Lectio divina

Lectio divina

Ecclesia De Eucharistia

1. The Church lives from the Eucharist. This truth does not only express a daily experience of faith, but contains in synthesis the nucleus of the mystery of the Church. With joy she experiences in many forms the continual fulfilment of the promise: "Behold, I am with you always, to the close of the age" (Mt 28:20); but in the Holy Eucharist, through the conversion of the bread and wine into the Body and Blood of the Lord, she rejoices in this presence with a unique intensity. From the moment when, at Pentecost, the Church, the People of the New Covenant, began her pilgrim journey towards her heavenly homeland, the Divine Sacrament has continued to mark her days, filling them with trusting hope.

3. The Church is born from the Paschal Mystery. Precisely for this reason the Eucharist, which is the sacrament par excellence of the Paschal Mystery, is placed at the centre of ecclesial life. This can be seen from the very first images of the Church offered to us in the Acts of the Apostles: "They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to the prayers" (2:42). In the "breaking of bread" the Eucharist is evoked. After two thousand years we continue to realize that primordial image of the Church. And as we do so in the Eucharistic celebration, the eyes of the soul are led back to the Easter Triduum: to what took place on the evening of Holy Thursday, during the Last Supper, and after it.

9. The Eucharist, Jesus' saving presence in the community of the faithful and his spiritual nourishment, is the most precious thing the Church can have on her journey through history. This explains the attentive attention that she has always given to the Eucharistic mystery, an attention that emerges authoritatively in the work of the Councils and the Supreme Pontiffs.

The Church has received the Eucharist from Christ her Lord not as a gift, however precious among many others, but as the gift par excellence, because it is the gift of himself, of his person in his holy humanity, as well as of his work of salvation. This does not remain confined to the past, since "all that Christ is, all that he accomplished and suffered for all men, participates in the divine eternity and therefore embraces all times"

(Encyclical Letter - John Paul II - 17 April 2003)

The Church lives from the Eucharist

Now I would like our attention to other words of Jesus. I immediately state that they are private interviews and as such can also be taken with reservations; we know that the Church is very prudent in this regard and does well; however, it is undeniable that these words contain and therefore highlight a worrying reality.

I confess to you that, personally, I have been and still am very shaken by these words, especially if I propose them to myself standing before the Tabernacle; Try it too and then you will be able to tell yourself if these are words to be let pass and not rather stop them so that they go to the bottom of the heart so that they can do what they were dictated for. Here they are:
"The last gift I want to give to humanity so that it may be saved is the rediscovery of the Eucharist, then I no longer know what to do for it." Now let's move on to the others that affect us more closely!" "How I would like my consecrated persons to be closer to Me, more within themselves. They would be more perfect if they prayed more. Not on cars, on trains and in living rooms, but I wait for them at my feet.

My only ardent desire is to bring souls, especially my priests, closer to the source of all holiness: my altar! How many of my consecrated persons have gone away and do not realize it! They do everything: they gather, study a lot, write books to improve their parish and save souls, but they forget the EVERYTHING! They thus risk making the Council itself fruitless!

They die of hunger so as not to exploit the largest, the only capital: THE HOLY TABERNACLE. If they lived closer to my forgotten Ciborium, everything would come back to life in souls. There my priest should spend his day after the occupations; there the faithful should find him to be helped by his work; do not seek it elsewhere, but in my Church.

So many works that seem necessary, so many initiatives that oblige us to go around and talk are real flatteries of wanting to agitate and move; It is said: "I do everything for souls". How far they are from the true apostolate!

It is the sacred and omnipotent promise of a God: "I will bless and be the salvation of that parish where my priest lives his hours near my Tabernacle praying and also studying. Little by little I will transform it all! Today we want to see enthusiastic crowds flocking. No! True good is long in coming, and those who truly believe in Me do not expect to see the fruits immediately!"

Regarding vocations, here is Jesus' thought: "There is the ambition to succeed one better than the other: in parties, academies, songs and games, and I in the last place! I don't want professors and teachers who are only human; I want saints, living around my altar as the Center. No, society, parishes, institutes would not be like this if I were sought and loved.

How many blessings on My little ones, if My Sisters would bring them close to Me. How many vocations I would give if my people often found my consecrated person, priests and nuns close to me; how much more they would believe in my presence in their midst. But I will annihilate many Institutes that only wish to appear with beautiful works, many diplomas and comfortable houses. I don't know what to do with them! Blessed be that Institute, even if little known and esteemed, which loves me and serves me with a flower and a clean linen! In many churches no one thinks of me and I am in dirt and abandonment!"

That's right, dirt and abandonment; a priest kept the Holy Eucharist wrapped in a sheet of newspaper! In a religious house, the superior had not known for two years that she had the Eucharist at home; the presence of a passing sister, dusting the dusty altar with dried flowers and dirty tablecloths, opening the Tabernacle had the nice surprise: there was the Eucharist.

I do not want to prolong it any longer, only in another affirmation of Jesus: "I want my consecrated persons closer to Me and only to Me! I want them to believe that as they spend their hours beside My Tabernacle, I will be with them, work with them, and change their hearts. It is on nothing that I build my great works. But until they leave me Master of their parishes and their Institutes, let them not wait for vocations and holiness of life... but my justice will act."

What do you think of this vocational crisis that we have been carrying on our shoulders for years with very unpleasant consequences (closure of homes, reduction of apostolate, increasingly strong dependence on external forces, etc.) and of a certain moral and intellectual malaise that snakes through our homes? Is not God's justice already at work?

Yes, however, we can mitigate it and, perhaps, have it suspended if we commit ourselves to putting an end to Jesus' laments, giving our daily life a greater Eucharistic direction and spirit.