I know at the end of my last column, I stated that my next writing would focus on the symbols and rituals of the Mass of the Roman Rite. However, I have decided to delay that column to address what I consider to be something that could be easily overlooked: “What happens after I have participated in Mass and received Holy Communion?” What takes place in my life (and your life) after the Final Blessing and the invitation to “Go in peace?”
I think my own answer sometimes would be nothing! I did my time, and now I will get back to my life. Therefore, the parking lot “wars,” the ignoring of certain persons as we leave church, the whispering about “so and so,” even the coarseness of our language might not be tempered while standing on holy ground. Some skeptics might even say, “Why did you even bother to go?” Although one of my favorite responses to this inquiry is, “Could you imagine what they would be like if they didn’t?!”
By now, I think you may be getting a hint of where I am going with this column. Just as the bread and wine are changed into the very Body and Blood of Christ at every Mass, how are we, too, changed by the receiving of His Holy Word and His Body and Blood? How do we grow as members of Christ’s Body each time we encounter Him?
There is a story that has made the rounds about a religion teacher asking her students the question, “What is the most important part of the Mass?” No students’ hands went up except that of a young man who happened to be the class clown. Reluctantly, the teacher acknowledged him and asked him to state his answer. He stood up proudly and announced to all the room, “Teacher, the most important part of the Mass is the Dismissal Rite.” As one may imagine the room erupted in laughter and the teacher, containing her irritation responded, “Please explain your answer,” to which the student replied, “The Dismissal Rite is the most important part of the Mass because that is when we go out and live the Mass!”
No theologian could have said it better! And yet, therein lies the challenge for all believers: How do we become what we see and consume? It is noted in the Gospel of John, Chapter 6, “The Bread of Life Discourses,” that not necessarily does everyone leave such an encounter changed. In fact, verse 60 states, “Then many of his disciples who were listening said, ‘This saying is hard; who can accept it?” And then in verse 66 one reads, “As a result of this, many of His disciples returned to their former way of life and no longer accompanied Him.”
I have been giving much thought to my own spiritual life, what my participation in the Eucharist means for the living out of my daily life. Even this morning, as I was offering Holy Mass, I chose to use the fourth version of the “Eucharistic Prayer for Various Needs,” which is entitled, “Jesus, Who Went About Doing Good.” In its Preface, it states: “He always showed compassion for children and for the poor, for the sick and for sinners, and He became a neighbor to the oppressed and the afflicted. By word and deed, He announced to the world that You are our Father and that You care for all Your sons and daughters.” And in its intercessions after the consecration, it says: “Open our eyes to the needs of our brothers and sisters; inspire in us words and actions to comfort those who labor and are burdened. Make us serve them truly, after the example of Christ and at His command. And may your Church stand as a living witness to truth and freedom, to peace and justice, that all people may be raised to a new hope.”
Wow! What a mandate! And yet, that is what the Eucharist is calling us to — “This is my body broken for you … this is my blood poured out for you” — not only Jesus’ words, but our words as well, who have a share in his Paschal Mystery — His living, dying, and rising. St. John Chrysostom writes of the moments after Holy Communion, “Let us then return from the table like lions breathing fire.” It echoes Jesus’ own words two Sundays ago when in the Gospel He proclaimed: “I have come to set the world on fire and how I wish it were already blazing” (Lk 12:49). The fire Jesus is speaking of is the fire of Divine Love — a fire symbolized by his Sacred Heart. One of the prayers I utter quietly to myself at Communion time is, “Jesus, meek and humble of heart, make my heart like unto Thine.”
Not an easy prayer, but one illustrated in the parable known as “The Workers in the Vineyard” (Matthew 20:1-16a) that often causes its readers and listeners angst. It concerns the laborers who were hired by the landowner at different hours of the day, but at the end of the day all received the same wage. I know that for many years of my life, I sympathized wholeheartedly with the laborers who felt they were getting the raw end of the deal by working all day, and then to find out those who worked only a couple of hours received the same pay. This does not take away from the landowner’s generosity or his right to do with his money as he pleases. However, fair is fair!
Yet, as I reflected on this passage last week, I found myself asking, “Is the landowner being more than fair?” What I mean by this question is that I was struck by the landowner’s attentiveness to those hired last in the sense that the usual daily wage would mean whether their families would have enough to eat today, since they were getting by hand to mouth. What struck me, in particular, is that the landowner was allaying this fear by paying them first. He was attentive to the anxiety and pressure they must be feeling and went out of his way to alleviate their stress.
This leads me to what I consider the BIG ASK in my reflection, “How do you and I help to alleviate the stress and anxiety felt by many in our society today, especially those struggling to make ends meet and have no place to call ‘home?’ I cannot help but be concerned about the ongoing squabbling between federal, state, and local governments about who should be paying for social programs to help the needy of our day, while putting up incessant roadblocks for those willing to do so. It seems that there is a lot of passing the buck and forgetting who this is all affecting — God’s precious sons and daughters! I feel that we are becoming a society of the “unseen” — if something or someone is “unseen” it is no longer our problem, whether within our own city, state, or nation, or in Gaza, or in other war-torn parts of our world.
Is that what it means to be a Eucharistic people? As disturbing as this question may be, I think you and I know the answer. Therefore, it brings us back to the question that began this reflection, “What happens after I have participated in Mass and received Holy Communion?” How will Jesus Christ be known and seen through me?
