Wednesday, March 31, 2010

Fr. Charles Mangan: Ten Commandments for Eucharistic Reverence

Our Holy Catholic Church possesses the Real Presence of Jesus in the Holy Eucharist. Catholics regardless of age, race, wealth, education and depth of devotion enjoy the singular opportunity and duty to love and worship the Holy Eucharist before, during and after Mass.


How can we demonstrate our genuine love and adoration for “the Bread of Life and the Chalice of Everlasting Salvation?” These are our


Leaflet of Our Reverence for the Holy Eucharist by Fr. Mangan available here.

Saturday, March 27, 2010

Bishop Robert Morlino: Reverence for the Eucharist

"Our own reverence for the Eucharist is the key to going out into the world and letting everybody else know that Jesus present in the Eucharist is the only Savior of the world; and the only way they're going to believe that is if they see it in our own behavior all the time...Let's rejoice in being the Body of Christ, and let's renew our loving devotion for Jesus Christ present in the Eucharist by giving Him the gift today and every day of a heart full of reverence."
~ Bishop Robert Morlino ~

Thursday, March 25, 2010

Fr. John Hardon: No Eucharist Without Mary

It is remarkable how widespread is the ignorance of so many professed Catholics in just what happened when the angel appeared to our Lady at Nazareth.

When Mary told the angel, “Be it done to me according to your word,” God, who was present as God on earth from the dawn of creation, began to be present on earth as the God-man. In other words, God began to exist as man the moment Our Lady consented to becoming the Mother of her Creator.

Once God became man, He intended to remain Incarnate for all eternity. He lived a human mortal life until His death on the cross. When He rose from the dead, He remained on earth visibly for forty days. Then He ascended into heaven and, as we profess in the Creed, He is seated at the right hand of His heavenly Father.

But on the night before He died, He ordained His apostles as priests, mainly to continue doing what He had done when He changed bread and wine into His own living Body and Blood. Why did He do this? In order to be not only in heaven, but to remain on earth as the God-man in the Holy Eucharist until the end of time.

It is impossible to exaggerate the role of Mary in the Holy Eucharist. Except for her, there would not have been any Incarnation, and without the Incarnation there could be no Eucharist.

Christ in the Eucharist, therefore, is identical with the Christ of history in possessing the same human nature. But this presents two more possibilities. Having the same human nature can mean that in both cases He has only the same human soul, or that He also has the same human body.

Orthodox Catholic doctrine teaches, of course, that the identity of Christ’s human nature covers both body and soul. Consequently we find a stress in the documents of the Church on a bodily presence in the Blessed Sacrament, as a counterpoise to the error of spiritualizing Christ in the Eucharist to the exclusion or at least the oversight of His body. The Church’s infallible teaching could not be clearer. In the Eucharist is present the whole Christ, humanity and divinity, body and soul. Everything which makes Christ, Christ is present in the Blessed Sacrament.

As Jesus told the crowd, “Amen, Amen, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man, and drink His blood you shall not have life in you” (John 6:54).

As Catholics we believe that Jesus Christ is present on earth in the fullness of His humanity. Unless this were true, there could be no adoration of the Blessed Sacrament. There could be no Sacrifice of the Mass, and no Holy Communion.

All of this we owe to the Blessed Virgin Mary once she agreed to conceive the Incarnate Son of God and give Him birth at Bethlehem. (Source)
~ Servant of God Fr. John Hardon, S.J. ~

Saturday, March 20, 2010

Fr. William Casey: "At the Name of JESUS Every Knee Must Bend!!!!!!!"

"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".
~ Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta ~

Wednesday, March 17, 2010

Sweet Sacrament, We Thee Adore

Jesus, my Lord, my God, my all,
How can I love Thee as I ought?
And how revere this wond'rous 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!

William Faber, an English convert to Catholicism wrote this and other beautiful hymns which today can be found in both Catholic and Protestant hymnals.


Wednesday, March 10, 2010

The Eucharist Changes the World

"Let us return from the Table
like lions breathing out fire,
terrifying to the devil."

~ St. John Chrysostom ~


Wednesday, March 3, 2010

St. Katharine Drexel's Sweetest Joy--Eucharistic Adoration

"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 ~