore, we plug into infinite dynamism and power. Adoration is more powerful for construction than nuclear bombs are for destruction,”
– Peter Kreeft, philosopher at Boston College
“I believe that today we are entering into the reign of the Eucharistic Heart of Jesus. In the midst of the winter in the world and even in the Church today innumerable little shoots are sprouting up through the snow. These shoots are chapels of Perpetual Eucharistic Adoration growing up around the world… I encourage you to soak up the healing rays of the Sun of Justice and do all you can to promote Perpetual Adoration,”
– Rev. Harold F. Cohen, S.J.
“O loving, tender Word of God, You tell me: โI have marked the path and opened the gate with My Blood; do not be negligent in following it, but take the same road which I, eternal Truth, have traced out with My Blood.โ Arise, my soul, and follow your Redeemer, for no one can go to the Father but by Him. O sweet Christ, Christ-Love, You are the way, and the door through which we must enter in order to reach the Father.”
“O unfathomable depth! O Deity eternal! O deep ocean! What more could You give me than to give me Yourself?”
– from the writings of St. Catherine of Siena on the Blessed Sacrament
“The Eucharist had so powerful an attraction for the Blessed Virgin that she could not live away from It. She lived in It and by It. She passed her days and her nights at the feet of her Divine Son… Her love for her hidden God shone in her countenance and communicated its ardor to all about her.
“O Mary! teach us the life of adoration! Teach us to see, as thou didst, all the mysteries and all the graces in the Eucharist; to live over again the Gospel story and to read it in the light of the Eucharistic Life of Jesus. Remember, O our Lady of the Most Blessed Sacrament, that thou art the Mother of all adorers of the Holy Eucharist,”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“A Mass said by Padre Pio is as effective as a missionary journey,” said Pope Paul VI, because of Padre’s great love for Jesus in the Most Blessed Sacrament.
Padre Pio himself said, “It would be easier for the world to exist without the sun than without the Holy Mass,” and “At times during the Mass I am consumed by the fire of Divine Love. My face seems to burn.”
| “In the Blessed Sacrament God loves us so tenderly, He empties Himself completely. O, who could believe it? Withholding nothing, He gives his all. He gives his flesh for us to eat He gives his blood for us to drink. He gives his soul, his infinite being To transform us into Himself. Praised be the Blessed Sacrament!” – St. Louis de Montfort (Hymn No. 30, 3rd Stanza) |
“Love watches. A mother prolongs her watches by her baby’s cradle till late at night. After lulling him to sleep, she continues her vigil, all the while covering his soul with her silent prayers and, with anxious concern, thinking of his future no less obscure than the night around the house.
“Jesus cannot permit even one mother to surpass Him in love and tender solicitude. At night, when His children are resting in sleep, He watches over them, covers them with His prayers, and protects them, ‘as a hen gathers her young under her wings.'”
– Excerpt from Jose Guadalupe Trevino’s “The Holy Eucharist”, on the love of Jesus in the Most Blessed Sacrament
“‘Lord you know that I love you…Lord, you know that I love you’ (Jn 21:15-17). The Eucharist is, in a certain way, the culminating point of this answer. I wish to repeat it together with the whole Church to Him, who manifested His love by means of the Sacrament of His Body and Blood, remaining with us ‘to the close of the age'” (Mt 28:20)
– Pope John Paul II, General Audience, June 13, 1979
| “I am just a speck of dust, But I want to make my dwelling In the shadow of the sanctuary With the Prisoner of Love. Ah! my soul longs for the host. I love Him and want nothing more. It is the hidden God who attracts me. I am the atom of Jesus…,” – from St. Therese of Lisieux’s poem “The Atom of Jesus-Host.” |
Day and night Jesus dwells in the Blessed Sacrament BECAUSE OF HIS INFINITE LOVE FOR YOU! “Behold I will be with you always even to the end of the world,” because “I have loved you with an everlasting love, and constant is My affection for you.” (Mt 28:20; Jer 31:3)
– from “One Lord, One Body, One People”
The following excerpts were taken from the writings of St. Peter Julian Eymard on the Feast of the Ascension and the role of Our Lady of the Most Blessed Sacrament:
“When Jesus Christ went up to heaven on the day of His Ascension, He went to take possession of His throne of glory and prepare a place for us… However, in order to keep the hope of heaven in us and make it more efficacious, in order to have us wait patiently for the heaven of glory and lead us there, our Lord has created the beautiful heaven of the Eucharist. For the Eucharist is a beautiful heaven; it is heaven begun. Is it not Jesus glorified coming from heaven to earth, and bringing heaven with Him? Is not heaven wherever our Lord is? His state there, although hidden from our senses, is one of glory, triumph, and blessedness. He has done away with the miseries of this life; when we go to Communion, we receive heaven, since we receive Jesus Who is the whole joy and glory of paradise.
“What an honor it is for a subject to receive his king! We receive the King of heaven; let us appreciate the honor done to us. Jesus comes into us lest we forget our true fatherland or, if we are mindful of it, lest we die of longing for it and of homesickness.”
“Mary devoted herself exclusively to the Eucharistic Glory of Jesus. She knew that it was the desire of the Eternal Father to make the Eucharist known, loved and served by all men; that need of Jesusโ Heart was to communicate to all men His gifts of grace and glory. She knew, too, that it was the mission of the Holy Spirit to extend and perfect in the hearts of men, the reign of Jesus Christ, and that the Church had been founded only to give Jesus to the world.
“All Maryโs desire, then, was to make Him known in His Sacrament. Her intense love for Jesus felt the need of expanding in this way, of consecrating itself โ as a kind of relief, as it were โ because of her own inability to glorify Him as much as she desired.
“Ever since Calvary, all men were her children. She loved them with a Motherโs tenderness and longed for their supreme good as for her own; therefore, she was consumed with the desire to make Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament known to all, to inflame all hearts with His love, to see them enchained to His loving service.
“To obtain this favor, Mary passed her time at the foot of the Most Adorable Sacrament, in prayer and penance. There she treated the worldโs salvation. In her boundless zeal, she embraced the needs of the faithful everywhere, for all time to come, who would inherit the Holy Eucharist and be Its adorers…
“Her prayers converted countless souls, and as every conversion is the fruit of prayer, and since Maryโs prayer could meet no refusal, the Apostles had in this Mother of Mercy their most powerful helper. “Blessed is he for whom Mary prays!”
“Eucharistic adorers share Maryโs life and mission of prayer at the foot of the Most Blessed Sacrament. It is the most beautiful of all missions, and it holds no perils. It is the most holy, for in it all the virtues are practiced. It is, moreover, the most necessary to the Church, which has even more need of prayerful souls than of powerful preachers; of men of penance rather than men of eloquence. Today more than ever have we need of men who, by their selfโimmolation, disarm the anger of God inflamed by the ever increasing crimes of nations. We must have souls who by their importunity reopen the treasures of grace which the indifference of the multitude has closed. We must have true adorers; that is to say, men of fervor and of sacrifice. When there are many such souls around their Divine Chief, God will be glorified, Jesus will be loved, and society will once more become Christian, conquered for Jesus Christ by the apostolate of Eucharisticprayer.”
“The Eucharist strikes such fire within us that we are compelled by our actions and our presence to warm the people we live among and to melt the ice of hate, discrimination, indifference, injustice and isolation. ‘Can a man hide fire in his bosom and his garments not burn?'” (Proverbs 6:27)
– from the article “They Have Been With Jesus“, by Rev. Franklyn M. McAfee
“The twentieth century must be a century of the Blessed Sacrament if it means to be a century of resurrection and of life,”
– Pope Leo XIII
“I know I would not be able to work one week if it were not for that continual force coming from Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament,” Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta said of the strength she and her sisters received in spending Holy Hours before Jesus each day.
“As in the days of Bethlehem the Father imparted the shadows and rights of the blessed paternity mysteriously to Mary and Joseph, and thus made the region of Infancy so glorious and heaven-like, in like manner now he will not leave us without similar consolations. He imparts them to his priests in their relationship to our souls, and, above all, in respect to the Blessed Sacrament. It is part of our Father’s love that inside the pale of the Church earth should be one perpetual, and even ubiquitous, Bethlehem. The infant Jesus, the joy of the Father and our joy, is forever there, and in him the Father declared, with rare expletive, that he was well pleased. Still on the altar and in the tabernacle the Babe of Bethlehem is increasing the glory of the Father,”
– from the book “Bethlehem”, by Fr. Faber
“Jesus gave Himself as spiritual food and True Presence among us in the Blessed Sacrament. In our own century at Fatima, Mary asked the three children and us to, ‘Pray the Rosary every day.’ Here we see two marvelous fonts of grace flowing together. When we receive Jesus in the Eucharist, we become united with Him. Adoring his presence exposed on the altar or in the tabernacle we bask in his warmth. Meditating on the Rosary, we recall Jesus’ life, death and resurrection and the union of his mother in the work of our salvation. Through the Eucharist and the Rosary, two hearts are joined in love, and we, in love, are joined to those two hearts.”
– From the article “Mirroring Divine Love”, by Michael Six
“The Church has a special duty to safeguard and strengthen the sacredness of the Eucharist. In our pluralistic and often deliberately secularized society, the living faith of the Christian community โ a faith always aware of its rights vis-a-vis those who do not share the faith โ ensures respect for this sacredness,”
– Pope John Paul II
“Three times in 1916 the ‘Angel of Portugal’ (St. Michael), also known as the ‘Angel of Peace’ appeared to the children. In the first apparition he taught them what has become known as the Angel’s Prayer: ‘My God, I believe, I adore, I hope and I love You! I ask pardon of You for those who do not believe, do not adore, do not hope and do not love You!’
The angel prepared them for the apparitions of Our Lady the following year. During these apparitions, the angel specifically called them to both prayer and Eucharistic adoration. In the third apparition in the fall, he appeared holding a chalice and a Host. He prostrated himself on the ground, while the chalice and Host were suspended in mid-air, and recited with them a Eucharistic prayer.”
– Excerpts from “Introducing Children to the Blessed Sacrament” by Rev. John DeMarchi, I.M.C.
“When we go before Jesus on the altar, we always find Him โwith Mary His Mother,โ as the Magi did at Bethlehem (Mt. 2:11). And Jesus in the sacred Host, from the altar of our hearts, can repeat to each one of us what He said to St. John the Evangelist from the altar of Calvary, โBehold thy Motherโ (Jn 19:27),”
– “Jesus, Our Eucharistic Love”, by Fr. Stefano Manelli, OFM.
“If we really loved the good God, we should make it our joy and happiness to come and spend a few moments to adore Him, and ask Him for the grace of forgiveness; and we should regard those moments as the happiest of our lives.”
– St. John Vianney (on Adoration of Jesus in the Most the Blessed Sacrament)
“Every time we come before the Eucharistic Heart of Jesus He touches the heart of all humanity! The Blessed Sacrament is the heartbeat of evangelization.”
– Excerpts from “The Sacred Eucharistic Heart of Jesus” audio tape
“God in his omnipotence could not give more, in His wisdom He knew not how to give more, in His riches He had not more to give, than the Eucharist.”
– St. Augustine
“In the Eucharist, this divine Heart governs us and loves us by living and abiding with us, so that we may live and abide in Him, because in this Sacrament… He offers and gives Himself to us as victim, companion, viaticum, and the pledge of future glory,”
– Pope Benedict XV
“Devotion to the Sacred Heart should bring us to a life of intimate union with Jesus who, we know, is truly present and living in the Eucharist. The two devotions โ to the Sacred Heart and to the Eucharist โ are closely connected. They call upon one another and, we may even say, they require one another. The Sacred Heart explains the mystery of the love of Jesus by which He becomes bread in order to nourish us with His substance, while in the Eucharist we have the real presence of this same Heart, living in our midst. It is wonderful to contemplate Jesus as the symbol of His infinite love, but it is even more wonderful to find Him always near us in the Sacrament of the altar. The Sacred Heart which we honor is not a dead person’s heart which no longer palpitates, so that we have only the memory of him, but it is the Heart of a living Person, of One who lives eternally. He lives not only in heaven where His sacred humanity dwells in glory, but He lives also on earth wherever the Eucharist is reserved. In speaking of the Eucharist, Our Lord says to us, ‘Behold, I am with you all days, even to the consummation of the world’ (Mt 28, 20). In Holy Communion, then, this Heart beats within us, it touches our heart; through the love of this Heart, we are fed with His Flesh and with His Blood, so that we may abide in Him and He in us,”
– from “Divine Intimacy”, by Fr. Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalen, O.C.D.
“O what a wonderful and intimate union is established between the soul and You, O lovable Lord, when it receives You in the Holy Eucharist! Then the soul becomes one with You, provided it is well disposed by the practice of the virtues, to imitate what You did in the course of Your life, Passion, and death,”
– St. Mary Magdalen dei Pazzi
“In order to be like You, who are always alone in the Blessed Sacrament, I shall love solitude and try to converse with You as much as possible. Grant that my mind may not seek to know anything but You, that my heart may have no longings or desires but to love You. When I am obliged to take some comfort, I shall take care to see that it be pleasing to Your Heart. In my conversations, O divine Word, I shall consecrate all my words to You so that You will not permit me to pronounce a single one which is not for Your glory…. When I am thirsty, I shall endure it in honor of the thirst You endured for the salvation of souls…. If by chance, I commit some fault, I shall humble myself, and then take the opposite virtue from Your Heart, offering it to the eternal Father in expiation for my failure. All this I intend to do, O Eucharistic Jesus, to unite myself to You in every action of the day.”
– St. Margaret Mary
I adore You, O Precious Blood of Jesus, flower of creation, fruit of virginity, ineffable instrument of the Holy Spirit, and I rejoice at the thought that You came from the drop of virginal blood on which eternal Love impressed its movement; You were assumed by the Word and deified in His person. I am overcome with emotion when I think of Your passing from the Blessed Virgin’s heart into the heart of the Word, and, being vivified by the breath of the Divinity, becoming adorable because You became the Blood of God.
I adore You enclosed in the veins of Jesus, preserved in His humanity like the manna in the golden urn, the memorial of the eternal Redemption which He accomplished during the days of His earthly life. I adore You, Blood of the new, eternal Testament, flowing from the veins of Jesus in Gethsemane, from the flesh torn by scourges in the Praetorium, from His pierced hands and feet and from His opened side on Golgotha. I adore You in the Sacraments, in the Eucharist, where I know You are substantially present….
I place my trust in You, O adorable Blood, our Redemption, our regeneration. Fall, drop by drop, into the hearts that have wandered from You and soften their hardness.
O adorable Blood of Jesus, wash our stains, save us from the anger of the avenging angel. Irrigate the Church; make her fruitful with Apostles and miracle-workers, enrich her with souls that are holy, pure and radiant with divine beauty.
– A meditation on the Precious Blood of Jesus from the writings of St. Albert the Great
“O You who are mad about Your creature! true God and true Man, You have left Yourself wholly to us, as food, so that we will not fall through weariness during our pilgrimage in this life, but will be fortified by You, celestial nourishment,”
– St. Catherine of Siena
“How many brave men in this century alone have fought and died for love of their country? How many wars have been fought for peace and freedom? And, yet, look how far we are away from either.
“There is only one war worth fighting for… Standing up for Christ in the Blessed Sacrament today is like standing up for Christ when He was on the Cross!
“What we need today is an army… who are willing to fight, standing up and being counted for the cause of Christ in the Most Blessed Sacrament.”
– From the book “Letters To A Brother Priest”
“The flesh feeds on the Body and Blood of Christ that the soul may be fattened on God,”
– Tertullian (c. 200)
“Beloved souls, in suffering and in joy, go to Jesus hidden in the Sacred Host and let the sweetness of His loving gaze fill you.”
“Like the sick who expose their diseased bodies to the healing rays of the sun, expose miseries, no matter what they are, to the beams of light streaming forth from the Sacred Host,”
– from “The Holy Eucharist”, by Jose Guadalupe Trevino
“I understand that, each time we contemplate with desire and devotion the Host in which is hidden Christ’s Eucharistic Body, we increase our merits in heaven and secure special joys to be ours later in the beatific vision of God,”
– St. Gertrude
“God likes to listen favorably to the prayers of His faithful, particularly when they look at Christ’s body,”
– William of Auxerre (on Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament)
| “Here ‘neath veils, my Saviour darkly I behold; To my thirsting spirit all thy light unfold; Face to face in heaven let me come to thee, And the blessed vision of thy glory see.” – “Adoro Te Devote”, St. Thomas Aquinas |
“O Lord, we cannot go to the pool of Siloe to which you sent the blind man. But we have the chalice of Your Precious Blood, filled with life and light,”
– St. Ephrem
“If we could comprehend all the good things contained in Holy Communion, nothing more would be wanting to content the heart of man. The miser would run no more after his treasures, or the ambitious after glory; each would shake off the dust of the earth, leave the world, and fly away towards heaven,”
– St. John Vianney
Our Savior, therefore, when about to depart from this world to the Father, instituted this sacrament in which He poured forth, as it were, the riches of His divine love for men, “making a remembrance of his wonderful works” (Ps 110:4), and He commanded us in the consuming of it to cherish His “memory” (1 Cor 11:24), and “to show forth his death until He come” to judge the world (1 Cor 11:26). But He wished that this sacrament be received as the spiritual food of souls (Mt 26:26), by which they may be nourished and strengthened, living by the life of Him who said: “He who eateth me, the same also shall live by me” (Jn 6:58), and as an antidote, whereby we may be freed from daily faults and be preserved from mortal sins. He wished, furthermore, that this be a pledge of our future glory and of everlasting happiness…,”
– The Council of Trent, Section XIII, Decree on the Most Holy Eucharist
“In Cana of Galilee Christ changed water into wine, and shall we think Him less worthy of credit when He changes wine into His Blood?,”
– St. Cyril of Jerusalem
| “Jesus Lord, kind Pelican, Cleanse my filth with Thy blood, One drop of which can save The whole world from all its sin,” – St. Thomas Aquinas |
“Christ is both the way and the door. Christ is the staircase and the vehicle, like the throne of mercy over the Ark of the Covenant, and the mystery hidden from the ages. A man should turn his full attention to this throne of mercy, and should gaze at him hanging on the cross, full of faith, hope and charity, devoted, full of wonder and joy, marked by gratitude, and open to praise and jubilation. Then such a man will make with Christ a pasch, that is, a passing-over. Through the branches of the cross he will pass over the Red Sea, leaving Egypt and entering the desert. There he will taste the hidden manna, and rest with Christ in the sepulcher, as if he were dead to things outside. He will experience, as much as is possible for one who is still living, what was promised to the thief who hung beside Christ: Today you will be with me in paradise,”
– St. Bonaventure
Hail, most holy Virgin, burning bush which without being consumed held the fire of divinity! Hail, spiritual oven, which provided fire and the Bread of Life freshly baked for the food of the world, the food of which Christ the Savior of the world said: “Take and eat, this is my body, which is broken for you unto the remission of sins.” Sumptuous indeed, dearly beloved, and filled with every virtue is that virginal banquet table, laden with all best foods that rejoice the earth. The holy Virgin, the Mother of Christ, herself has furnished it.
– A prayer from The Breviary
…”Water and blood are a symbol of baptism and the most holy sacrament [of the Eucharist]. Now the Church is founded on the spiritual renewal by the bath of rebirth and on the most holy sacrament [of the Eucharist], both of which have their origin in the side of Christ. Therefore Christ built the Church from the side of Christ, just as he made Eve from the side of Adam. Therefore St. Paul says, ‘We are of his flesh and of his bones.'”
“Now we see how intimately Christ has been united to his spouse (the Church); see with what food he satisfies us. He himself is our food and nourishment; and just as a woman nourishes her child with her own blood and milk, Christ also constantly nourishes with his own blood those to whom he has given birth (by Baptism).”
– A meditation from the writings of St. John Chrysostom (344-407)
“Do grant, oh my God, that when my lips approach Yours to kiss You, I may taste the gall that was given You; when my shoulders lean against Yours, make me feel Your scourging; when my flesh is united with Yours, in the Holy Eucharist, make me feel Your passion; when my head comes near Yours, make me feel Your thorns, when my heart is close to Yours, make me feel Your spear,”
– St. Gemma Galgani
“Just as bread from the earth, when it receives the invocation of God, is no longer common bread but the Eucharist, made up of two elements, one earthly and one heavenly, so also our bodies, in receiving the Eucharist, are no longer corruptible, for they have the hope of resurrection,”
– St. Irenaeus
“Loving souls can find no greater delight than to be in the company of those whom they love. If we, then, love Jesus Christ much, behold we are now in his presence. Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament sees us and hears us; shall we, then, say nothing to Him? Let us console ourselves in His company; let us rejoice in His glory, and in the love which so many enamoured souls bear Him in the Most Holy Sacrament. Let us desire that all should love Jesus in the Holy Sacrament, and consecrate their hearts to Him; at least let us consecrate our affections to Him. He should be all our love and our whole desire,”
– from St. Alphonsus Liguori’s “The Holy Eucharist”
…”The Blessed Sacrament is the magnet of souls. There is a mutual attraction between Jesus and the souls of men. Mary drew Him down from heaven. Our nature attracted Him rather than the nature of angels. Our misery caused Him to stoop to our lowness. Even our sins had a sort of attraction for the abundance of His mercy and the predilection of His grace. Our repentance wins Him to us. Our love makes earth a paradise to Him; and our souls lure Him as gold lures the miser, with irresistible fascination,”
– from “The Blessed Sacrament”, by Fr. Faber
…”He draws us to Himself by grace, by example, by power, by lovingness, by beauty, by pardon, and above all by the Blessed Sacrament. Every one who has had anything to do with ministering to souls has seen the power which Jesus has. Talent is not needed. Eloquence is comparatively unattractive. Learning is often beside the mark. Controversy simply repels… All the attraction of the Church is in Jesus, and His chief attraction is the Blessed Sacrament,”
– from “The Blessed Sacrament”, by Fr. Faber
“There is another food that gives health and life, another food that really commends man to God and returns him to God, another food that strengthens the weak, calls back those who stray, lifts the fallen, and gives to the dying signs of eternal immortality. Seek the bread and the chalice of Christ, so that, having overcome earthly weakness, the substance of man may be fed with immortal food,”
– Julius Firmicus Maternus (died after 348)
“At the feet of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, let you hearts through the grace of God and the sacrifices you perform be like a golden thurible. Your generous hearts will be as it were incandescent pieces of charcoal. Your purity will become incense which as it is consumed gives joy to the Heart of Jesus through the perfume rising from it,”
– Mother Mary of Jesus, foundress of the Daughters of the Heart of Jesus
“When we go before the Blessed Sacrament, let us open our heart; our good God will open His. We shall go to Him; He will come to us; the one to ask, the other to receive. It will be like a breath from one to the other,”
– St. John Vianney
“If you are looking for vocations, as a community have adoration every day. Once the Missionaries of Charity started daily adoration, their vocations doubled,”
– Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta, at the co-workers chapter held in Paris in May 1988
“I hope that your example attracts many souls to the adoration of Jesus Christ who is present on the altar to be of comfort and hope to those who confide in him with faith and love; they look on him as the Emmanuel, God with us, who wished to dwell amongst us: his heart in our heart,”
– Pope John Paul II
“Oh, how fortunate you shall be to be able to receive every day this divine Sacrament, to hold this God of Love in your hands and place Him in your own heart!
I desire but this one grace, and long to be consumed like a burning candle in His holy Presence every moment of the life that remains to me. For that I would be willing, I think, to suffer all the pains imaginable till judgment day, if only I should not have to leave His sacred presence. My only motive would be to be consumed in honoring Him and to acknowledge the burning love He shows us in this wonderful Sacrament. Here His love holds Him captive till the end of time. It is of this one can truly say, “Love triumphs, love enjoys/ Love finds in God its joys!”
– St. Margaret Mary
“To adore Jesus Christ in the Most Blessed Sacrament is first of all to acknowledge him truly, really and substantially present therein by the humble sentiment of a lively and spontaneous faith: humbly surrendering our feeble reason to the divinity of this sublime Mystery; asking neither to see or touch, like the unbelieving Apostle, before accepting the truth of Jesus Hostia; merely waiting, to prostrate ourselves at His feet, for the infallible and gentle word of the Church telling us like Saint John the Baptist: ‘Look, this is the Lamb of God; look, this is he who takes away the sin of the world,'”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“The whole Jubilee journeyโthe pilgrimage into the third Christian millenniumโ has as its starting point and conclusion (in) the Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist!
The Jubilee Year 2000 will be a time to ask and answer St. Paul’s age-old question to the Christians of Rome:
“What will separate us from the love of Christ? Will anguish, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or the sword?”
In the Celebration of the Eucharist comes the answer: We are one in Christ because we partake of that which is more sublime than “angels, principalities, powers, heights, depths or anything else in all creation.” We receive the living God!
“Jesus saw the vast throng, and His heart was moved with pity….’Give them something to eat.'”
The throng is greater in number as the year 2000 approaches. The Lord’s gracious gift is His own self for our heavenly food. Then and now.”
– Meditation from a liturgical reflection on the 18th Sunday of the year by Fr. John T. Myler
| Soul of Christ, sanctify me. Body of Christ, save me. Blood of Christ, inebriate me. Water from the side of Christ, wash me. Passion of Christ, strengthen me. O good Jesus, hear me. Within Thy wounds hide me. Permit me not to be separated from Thee. From the wicked foe defend me. At the hour of my death call me. And bid me come to Thee. That with Thy saints I may praise Thee For ever and ever. Amen. – St. Ignatius of Loyola |
“For 2,000 years, the Church has been the cradle in which Mary places Jesus and entrusts Him to the adoration and contemplation of all peoples. May the humility of the Bride cause to shine forth still more brightly the glory and power of the Eucharist, which she celebrates and treasures in her heart. In the sign of the consecrated Bread and Wine, Christ Jesus risen and glorified, the light of the nations, reveals the enduring reality of His Incarnation. He remains living and real in our midst in order to nourish the faithful with His Body and Blood.”
– From Pope John Paul II’s papal bull “Incarnationis Mysterium”, The Mystery of the Incarnation
“Jesus Christ, after having given us all he could give, that is to say, the merit of his toils, his sufferings, and bitter death; after having given us his adorable body and blood to be the food of our souls, willed also to give us the most precious thing he had let, which was his holy Mother,”
– St. John Vianney
“At all times let us keep our gaze fixed lovingly on the divine Victim being immolated on the altar. And let us allow ourselves to be immolated at the same time. Weeping before the altars that are the object of indifference or profanation, may we love and make up for the coldness of those who do not know how to return love for love,”
– Marie-Deluil Martiny, Mother Mary of Jesus, foundress of the Daughters of the Heart of Jesus
“O how unspeakable is this Sacrament which sets our affections ablaze with charity. โฆ It is the fulfillment of Christ’s Mystical Body.”
– St. Thomas Aquinas
“Peoples of the entire world
need to hear these words.
Their conscience needs to
grow in the certainty that
Someone exists who holds in His Hands
the destiny of this passing worldโฆ
And this Someone is Loveโ
Love that became Man,
Love crucified and risen,
Love unceasingly present among men.
It is Eucharistic Love.”
– Pope John Paul II, Crossing the Threshold of Hope
“I am making my retreat with the Eucharistic Heart. I am on fire, burning with the desire to love God and to bring others to love him. ‘Our Lady of the Eucharistic Heart, I beg you to give Jesus to souls!'”
– Blessed Dina Belanger)
“My greatest happiness is to be before the Blessed Sacrament, where my heart is, as it were, in Its center.”
– St. Margaret Mary Alacoque)
“Farmers everywhere provide bread for all humanity, but it is Christ alone who is the bread of lifeโฆEven if all the physical hunger of the world were satisfied, even if everyone who is hungry were fed by his or her own labor or by the generosity of others, the deepest hunger of man would still existโฆTherefore, I say, Come, all of you, to Christ. He is the bread of life. Come to Christ and you will never be hungry againโฆ”
– Pope John Paul II)
“The Eucharistic Heart in the Host draws me more and more. If I merely pass near the chapel, I feel an irresistible force inviting me in. Close to the tabernacle, I experience an indefinable joy. When the Blessed Sacrament is exposed, I feel totally taken over, paralyzed, by this gentle Eucharistic Heart. When I leave the chapel, I have to tear myself away from the divine Prisoner. Yet, I never cease to live in him; all this takes place in the Heart of the Most Blessed Trinity, an immense distance from the earth; but Jesus wants me to enjoy him in his Eucharist and to grieve when I am far from his consecrated Host.”
– Blessed Dina Belanger
“Her [Mary’s] motherhood extends beyond view. In the will of the Son, she becomes at once mother and maid: sheltering him, but sheltered in him, forming him, but formed by him … When she pronounces the words: ‘Be it done to me according to thy word’, the Mother conceives the mystery from the Trinity, in order to give it to the Son. The Son gives the word back to the Trinity by giving everything he has back to the Father in the Spirit. Then, after the Father has received it again, it is distributed to mankind by means of that extravagant expansioningโthe Eucharist and the Holy Spirit.”
– Adrienne von Speyr
“If I am despised by the world,
If it considers me as nothing,
A divine peace flood me.
For I have the Host as my support.
When I draw near the ciborium,
All my sighs are heardโฆ
To be nothing is my glory.
I am the atom of Jesusโฆ”
– The Atom of Jesus-Host St. Therese of Lisieux
โThe Eucharist is not only a particularly intense expression of the reality of the Churchโs life, but also in a sense its fountainhead. The Eucharist feeds and forms the Church: โBecause there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one breadโ (1 Cor 10:17, RSV). Because of this vital link with the sacrament of the Body and Blood of the Lord, the mystery of the Church is savored, proclaimed, and lived supremely in the Eucharist.โ
– Pope John Paul II, Dies Domini, Pentecost Sunday, May 31, 1998
“When we are before the Blessed Sacrament, instead of looking about us, let us shut our eyes and open our hearts; and the good God will open his. We will go to him, and he will come to us, the one to give, and the other to receive. It will be like a breath passing from one to the other. What delight we find in forgetting ourselves that we may seek God!”
– St. John Vianney
“This Sacrament really contains You, O my God, You whom the Angels adore, in whose presence the Spirits and mighty Powers tremble. Oh! if we could only see You clearly as they do, with what reverence would we approach this Sacrament, with what humility would we receive You.”
– St. Angela of Foligno
“To cast fire upon the earthโthat is my mission! And how I wish it were already blazing fiercely! Nothing in the world can set hearts ablaze with love for God like the Blessed Sacrament. That is why this divine bread has been pictured as a furnace of love. Saint Catherine of Siena saw far-reaching flames coming from this furnace of love and spreading throughout the world. Seeing this, Catherine simply could not understand how so many people could live without loving God. “My Lord, set me on fire with love for you. Let me think of nothing, crave for nothing, yearn for nothing, search for nothing, but you. How I wish to be caught up in this scorching fire of love! How I wish it would consume every obstacle that blocks my path toward you! Make my love for you grow stronger each day of my life.”
– St. Alphonsus Liguori
“This is a real presence which includes every dimension of who Jesus is: body and blood, human soul and divine person. The consecrated Eucharistic species are the Lord and therefore command our adoration. We do not adore ourselves, nor the ordained priest, nor the Bible, even though these are vehicles for Christ’s spiritual presence; we do adore the Eucharist, this blessed sacrifice made really present sacramentally.”
– Francis Cardinal George of Chicago
“Dear Eucharistic soul: In that hour [of the Last Supper] Jesus thought of you. Have no doubt about it. He thought of you in particular, and had you before His eyes. He understood that, without that small, white, consecrated wafer, which you adore and which you receive every morning, you would feel lonely, very lonely, in your exile here below. He knew that your heart would hunger and thirst for love and be the prey of unmitigated nostalgia for heaven. He knew that on the road through life you would find many a cause for grief and, behind a smiling appearance, would have to conceal many a galling sorrow. And for your sake, dear soul, lest you be orphaned and without a loyal friend in whose understanding heart you might pour out the overflowing bitterness of your heart, Jesus overlooked all those sacrileges, profanations, and ingratitudes and, in that night, instituted the Eucharist for youโunderstand this well!โjust for you. And for your sake He has remained in that small, white, consecrated Host which you receive each morning. Do you understand now, dear soul, how much you are loved by the Christ of the Cenacle and of the Eucharist?”
– Jose Guadalupe Trevino
โThe Eucharist is the full realization of the worship which humanity owes to God, and it cannot be compared to any other religious experience…. The risen Lord … calls the faithful together to give them the light of His Word and the nourishment of His Body as the perennial sacramental wellspring of redemption. The grace flowing from this wellspring renews mankind, life, and history.โ
– Pope John Paul II, Dies Domini, Pentecost Sunday, May 31, 1998
“The essential commitment and, above all, the visible grace and source of supernatural strength for the Church as the People of God is to persevere and advance constantly in Eucharistic life and Eucharistic piety and to develop spiritually in the climate of the Eucharist.”
– Pope John Paul II, Redemptor Hominis, Art. 20
“Almighty and Eternal God, behold I come to the Sacrament of Your only-begotten Son, our Lord Jesus Christ. As one sick, I come to the Physician of life; unclean, to the Fountain of mercy; blind, to the Light of eternal splendor; poor and needy, to the Lord of heaven and earth. Therefore, I beg of You, through Your infinite mercy and generosity, heal my weakness, wash my uncleanness, give light to my blindness, enrich my poverty, and clothe my nakedness. May I thus receive the Bread of Angels, the King of Kings, the Lord of Lords, with such reverence and humility, contrition and devotion, purity and faith, purpose and intention, as shall aid my soul’s salvation…”
– St. Thomas Aquinas
“For He is in the midst of us day and night [in the Blessed Sacrament]; He dwells in us with the fullness of grace and truth. He raises the level of morals, fosters virtue, comforts the sorrowful, strengthens the weak and stirs up all those who draw near to Him to imitate Him, so that they may learn from his example to be meek and humble of heart, and to seek not their own interests but those of God.”
– Pope Paul VI, Mysterium Fidei, Art. 67
“I believe that You, O Jesus, are in the most holy Sacrament. I love You and desire You. Come into my heart. I embrace You. Oh, never leave me. May the burning and most sweet power of Your love, O Lord Jesus Christ, I beseech You, absorb my mind that I may die through love of Your love, Who were graciously pleased to die through love of my love.”
– St. Francis
“You also realize, Venerable Brothers, that the Eucharist is reserved in churches or oratories to serve as the spiritual center of a religious community or a parish community, indeed of the whole Church and the whole of mankind, since it contains, beneath the veil of the species, Christ the invisible Head of the Church, the Redeemer of the world, the center of all hearts, ‘by whom all things are and by whom we exist’.”
– Pope Paul VI, Mysterium Fidei, Art. 68
“Give me the grace to long for Your holy sacraments, and especially to rejoice in the presence of Your body, sweet Savior Christ, in the holy sacrament of the altar.”
– St. Thomas More
“How is it that we do not die of love in seeing that God Himself could do no more than shed His divine blood for us drop by drop? When as man He was preparing for death, He made Himself our food in order to give us life. God becomes food, bread for his creatures. Is this not enough to make us die of love?”
– St. Teresa of the Andes
“Beloved souls, in suffering and in joy, go to Jesus hidden in the Sacred Host and let the sweetness of His loving gaze fill you. Like the sick who expose their diseased bodies to the healing rays of the sun, expose your miseries, no matter what they are, to the beams of light streaming forth from the Sacred Host. Why dilute your love in an unceasing flow of words?Why destroy the charm of intimate communings with Him by childish loquacity?May the silence of the Eucharist teach you silent recollection!But, while your lips are still, let your eyes speak. Yes, tell it all to Jesus with a long gaze full of adoration, love, and pleading.Put all your tenderness in that look, all your desires, your sorrows, your disillusionsโin a word, your whole soul. Stir up your faith and seek the eyes of Jesus through the Eucharistic veils. May His gaze and yours meet, be united, and form together one and the same light and one and the same fire of love.Why do you look for more? Ask Him only to deign to look upon you.Tell Him with entire confidence: ‘Look upon me and have mercy on me’ (Ps 118:132). Remembering that, as soon as Jesus had looked on that young man who came to Him, He loved him, fear not to tell Him also: ‘Look upon me and โฆ love me!'”
– The Holy Eucharist, Jose Guadalupe Trevino
O Christ Jesus! true God and man, of one substance, majesty and power with the Father, with firm faith I believe and confess that You are truly and really present in this sacrament. For You who are the Truth itself, have said, “This is my body.”
– John J. Cardinal Carberry
I love You, O Christ Jesus, because You, in Your exceeding love for me, have come in the flesh, and have loved me even to death; and in the Blessed Sacrament have given me Yourself for a pledge of this love. I love You more than myself and than all things; at least, I most earnestly desire so to love You, and always to adhere to You alone. Oh, that by the force of this sacrament there may be cemented between You and me a union of love so great, that nothing may be able to separate me from the love of Christ my Savior.
– John J. Cardinal Carberry
“Jesus, my God, I adore You, here present in the Blessed Sacrament of the altar, where You wait day and night to be our comfort while we await Your unveiled presence in heaven. Jesus, my God, I adore You in all places where the Blessed Sacrament is reserved and where sins are committed against this Sacrament of Love. Jesus, my God, I adore You for all time, past, present and future, for every soul that ever was, is or shall be created. Jesus, my God, who for us has endured hunger and cold, labor and fatigue, I adore You. Jesus, my God, who for my sake has deigned to subject Yourself to the humiliation of temptation, to the perfidy and defection of friends, to the scorn of Your enemies, I adore You. Jesus, my God, who for us has endured the buffeting of Your passion, the scourging, the crowning with thorns, the heavy weight of the cross, I adore You. Jesus, my God, who, for my salvation and that of all mankind, was cruelly nailed to the cross and hung there for three long hours in bitter agony, I adore You. Jesus, my God, who for love of us did institute this Blessed Sacrament and offer Yourself daily for the sins of men, I adore You. Jesus, my God, who in Holy Communion became the food of my soul, I adore You. “Jesus, for You I live. Jesus, for You I die. Jesus, I am Yours in life and death.”
– Reflections and Prayers for Visits with our Eucharistic Lord, by John J. Cardinal Carberry
“O You Who are hidden, body, soul and divinity,
Under the fragile form of bread,
You are my life from Whom springs an abundance of graces;
And, for me, You surpass the delights of Heaven.”
– St. M. Faustina
“Like so many pilgrims before us, we kneel in wonder and adoration before the ineffable mystery which. was accomplished here… In This Child โ the Son who is given to us โ we find rest for our souls and the true bread that never fails โ the Eucharistic Bread foreshadowed even in the name of this town: Bethlehem, the house of bread. God lies hidden in the Child; divinity lies hidden in the Bread of Life,”
– Pope John Paul II, Mass in Manger Square, Bethlehem
“What does it matter where we go? Wherever we go, won’t we be serving God there? And wherever we go, won’t we have Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament with us? Isn’t that enough to make us happy?”
– The Venerable Father Solanus Casey
“The veil of mystery has been torn asunder. He is there, my God, infinite Unity, adorable Trinity, under the appearance of a small piece of bread. Jesus is there, in His sacred Humanity, His Heart, His precious Blood, His Soul, His eternal Divinity; He is there, whole and entire, in each Host consecrated throughout the world and in each fragment of consecrated Host.”
– Blessed Dina Belanger
โWe should consider those moments spent before the Blessed Sacrament as the happiest of our lives.โ
– St. John Vianney โ The Cure of Ars
“Good friends find pleasure in one another’s company. Let us know pleasure in the company of our best Friend, a Friend who can do everything for us, a friend who loves us beyond measure. Here in the Blessed Sacrament we can talk to him straight from the heart. We can open our souls to him, tell him what we need, beg him for powerful graces. We are perfectly free to approach the King of the universe with full confidence and without fear.”
– St. Alphonsus Liguori
“When you have anything to suffer, rejoice and unite it to that which the Sacred Heart has suffered and still suffers in the Blessed Sacrament.”
– St. Margaret Mary
“Let us love Him, then, this only Love of our souls, since He has first loved us and still loves us with burning ardor in the Blessed Sacrament. We have only to love this All-Holy One, to become holy: who can prevent us from being so, since we have a heart to love and a body to suffer?”
– St. Margaret Mary
“I need nothing in this world in order to be happy. I only need to see Jesus in heaven, Whom I now see and adore on the altar with the eyes of faith.”
– St. Dominic Savio
“Communion is as necessary for us to sustain our Christian vitality, as the vision of God is necessary to the angels, to maintain their life of glory.”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
โVirgin Immaculate, perfect lover of Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament, we ask you to obtain for us the graces we need to become true adorers of our Eucharistic God. Grant us, we beg of you, to know Him better, to love Him more, and to center our lives around the Eucharist, that is, to make our whole life a constant prayer of adoration, thanksgiving, reparation, and petition to Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament. Amen.โ
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“In the Mass and in Eucharistic Adoration we meet the merciful love of God that passes through the Heart of Jesus Christ.”
– Pope John Paul II
“This practice of adoration is based on strong and solid reasons. For the Eucharist is at once a sacrifice and a sacrament; but it differs from the other sacraments in this that it not only produces grace, but contains IN A PERMANENT MANNER, the AUTHOR of grace Himself. When therefore the Church bids us adore Christ hidden behind the Eucharistic veils and pray to Him for spiritual and temporal favors, of which we ever stand in need, she manifests living faith in her divine Spouse who is present beneath these veils; she professes her gratitude to Him and she enjoys the intimacy of His friendship.”
– Pope Pius XII
โO Christ Jesus, really present upon the altar, I cast myself down at Your feet; may all adoration be offered to You in the Sacrament which You left to us on the eve of Your Passion, as the testimony of the excess of Your love!โ
– The Blessed Sacrament, Abbot Columba Marmion, O.S.B.
โWe show our adoration by going to visit Christ in the tabernacle or exposed in the monstrance. Would it not indeed be a failing in respect to neglect the divine Guest who awaits us? He dwells there, really present, He who was present in the crib, at Nazareth, upon the mountains of Judea, in the supper-room, upon the Cross. It is the same Jesus who said to the Samaritan woman, โIf thou didst know the gift of God!โโ
– The Blessed Sacrament, Abbot Columba Marmion, O. S. B.
“To keep me from sin and straying from Him, God has used devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament. My life vows destined to be spent in the light irradiating from the tabernacle, and it is to the Heart of Jesus that I dare go for the solution of all my problems,”
– Pope John XXIII
“The Church has a special duty to safeguard and strengthen the sacredness of the Eucharist. In our pluralistic and often deliberately secularized society, the living faith of the Christian community โ a faith always aware of its rights vis-a-vis those who do not share the faith โ ensures respect for this sacredness,”
– Pope John Paul II
โEvery time we look at the Blessed Sacrament our place in heaven is raised forever.โ
– St. Gertrude
โNo tongue is able to declare the greatness of the love that Jesus bears to every soul: and therefore this Spouse, when he would leave this earth, in order that his absence might not cause us to forget him, left us as a memorial this Blessed Sacrament, in which he himself remained; for he would not that there should be any other pledge to keep alive our remembrance of him than he himself.โ
– St. Peter of Alcantara
“We do not sin when we adore Christ in the Eucharist; we do sin when we do not adore Christ in the Eucharist.”
– St. Augustine
“Let us never forget that an age prospers or dwindles in proportion to its devotion to the Holy Eucharist. This is the measure of its spiritual life and its faith, of its charity and its virtue.”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“Do you realize that Jesus is there in the tabernacles expressly for you, for you alone? He burns with desire to come into your heart.”
– St.Therese of Lisieux
โThe devotion to the Eucharist is the most noble, because it has God as its object; it is the most profitable for salvation, because It gives us the Author of Grace; it is the sweetest, because the Lord is Sweetness Itself.โ
– Pope St. Pius X
“O Jesus, here present in the Holy Eucharist, Thy Heart is all aglow with love for me! Thou dost call me, Thou dost urge me to come to Thee …”
– St. Ildephons
“In obedience to humanity, the King of the universe come down from heaven! In obedience to humanity, he lives imprisoned on the altar! I shall not resist. He allows humans to keep him wherever they wishโin monstrance or tabernacle; to carry him in procession; to bring him into the homes of the sick and dying; to dispense him to all, whether saint or sinner. The gospel tells how marvelously he obeyed Mary and Joseph. Today he obeys every priest in the world.”
– St. Alphonsus Liguori
“My heart feels as if it were being drawn by a superior force each morning just before uniting with Him in the Blessed Sacrament. I have such a thirst and hunger before receiving Him that it’s a wonder I don’t die of anxiety. I was hardly able to reach the Divine Prisoner in order to celebrate Mass. When Mass ended I remained with Jesus to render Him thanks. My thirst and hunger do not diminish after I have received Him in the Blessed Sacrament, but rather, increase steadily. Oh, how sweet was the conversation I held with Paradise this morning. The Heart of Jesus and my own, if you will pardon my expression, fused. They were no longer two hearts beating but only one. My heart disappeared as if it were a drop in the ocean.”
– St. Padre Pio
“How many there are who still say, ‘I want to see His shape, His image, His clothing, His sandals.’ Behold, you do see Him, you touch Him, you eat Him! You want to see His clothing. He gives Himself to you, not just to be seen but to be touched, to be eaten, to be received within …. Let all of you be ardent, fervent, enthusiastic. If the Jews stood, shoes on, staff in hand, and eating in haste, how much more vigilant should you be. They were about to go to Palestine; … you are about to go to heaven.”
– St. John Chrysostom
“I come, O Lord, unto Thy sanctuary to see the life and food of my soul. As I hope in Thee, O Lord, inspire me with that confidence which brings me to Thy holy mountain. Permit me, Divine Jesus, to come closer to Thee, that my whole soul may do homage to the greatness of Thy majesty; that my heart, with its tenderest affections, may acknowledge Thine infinite love; that my memory may dwell on the admirable mysteries here renewed every day, and that the sacrifice of my whole being may accompany Thine.”
– St. Clare
“Any time spent before the Eucharistic presence, be it long or short, is the best-spent time of our lives.”
– St. Catherine of Genoa
“Father of mercy and God of all consolation, graciously look upon me and impart to me the blessing which flows from this holy Sacrament. Overshadow me with Your loving kindness, and let this divine Mystery bear fruit in me.”
– St. Blase
“Love keeps Him there [in the Blessed Sacrament] as a victim completely and perpetually delivered over to sacrifice for the glory of the Father and for our salvation. Unite yourself with Him, then, in all that you do. Refer everything to His glory. Set up your abode in this loving Heart of Jesus and you will there find lasting peace and the strength both to bring to fruition all the good desires He inspires in you, and to avoid every deliberate fault. Place in this Heart all your sufferings and difficulties. Everything that comes from the Sacred Heart is sweet. He changes everything into love.”
– St. Margaret Mary
“O how unspeakable is this Sacrament which sets our affections ablaze with charity. โฆ It is the fulfillment of Christ’s Mystical Body.”
– St. Thomas Aquinas
“Peoples of the entire world
need to hear these words.
Their conscience needs to
grow in the certainty that
Someone exists who holds in His Hands
the destiny of this passing worldโฆ
And this Someone is Loveโ
Love that became Man,
Love crucified and risen,
Love unceasingly present among men.
It is Eucharistic Love.”
– Pope John Paul II, Crossing the Threshold of Hope
“I am making my retreat with the Eucharistic Heart. I am on fire, burning with the desire to love God and to bring others to love him. ‘Our Lady of the Eucharistic Heart, I beg you to give Jesus to souls!'”
– Blessed Dina Belanger)
“My greatest happiness is to be before the Blessed Sacrament, where my heart is, as it were, in Its center.”
– St. Margaret Mary Alacoque)
“Farmers everywhere provide bread for all humanity, but it is Christ alone who is the bread of lifeโฆEven if all the physical hunger of the world were satisfied, even if everyone who is hungry were fed by his or her own labor or by the generosity of others, the deepest hunger of man would still existโฆTherefore, I say, Come, all of you, to Christ. He is the bread of life. Come to Christ and you will never be hungry againโฆ”
– Pope John Paul II)
“The Eucharistic Heart in the Host draws me more and more. If I merely pass near the chapel, I feel an irresistible force inviting me in. Close to the tabernacle, I experience an indefinable joy. When the Blessed Sacrament is exposed, I feel totally taken over, paralyzed, by this gentle Eucharistic Heart. When I leave the chapel, I have to tear myself away from the divine Prisoner. Yet, I never cease to live in him; all this takes place in the Heart of the Most Blessed Trinity, an immense distance from the earth; but Jesus wants me to enjoy him in his Eucharist and to grieve when I am far from his consecrated Host.”
– Blessed Dina Belanger
“Her [Mary’s] motherhood extends beyond view. In the will of the Son, she becomes at once mother and maid: sheltering him, but sheltered in him, forming him, but formed by him … When she pronounces the words: ‘Be it done to me according to thy word’, the Mother conceives the mystery from the Trinity, in order to give it to the Son. The Son gives the word back to the Trinity by giving everything he has back to the Father in the Spirit. Then, after the Father has received it again, it is distributed to mankind by means of that extravagant expansioningโthe Eucharist and the Holy Spirit.”
– Adrienne von Speyr
“If I am despised by the world,
If it considers me as nothing,
A divine peace flood me.
For I have the Host as my support.
When I draw near the ciborium,
All my sighs are heardโฆ
To be nothing is my glory.
I am the atom of Jesusโฆ”
– The Atom of Jesus-Host St. Therese of Lisieux
โThe Eucharist is not only a particularly intense expression of the reality of the Churchโs life, but also in a sense its fountainhead. The Eucharist feeds and forms the Church: โBecause there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one breadโ (1 Cor 10:17, RSV). Because of this vital link with the sacrament of the Body and Blood of the Lord, the mystery of the Church is savored, proclaimed, and lived supremely in the Eucharist.โ
– Pope John Paul II, Dies Domini, Pentecost Sunday, May 31, 1998
“When we are before the Blessed Sacrament, instead of looking about us, let us shut our eyes and open our hearts; and the good God will open his. We will go to him, and he will come to us, the one to give, and the other to receive. It will be like a breath passing from one to the other. What delight we find in forgetting ourselves that we may seek God!”
– St. John Vianney
“This Sacrament really contains You, O my God, You whom the Angels adore, in whose presence the Spirits and mighty Powers tremble. Oh! if we could only see You clearly as they do, with what reverence would we approach this Sacrament, with what humility would we receive You.”
– St. Angela of Foligno
“To cast fire upon the earthโthat is my mission! And how I wish it were already blazing fiercely! Nothing in the world can set hearts ablaze with love for God like the Blessed Sacrament. That is why this divine bread has been pictured as a furnace of love. Saint Catherine of Siena saw far-reaching flames coming from this furnace of love and spreading throughout the world. Seeing this, Catherine simply could not understand how so many people could live without loving God. “My Lord, set me on fire with love for you. Let me think of nothing, crave for nothing, yearn for nothing, search for nothing, but you. How I wish to be caught up in this scorching fire of love! How I wish it would consume every obstacle that blocks my path toward you! Make my love for you grow stronger each day of my life.”
– St. Alphonsus Liguori
“This is a real presence which includes every dimension of who Jesus is: body and blood, human soul and divine person. The consecrated Eucharistic species are the Lord and therefore command our adoration. We do not adore ourselves, nor the ordained priest, nor the Bible, even though these are vehicles for Christ’s spiritual presence; we do adore the Eucharist, this blessed sacrifice made really present sacramentally.”
– Francis Cardinal George of Chicago
“Dear Eucharistic soul: In that hour [of the Last Supper] Jesus thought of you. Have no doubt about it. He thought of you in particular, and had you before His eyes. He understood that, without that small, white, consecrated wafer, which you adore and which you receive every morning, you would feel lonely, very lonely, in your exile here below. He knew that your heart would hunger and thirst for love and be the prey of unmitigated nostalgia for heaven. He knew that on the road through life you would find many a cause for grief and, behind a smiling appearance, would have to conceal many a galling sorrow. And for your sake, dear soul, lest you be orphaned and without a loyal friend in whose understanding heart you might pour out the overflowing bitterness of your heart, Jesus overlooked all those sacrileges, profanations, and ingratitudes and, in that night, instituted the Eucharist for youโunderstand this well!โjust for you. And for your sake He has remained in that small, white, consecrated Host which you receive each morning. Do you understand now, dear soul, how much you are loved by the Christ of the Cenacle and of the Eucharist?”
– Jose Guadalupe Trevino
โThe Eucharist is the full realization of the worship which humanity owes to God, and it cannot be compared to any other religious experience…. The risen Lord … calls the faithful together to give them the light of His Word and the nourishment of His Body as the perennial sacramental wellspring of redemption. The grace flowing from this wellspring renews mankind, life, and history.โ
– Pope John Paul II, Dies Domini, Pentecost Sunday, May 31, 1998
“The essential commitment and, above all, the visible grace and source of supernatural strength for the Church as the People of God is to persevere and advance constantly in Eucharistic life and Eucharistic piety and to develop spiritually in the climate of the Eucharist.”
– Pope John Paul II, Redemptor Hominis, Art. 20
“Almighty and Eternal God, behold I come to the Sacrament of Your only-begotten Son, our Lord Jesus Christ. As one sick, I come to the Physician of life; unclean, to the Fountain of mercy; blind, to the Light of eternal splendor; poor and needy, to the Lord of heaven and earth. Therefore, I beg of You, through Your infinite mercy and generosity, heal my weakness, wash my uncleanness, give light to my blindness, enrich my poverty, and clothe my nakedness. May I thus receive the Bread of Angels, the King of Kings, the Lord of Lords, with such reverence and humility, contrition and devotion, purity and faith, purpose and intention, as shall aid my soul’s salvation…”
– St. Thomas Aquinas
“For He is in the midst of us day and night [in the Blessed Sacrament]; He dwells in us with the fullness of grace and truth. He raises the level of morals, fosters virtue, comforts the sorrowful, strengthens the weak and stirs up all those who draw near to Him to imitate Him, so that they may learn from his example to be meek and humble of heart, and to seek not their own interests but those of God.”
– Pope Paul VI, Mysterium Fidei, Art. 67
“I believe that You, O Jesus, are in the most holy Sacrament. I love You and desire You. Come into my heart. I embrace You. Oh, never leave me. May the burning and most sweet power of Your love, O Lord Jesus Christ, I beseech You, absorb my mind that I may die through love of Your love, Who were graciously pleased to die through love of my love.”
– St. Francis
“You also realize, Venerable Brothers, that the Eucharist is reserved in churches or oratories to serve as the spiritual center of a religious community or a parish community, indeed of the whole Church and the whole of mankind, since it contains, beneath the veil of the species, Christ the invisible Head of the Church, the Redeemer of the world, the center of all hearts, ‘by whom all things are and by whom we exist’.”
– Pope Paul VI, Mysterium Fidei, Art. 68
“Give me the grace to long for Your holy sacraments, and especially to rejoice in the presence of Your body, sweet Savior Christ, in the holy sacrament of the altar.”
– St. Thomas More
“How is it that we do not die of love in seeing that God Himself could do no more than shed His divine blood for us drop by drop? When as man He was preparing for death, He made Himself our food in order to give us life. God becomes food, bread for his creatures. Is this not enough to make us die of love?”
– St. Teresa of the Andes
“Beloved souls, in suffering and in joy, go to Jesus hidden in the Sacred Host and let the sweetness of His loving gaze fill you. Like the sick who expose their diseased bodies to the healing rays of the sun, expose your miseries, no matter what they are, to the beams of light streaming forth from the Sacred Host. Why dilute your love in an unceasing flow of words?Why destroy the charm of intimate communings with Him by childish loquacity?May the silence of the Eucharist teach you silent recollection!But, while your lips are still, let your eyes speak. Yes, tell it all to Jesus with a long gaze full of adoration, love, and pleading.Put all your tenderness in that look, all your desires, your sorrows, your disillusionsโin a word, your whole soul. Stir up your faith and seek the eyes of Jesus through the Eucharistic veils. May His gaze and yours meet, be united, and form together one and the same light and one and the same fire of love.Why do you look for more? Ask Him only to deign to look upon you.Tell Him with entire confidence: ‘Look upon me and have mercy on me’ (Ps 118:132). Remembering that, as soon as Jesus had looked on that young man who came to Him, He loved him, fear not to tell Him also: ‘Look upon me and โฆ love me!'”
– The Holy Eucharist, Jose Guadalupe Trevino
O Christ Jesus! true God and man, of one substance, majesty and power with the Father, with firm faith I believe and confess that You are truly and really present in this sacrament. For You who are the Truth itself, have said, “This is my body.”
– John J. Cardinal Carberry
I love You, O Christ Jesus, because You, in Your exceeding love for me, have come in the flesh, and have loved me even to death; and in the Blessed Sacrament have given me Yourself for a pledge of this love. I love You more than myself and than all things; at least, I most earnestly desire so to love You, and always to adhere to You alone. Oh, that by the force of this sacrament there may be cemented between You and me a union of love so great, that nothing may be able to separate me from the love of Christ my Savior.
– John J. Cardinal Carberry
“Jesus, my God, I adore You, here present in the Blessed Sacrament of the altar, where You wait day and night to be our comfort while we await Your unveiled presence in heaven. Jesus, my God, I adore You in all places where the Blessed Sacrament is reserved and where sins are committed against this Sacrament of Love. Jesus, my God, I adore You for all time, past, present and future, for every soul that ever was, is or shall be created. Jesus, my God, who for us has endured hunger and cold, labor and fatigue, I adore You. Jesus, my God, who for my sake has deigned to subject Yourself to the humiliation of temptation, to the perfidy and defection of friends, to the scorn of Your enemies, I adore You. Jesus, my God, who for us has endured the buffeting of Your passion, the scourging, the crowning with thorns, the heavy weight of the cross, I adore You. Jesus, my God, who, for my salvation and that of all mankind, was cruelly nailed to the cross and hung there for three long hours in bitter agony, I adore You. Jesus, my God, who for love of us did institute this Blessed Sacrament and offer Yourself daily for the sins of men, I adore You. Jesus, my God, who in Holy Communion became the food of my soul, I adore You. “Jesus, for You I live. Jesus, for You I die. Jesus, I am Yours in life and death.”
– Reflections and Prayers for Visits with our Eucharistic Lord, by John J. Cardinal Carberry
“O You Who are hidden, body, soul and divinity,
Under the fragile form of bread,
You are my life from Whom springs an abundance of graces;
And, for me, You surpass the delights of Heaven.”
– St. M. Faustina
“Like so many pilgrims before us, we kneel in wonder and adoration before the ineffable mystery which. was accomplished here… In This Child โ the Son who is given to us โ we find rest for our souls and the true bread that never fails โ the Eucharistic Bread foreshadowed even in the name of this town: Bethlehem, the house of bread. God lies hidden in the Child; divinity lies hidden in the Bread of Life,”
– Pope John Paul II, Mass in Manger Square, Bethlehem
“What does it matter where we go? Wherever we go, won’t we be serving God there? And wherever we go, won’t we have Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament with us? Isn’t that enough to make us happy?”
– The Venerable Father Solanus Casey
“The veil of mystery has been torn asunder. He is there, my God, infinite Unity, adorable Trinity, under the appearance of a small piece of bread. Jesus is there, in His sacred Humanity, His Heart, His precious Blood, His Soul, His eternal Divinity; He is there, whole and entire, in each Host consecrated throughout the world and in each fragment of consecrated Host.”
– Blessed Dina Belanger
โWe should consider those moments spent before the Blessed Sacrament as the happiest of our lives.โ
– St. John Vianney โ The Cure of Ars
“Good friends find pleasure in one another’s company. Let us know pleasure in the company of our best Friend, a Friend who can do everything for us, a friend who loves us beyond measure. Here in the Blessed Sacrament we can talk to him straight from the heart. We can open our souls to him, tell him what we need, beg him for powerful graces. We are perfectly free to approach the King of the universe with full confidence and without fear.”
– St. Alphonsus Liguori
“When you have anything to suffer, rejoice and unite it to that which the Sacred Heart has suffered and still suffers in the Blessed Sacrament.”
– St. Margaret Mary
“Let us love Him, then, this only Love of our souls, since He has first loved us and still loves us with burning ardor in the Blessed Sacrament. We have only to love this All-Holy One, to become holy: who can prevent us from being so, since we have a heart to love and a body to suffer?”
– St. Margaret Mary
“I need nothing in this world in order to be happy. I only need to see Jesus in heaven, Whom I now see and adore on the altar with the eyes of faith.”
– St. Dominic Savio
“Communion is as necessary for us to sustain our Christian vitality, as the vision of God is necessary to the angels, to maintain their life of glory.”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
โVirgin Immaculate, perfect lover of Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament, we ask you to obtain for us the graces we need to become true adorers of our Eucharistic God. Grant us, we beg of you, to know Him better, to love Him more, and to center our lives around the Eucharist, that is, to make our whole life a constant prayer of adoration, thanksgiving, reparation, and petition to Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament. Amen.โ
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“In the Mass and in Eucharistic Adoration we meet the merciful love of God that passes through the Heart of Jesus Christ.”
– Pope John Paul II
“This practice of adoration is based on strong and solid reasons. For the Eucharist is at once a sacrifice and a sacrament; but it differs from the other sacraments in this that it not only produces grace, but contains IN A PERMANENT MANNER, the AUTHOR of grace Himself. When therefore the Church bids us adore Christ hidden behind the Eucharistic veils and pray to Him for spiritual and temporal favors, of which we ever stand in need, she manifests living faith in her divine Spouse who is present beneath these veils; she professes her gratitude to Him and she enjoys the intimacy of His friendship.”
– Pope Pius XII
โO Christ Jesus, really present upon the altar, I cast myself down at Your feet; may all adoration be offered to You in the Sacrament which You left to us on the eve of Your Passion, as the testimony of the excess of Your love!โ
– The Blessed Sacrament, Abbot Columba Marmion, O.S.B.
โWe show our adoration by going to visit Christ in the tabernacle or exposed in the monstrance. Would it not indeed be a failing in respect to neglect the divine Guest who awaits us? He dwells there, really present, He who was present in the crib, at Nazareth, upon the mountains of Judea, in the supper-room, upon the Cross. It is the same Jesus who said to the Samaritan woman, โIf thou didst know the gift of God!โโ
– The Blessed Sacrament, Abbot Columba Marmion, O. S. B.
“To keep me from sin and straying from Him, God has used devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament. My life vows destined to be spent in the light irradiating from the tabernacle, and it is to the Heart of Jesus that I dare go for the solution of all my problems,”
– Pope John XXIII
“The Church has a special duty to safeguard and strengthen the sacredness of the Eucharist. In our pluralistic and often deliberately secularized society, the living faith of the Christian community โ a faith always aware of its rights vis-a-vis those who do not share the faith โ ensures respect for this sacredness,”
– Pope John Paul II
โEvery time we look at the Blessed Sacrament our place in heaven is raised forever.โ
– St. Gertrude
โNo tongue is able to declare the greatness of the love that Jesus bears to every soul: and therefore this Spouse, when he would leave this earth, in order that his absence might not cause us to forget him, left us as a memorial this Blessed Sacrament, in which he himself remained; for he would not that there should be any other pledge to keep alive our remembrance of him than he himself.โ
– St. Peter of Alcantara
“We do not sin when we adore Christ in the Eucharist; we do sin when we do not adore Christ in the Eucharist.”
– St. Augustine
“Let us never forget that an age prospers or dwindles in proportion to its devotion to the Holy Eucharist. This is the measure of its spiritual life and its faith, of its charity and its virtue.”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“Do you realize that Jesus is there in the tabernacles expressly for you, for you alone? He burns with desire to come into your heart.”
– St.Therese of Lisieux
โThe devotion to the Eucharist is the most noble, because it has God as its object; it is the most profitable for salvation, because It gives us the Author of Grace; it is the sweetest, because the Lord is Sweetness Itself.โ
– Pope St. Pius X
“O Jesus, here present in the Holy Eucharist, Thy Heart is all aglow with love for me! Thou dost call me, Thou dost urge me to come to Thee …”
– St. Ildephons
“In obedience to humanity, the King of the universe come down from heaven! In obedience to humanity, he lives imprisoned on the altar! I shall not resist. He allows humans to keep him wherever they wishโin monstrance or tabernacle; to carry him in procession; to bring him into the homes of the sick and dying; to dispense him to all, whether saint or sinner. The gospel tells how marvelously he obeyed Mary and Joseph. Today he obeys every priest in the world.”
– St. Alphonsus Liguori
“My heart feels as if it were being drawn by a superior force each morning just before uniting with Him in the Blessed Sacrament. I have such a thirst and hunger before receiving Him that it’s a wonder I don’t die of anxiety. I was hardly able to reach the Divine Prisoner in order to celebrate Mass. When Mass ended I remained with Jesus to render Him thanks. My thirst and hunger do not diminish after I have received Him in the Blessed Sacrament, but rather, increase steadily. Oh, how sweet was the conversation I held with Paradise this morning. The Heart of Jesus and my own, if you will pardon my expression, fused. They were no longer two hearts beating but only one. My heart disappeared as if it were a drop in the ocean.”
– St. Padre Pio
“How many there are who still say, ‘I want to see His shape, His image, His clothing, His sandals.’ Behold, you do see Him, you touch Him, you eat Him! You want to see His clothing. He gives Himself to you, not just to be seen but to be touched, to be eaten, to be received within …. Let all of you be ardent, fervent, enthusiastic. If the Jews stood, shoes on, staff in hand, and eating in haste, how much more vigilant should you be. They were about to go to Palestine; … you are about to go to heaven.”
– St. John Chrysostom
“I come, O Lord, unto Thy sanctuary to see the life and food of my soul. As I hope in Thee, O Lord, inspire me with that confidence which brings me to Thy holy mountain. Permit me, Divine Jesus, to come closer to Thee, that my whole soul may do homage to the greatness of Thy majesty; that my heart, with its tenderest affections, may acknowledge Thine infinite love; that my memory may dwell on the admirable mysteries here renewed every day, and that the sacrifice of my whole being may accompany Thine.”
– St. Clare
“Any time spent before the Eucharistic presence, be it long or short, is the best-spent time of our lives.”
– St. Catherine of Genoa
“Father of mercy and God of all consolation, graciously look upon me and impart to me the blessing which flows from this holy Sacrament. Overshadow me with Your loving kindness, and let this divine Mystery bear fruit in me.”
– St. Blase
“Love keeps Him there [in the Blessed Sacrament] as a victim completely and perpetually delivered over to sacrifice for the glory of the Father and for our salvation. Unite yourself with Him, then, in all that you do. Refer everything to His glory. Set up your abode in this loving Heart of Jesus and you will there find lasting peace and the strength both to bring to fruition all the good desires He inspires in you, and to avoid every deliberate fault. Place in this Heart all your sufferings and difficulties. Everything that comes from the Sacred Heart is sweet. He changes everything into love.”
– St. Margaret Mary
“I no longer take pleasure in perishable food or in the delights of this world. I want only God’s bread, which is the Flesh of Jesus Christ, formed of the seed of David, and for drink I crave His Blood which is love that cannot perish.”
– St. Ignatius of Antioch
“My sweetest Joy is to be in the presence of Jesus in the holy Sacrament. I beg that when obliged to withdraw in body, I may leave my heart before the holy Sacrament. How I would miss Our Lord if He were to be away from me by His presence in the Blessed Sacrament!”
– St. Katharine Drexel
“O Jesus! on this day, you have fulfilled all my desires. From now on, near the Eucharist, I shall be able To sacrifice myself in silence, to wait for Heaven in peace. Keeping myself open to the rays of the Divine Host, In this furnace of love, I shall be consumed, And like a seraphim, Lord, I shall love You.”
– St. Therese of Lisieux
“O Mary, Mother of Jesus Christ, and our dear Mother! O all ye holy angels, who, by your adoration in our churches, make up for the little love which your God and our Saviour receives from men, obtain for us the grace to comprehend a little the love of Jesus Christ in the Most Holy Sacrament.”
– St. Margaret Mary Alacoque
“United with the angels and saints of the heavenly Church, let us adore the most Holy Sacrament of the Eucharist. Prostrate, we adore this great mystery that contains Godโs new and definitive covenant with humankind in Christ.”
– Pope John Paul II
“Let weak and frail man come here suppliantly to adore the Sacrament of Christ, not to discuss high things, or wish to penetrate difficulties, but to bow down to secret things in humble veneration, and to abandon God’s mysteries to God, for Truth deceives no manโAlmighty God can do all things. Amen.”
– St. Paul of the Cross
“O King of glory, though you hide your beauty, yet the eye of my soul rends the veil. I see the angelic choirs giving you honor without cease.”
– St. Mary Faustina Kowalska
“When she [Mother Frances Cabrini] went to the chapel โฆ her whole attitude โฆ revealed that she was completely immersed in the Divine Presence. One day, during the Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament, a sister brought her a telegram. Observing that Mother made no response, the sister put the telegram on the prie-dieu. Then, perceiving that Mother still did not move, the sister looked into her face. She saw there a seraphic expression, the eyes openly fixed upon the Sacred Heart; but Mother was not able to see nor hear anything that was going on around her.”
– Mother Saverio De Maria, MSC, Mother Frances Xavier Cabrini
“From the Eucharist comes strength to live the Christian life and zeal to share that life with others.”
– Pope John Paul II
“I understand that, each time we contemplate with desire and devotion the Host in which is hidden Christ’s Eucharistic Body, we increase our merits in heaven and secure special joys to be ours later in the beatific vision of God.”
– St. Gertrude
“The Eucharist bathes the tormented soul in light and love. Then the soul appreciates these words, ‘Come all you who are sick, I will restore your health.'”
– St. Bernadette Soubirous
“As a man must be born before he can begin to lead his physical life, so he must be born to lead a Divine Life. That birth occurs in the Sacrament of Baptism. To survive, he must be nourished by Divine Life; that is done in the Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist.”
– Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen
“Go with Him, as His inseparable companion, to the wedding feast of Cana, and drink of the wine of His blessing. Let you have ever before you the Face of the Lord, and look upon His beauty, and let your earnest gaze turn nowhere away from His most sweet countenance. Go before Him into a desert place and see the wonder of His works, where He multiplied in His own Holy Hands the bread that sufficed the great multitude. Go, my brother, go forward, and with all the love of your soul follow Christ wherever He may goโฆ And lovingly behold Him as taking bread into His hands, He blesses it, and breaks it, as the outward form of His own Immaculate Body; and the chalice which He blessed as the outward form of His Precious Blood, and gave to His Disciples; and be you also a partaker of His sacraments.”
– St. Ephrem of Syria
“You consider Zacheus happy because Our Lord vouchsafed to enter his house and eat with him; you deem St. John happy because he rested on the breast of our Saviour at the Last Supper; and, above all, you regard St. Joseph and the Blessed Virgin Mary so very happy because they nourished and supported Our Dear Lord. But are you not as happy as they? Are you not even happier? You do not hold Our Lord in your arms as Simeon did, but you receive Him into your heart in Holy Communion; you do not rest on the bosom of St. John, but the Saviour rests in your heart after Holy Communion; you do not nurse and support Our Lord like St. Joseph and the Blessed Virgin, but you have a still greater happiness, for the Saviour Himself nourishes you and gives Himself to you as your food. O Love! O Love! O who can understand the love of God for men!”
– The Blessed Eucharist, Fr. Michael Muller, C.S.S.R.
“Nothing is nearer to Our heart than that devotion to the Holy Eucharist grow from day to day throughout the world,”
– Pope Benedict XV
“You must propagate veneration of the Most Blessed Sacrament with all your might, for the devotion to the Holy Eucharist is the queen of all devotions.”
– Pope Benedict XV
“The Eucharist is the consummation of the whole spiritual life,”
– St. Thomas Aquinas
“Our Lord came to the aid of each great tribulation with a special devotion. The present and future tribulations of the Church and of nations are greater than at any other period, and this persecution is more dangerous than those of previous times. Hence, the devotion which God sends to the succor of His Church and of the nations at the present time is the devotion to the Most Holy Eucharist. It is the highest of all devotions.”
– Pope Leo XIII
โYes, I am happy, perfectly happy; and do you wish to know where I find true happiness? At the feet of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament,”
– Augustine Maria of the Blessed Sacrament, Herman Cohen
“We must visit Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament a hundred thousand times a day.”
– St. Francis de Sales
“What happiness do we not feel in the presence of God, when we find ourselves alone at his feet, before the holy tabernacle! โฆ ‘Come, my soul, redouble your ardor! You are here alone to adore your God! His look rests on you alone!’ Ah! if we only had the angels’ eyes! Seeing our Lord Jesus Christ here, on that altar, and looking at us, how we should love him! We should want to stay always at his feet; it would be a foretaste of heaven; everything else would become insipid to us.”
– St. John Vianney
“The Eucharist had so powerful an attraction for the Blessed Virgin that she could not live away from it. She lived in it and by it. She passed her days and her nights at the feet of her divine Sonโฆ. Her love for her hidden God shone in her countenance and communicated its ardour to all about her.”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“I have a burning thirst to be honored by men in the Blessed Sacrament, and I find hardly anyone who strives, according to My desire, to allay this thirst by making Me some return of love.”
– Words of Jesus to St. Margaret Mary
“I am not in an audience with our Holy Father, not am I in the presence of a saint from heaven, nor with some distinguished personality. Before me, dear Jesus, You are present under the frail appearance of the host. With the eyes of faith I believe that You are present as my God, my Lord, my Redeemer, the Creator of heaven and earth, my all. I believe, dear Jesus, that You are truly present, body and blood, soul and divinity, in the most Blessed Sacrament.”
– Reflections and Prayers for Visits with our Eucharistic Lord, John J. Cardinal Carberry
“Ah! What can I desire on earth, what hope for in Heaven but Thee, my Jesus! Thou art the God of my heart, and the inheritance I desire for eternity. O infinite God, God thrice blessed, Thou before whom the very angels are not sufficiently pure, what is man in Thy presence? Should he even dare to enter Thy temple, or address his prayers to Thee? It is true, my God; and yet, though I am a thousand times unworthy to enter into Thy temple, it pleases Thee to enter into Thy temple, it please Thee to enter into my heart; it please Thee to unite Thy soul to my soul, to incorporate Thy Flesh with my flesh, to mingle Thy Blood with my blood, and to press, in the sweet embrace of a brother and a friend, Thy Heart, so holy, to my heart โฆ”
– St. Francis de Sales
“Let every knee bend before Thee, O greatness of my God, so supremely humbled in the Sacred Host. May every heart love Thee, every spirit adore Thee and every will be subject to Thee!”
– St. Margaret Mary Alacoque
“I desire but this one grace, and long to be consumed like a burning candle in His holy Presence every moment of the life that remains to me. For that I would be willing, I think, to suffer all the pains imaginable till judgment day, if only I should not have to leave His sacred presence. My only motive would be to be consumed in honoring Him and to acknowledge that burning love He shows us in this wonderful Sacrament. Here His love holds Him captive till the end of time. It is of this one can truly say, ‘Love triumphs, love enjoys, Love finds in God its joys.'”
– St. Margaret Mary
“Mostly [St.] Bernadette’s thoughts were fixed beyond this earth. ‘During her long nights,’ reported Canon Perreau, ‘she used to say the Rosary.’ At other times she placed herself as it were in adoration before the Tabernacle. On her curtains had been fastened the picture of a monstrance. ‘I am happy in my sleepless hours,’ she confided to Mother Audidier, ‘uniting myself with our Lord. One glance at this picture gives me the longing and strength to immolate myself, when I am feeling my loneliness and my pains.'”
– Saint Bernadette Soubirous, Francis Trochu
“The time you spend with Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament is the best time that you will spend on earth. Each moment that you spend with Jesus will deepen your union with Him and make your soul everlastingly more glorious and beautiful in heaven, and will help bring about an everlasting peace on earth.”
– Mother Teresa of Calcutta
“The greatest love story of all time is contained in a tiny white Host.”
– Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen
โThe holy hour in our modern rat race is necessary for authentic prayer. Our world is one of speed in which intensity of movement is a substitute for lack of purpose; where noise is invoked to drown out the whisperings of conscience; where talk, talk, talk gives the impression that we are doing something when really we are not; where activity kills self-knowledge won by contemplationโฆ
There seems to be so little in common between our involvement with the news of the world and the Stranger in whose Presence we find ourselves. The hour means giving up a golf game or a cocktail party, or a napโฆ
Sometimes it is hard, especially during vacation when we have nothing to do. I remember once having two hours between trains in Paris. I went to the Church of Saint Roch to make my holy hour. There are not ten days a year I can sleep in the daytime This was one. I was so tired, I sat down at 2:00p.m.–too tired to kneel–and went to sleep. I slept perfectly until 3:00p.m. I said to the Good Lord: “Did I make a holy hour?” The answer came back: “Yes! That’s the way the Apostles made their first one.” The best time to make a holy hour is in the morning, early, before the day sets traps for us. By being faithful to it, and letting nothing interfere with it, we use it as the sign and symbol of our victimhood. We are not called to great penances, and many would interfere with our duty, but the hour is our daily sacrifice in union with Christ.โ
– Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen
“Know also that you will probably gain more by praying fifteen minutes before the Blessed Sacrament than by all the other spiritual exercises of the day. True, Our Lord hears our prayers anywhere, for He has made the promise, ‘Ask, and you shall receive,’ but He has revealed to His servants that those who visit Him in the Blessed Sacrament will obtain a more abundant measure of grace.”
– St. Alphonsus Liguori
“The Sacrament [of the Holy Eucharist] is the Gift of gifts, and the Grace of graces. When the almighty and eternal God comes to us with all the perfection of His thrice holy humanity and His divinity, He surely does not come empty-handed โฆ”
– Bl. Angela of Foligno
“The Eucharist is source and pledge of blessedness and glory, not for the soul alone, but for the body alsoโฆ. In the frail and perishable body that divine Host, which is the immortal body of Christ, implants a principle of resurrection, a seed of immortality, which one day must germinate,”
– Pope Leo XIII
“If souls but understood the Treasure they possess in the Divine Eucharist, it would be necessary to encircle the tabernacles with the strongest ramparts for, in the delirium of a devouring and holy hunger, they would press forward themselves to feed on the Bread of Angels. The Churches would overflow with adorers consumed with love for the Divine prisoner no less by night than by day.”
– Bl. Dina Belanger
“At Nazareth Joseph’s days were filled with work which necessarily took him away at times from his Infant God. During these hours Mary replaced him, but when evening brought him home again, he would pass the entire night in adoration, never tiring, only too happy for the chance to contemplate the hidden riches of Jesus’ divinity. For he pierced the rough garments the Child wore, until his faith touched the Sacred Heart. In profound adoration he united himself to the special grace of each one of the events in the life of Jesus. He adored our Lord in His hidden life and in His Passion and Death; he adored in advance the Eucharistic Christ in His tabernacles: there was nothing that our Lord could hide from Saint Joseph. Among the graces which Jesus gave to His foster-father (and He flooded him with the graces attached to every one of His mysteries) is that special to an adorer of the Blessed Sacrament. That is the one we must ask of St. Joseph. Have confidence, strong confidence in him. Take him as the patron and the model of your life of adoration.”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“So immense are its spiritual benefits that Pope St. Pius X hailed perpetual adoration as the devotion which surpasses all others. And Paul VI had it mainly in mind when he echoed the hope generated by Vatican II that a new era of Eucharistic piety would pervade the whole Church. “As we would expect, an outstanding spiritual growth and impetus tend to spring from perpetual adoration. It brings heaven’s choice blessings in the first place on those generous souls that keep their hour-long tryst with the Lord. But, being such a powerhouse of grace, the devotion extends its influence far beyond the individual adorers, touching their homes and families and reaching out to the parish community and beyond.”
– Fr. Richard Foley, S. J.
“When later he [St. Joseph] carried the Child in his arms, acts of loving faith welled up constantly in his heart. It was a worship that pleased our Lord more than that which he receives in heaven. Picture to yourself Saint Joseph, adoring the little Child in his arms as his God. He tells of his readiness to die for Christ, of all his plans to promote Christ’s glory, and to win more souls to his love. No lover builds more scintillating plans for his loved one than a saint.”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“This is the wonderful truth, my dear friends: the Word, which became flesh two thousand years ago, is present today in the Eucharist,”
– Pope John Paul II
“O Mary, Mother of Jesus Christ, and our dear Mother! O all ye holy angels, who, by your adoration in our churches, make up for the little love which your God and our Saviour receives from men, obtain for us the grace to comprehend a little the love of Jesus Christ in the Most Holy Sacrament.”
– St. Margaret Mary
“When there are two roads which will bring me to some place, I take the one with more churches so as to be nearer the Blessed Sacrament. When I see a place where my Jesus is, I could not be happier, and I say, ‘You are here, my God and my All.'”
– Venerable J. J. Olier
“Heaven for me is hidden in a little Host Where Jesus, my Spouse, is veiled for love. I go to that Divine Furnace to draw out life, And there my Sweet Saviour listens to me night and day.”
– Heaven For Me, St. Therese of Lisieux
“The Eucharist is connected with the Passion. If Jesus had not established the Eucharist we would have forgotten the crucifixion. It would have faded into the past and we would have forgotten that Jesus loved us. There is a saying that to be far away from the eyes is to be far away from the heart. To make sure that we do not forget, Jesus gave us the Eucharist as a memorial of his love โฆ When you look at the Crucifix, you understand how much Jesus loved you then, when you look at the Sacred Host you understand how much Jesus loves you now.”
– Mother Teresa of Calcutta
“To withdraw from creatures and repose with Jesus in the Tabernacle is my delight; there I can hide myself and seek rest. There I find a life which I cannot describe, a joy which I cannot make others comprehend, a peace such as is found only under the hospitable roof of our best Friend.”
– St. Ignatius
“Our hours of adoration will be special hours of reparation for sins, and intercession for the needs of the whole world, exposing the sin-sick and suffering humanity to the healing, sustaining and transforming rays of Jesus, radiating from the Eucharist.”
– Mother Teresa of Calcutta
“Trust all things to Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament and to Mary Help of Christians and you will see what miracles are.”
– St. John Bosco
“We adore Thee most holy Lord Jesus Christ, here in all Thy Churches, which are in the whole world, because by Thy holy cross, Thou hast redeemed the world.”
– St. Francis of Assisi
“This practice of adoration is based on strong and solid reasons. For the Eucharist is at once a sacrifice and a sacrament; but it differs from the other sacraments in that it not only produces grace, but contains in a permanent manner the Author of Grace Himself. When, therefore, the Church bids us to adore Christ hidden behind the Eucharistic veils and to pray to Him for spiritual and temporal favors, of which we ever stand in need, she manifests faith in her divine Spouse who is present beneath these veils, she professes her gratitude to Him, and she enjoys the intimacy of His friendship”
– Pope Pius XII
“O Jesus of the Eucharist! O consecrated Host! O envied Monstrance! O blessed Ciborium, beloved of my heart! The Tabernacle is my Treasure, and, far or near, my eyes never lose sight of it, for it contains the God of Love.”
– Concepcion Cabrera de Armida
“It is most heartening to learn that young men and women, in their late teens and twenties, are increasingly attracted to meditative prayer in the Presence of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament. May all the faithful find in the Eucharist their source of strength and courage to imitate our Lady, totally open to his will in their daily lives. It is my hope that this devotion to Jesus in the Eucharist will spread to more and more parishes and dioceses across our nation.”
– John Cardinal O’Connor
“Every morning, even in the bitterest winter, she stood before the chapel door until it opened at four and remained there until after the last Mass. Out from her Caughnawaga cabin at dawn and straight-way to chapel to adore the Blessed Sacrament, hear every Mass; back again during the day to hear instruction, and at night for a last prayer or Benediction.”
– From the Catholic Network’s biography of Bl. Kateri Tekakwitha
“You come to me and unite Yourself intimately to me under the form of nourishment. Your Blood now runs in mine, Your Soul, Incarnate God, compenetrates mine, giving courage and support. What miracles! Who would have ever imagined such!”
– St. Maximilian Kolbe
“Wherever I may be I will often think of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament. I will fill my thoughts with the holy tabernacle (even when I happen to wake up at night) adoring Him from where I am, calling to Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, offering up to Him the action in which I am engaged. I will install one telegraph cable from my study to the Church, another from my bedroom, and a third from our refectory; and as often as I can, I will send messages of love to Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament.”
– Andrew Beltrami
“Put your sins in the chalice for the precious blood to wash away. One drop is capable of washing away the sins of the world.”
– Mother Teresa of Calcutta
“The daily adoration or visit to the Blessed Sacrament is the practice which is the fountainhead of all devotional works”
– Pope St. Pius X
“A thousand years of enjoying human glory is not worth even an hour spent sweetly communing with Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament.”
– St. Padre Pio
“Do you want the Lord to give you many graces? Visit Him often. Do you want Him to give you few graces? Visit Him rarely. Do you want the devil to attack you? Visit Jesus rarely in the Blessed Sacrament. Do you want him to flee from you? Visit Jesus often. Do you want to conquer the devil? Take refuge often at the feet of Jesus. Do you want to be conquered by the devil? Forget about visiting Jesus. My dear ones, the visit to the Blessed Sacrament is an extremely necessary way to conquer the devil. Therefore, go often to visit Jesus and the devil will not come out victorious against you.”
– St. John Bosco
“Certainly amongst all devotions, after that of receiving the sacraments, that of adoring Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament holds first place, is most pleasing to God, and most useful to ourselves. Do not then, O devout soul, refuse to begin this devotion; and forsaking the conversation of men, dwell each day, from this time forward, for at least half or quarter of an hour, in some church, in the presence of Jesus Christ under the sacramental species. Taste and see how sweet is the Lord.”
– St. Alphonsus Liguori
“The sovereigns of the earth do not always grant audience readily; on the contrary, the King of Heaven, hidden under the eucharistic veils, is ready to receive anyoneโฆ”
– St. Alphonsus Liguori
“The Eucharist, behold the Christian’s treasure, his delight on earth. Since Jesus is in the Eucharist for him personally, his whole life ought to be drawn to it like a magnet to its center.”
– St. Peter Julian Eymard
“When I stand up to talk, people listen to me; they will follow what I have to say. Is it any power of mine? Of course not. St. Paul says, ‘What have you that you have not received and you who have received, why do you glory as if you had not?’ But the secret of my power is that I have never in fifty-five years missed spending an hour in the presence of our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament. That’s where the power comes from. That’s where sermons are born. That’s where every good thought is conceived.”
– Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen
“Jesus, my God, I adore You, here present in the Blessed Sacrament of the altar, where You wait day and night to be our comfort while we await Your unveiled presence in heaven.”
– John J. Cardinal Carberry
“Perpetual Eucharistic Adoration with exposition needs a great push. People ask me: ‘What will convert America and save the world?’ My answer is prayer. What we need is for every parish to come before Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament in holy hours of prayer.”
– Mother Teresa of Calcutta
“I encourage Christians regularly to visit Christ present in the Blessed Sacrament, for we are all called to abide in the presence of God.”
– Pope John Paul II
“When the Sisters are exhausted, up to their eyes in work; when all seems to go awry, they spend an hour in prayer before the Blessed Sacrament. This practice has never failed to bear fruit: they experience peace and strength.”
– Mother Teresa of Calcutta
“I am quite sure that if we could but once approach the Most Holy Sacrament with great faith and love, it would suffice to make us rich. How much more so if we approach it often!”
– St. Teresa of Avila
“The faith I have when I am in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament is so strong that I find it impossible to express what I feelโฆ.When the time comes to leave I must force myself to overcome the inclination to prolong my stay with Jesus.”
– St. Anthony Mary Claret
