Creating what does not exist and changing natures to something new

If the words of Elijah had power even to bring down fire from heaven, will not the words of Christ have power to change the natures of the elements? You have read that in the creation of the whole world he spoke and they came to be; he commanded and they were created. If Christ could by speaking create out of nothing what did not yet exist, can we say that his words are unable to change existing things into something they previously were not? It is no lesser feat to create new natures for things than to change their existing natures.

St. Ambrose, from treatise on the Mysteries

This is such a basic bit of logic and yet one that never occurred to me. Now I just have to hope it pops into my mind if I am in discussion about the Eucharist.

Come, Let Us Adore Him

The words to a Christmas song ... in July.

Yet, they speak to a reality that we would do well to consider all the year round. The Real Presence of Jesus is waiting in the church, at Mass, in the tabernacle, and if we are very fortunate Jesus is exposed in the Monstrance for us to come to Him.

All of this presupposes that one understands that Christ's Real Presence means Jesus' body and blood, soul and divinity, are contained completely in the Eucharist. Now, I don't know about you, but if Jesus appeared before me physically, I'd likely fall on my face in worship and adoration, blown away by His Presence. So if we would do it under those circumstances then why wouldn't we do it for his very real presence in the Eucharist?

A very big reason is that poor teaching can leave even our priests not understanding this elemental foundation of our Catholic faith. This is witnessed to by the explanation given at a local church (handily typed up and ready to pass around) about why they do not have Adoration. Think of it. So many people ask about Adoration that they must have a handout ready as to why they deny it. The essence of the handout says these reasons that that particular church does not offer Adoration:

The basic reason is that it takes away from the true meaning of the Eucharist - the eating and drinking of the Lord as a Community during Mass. Adoration takes the Eucharist out of its true context - a dynamic action of the Community, and turns it into a thing, the Body of Christ. All other sacraments are actions; we anoint, we lay on hands, we pour water. The instructions of Jesus are clear - take and eat, take and drink. There is nothing in scriptures that supports adoration. Every mention is in terms of the eating and drinking. As the apostles remarked after encountering the risen Jesus on Easter Sunday .... "We knew him in the breaking of the bread".

Another important factor is that when we practice adoration, we are localizing Jesus. When we focus on the host in the monstrance as the real presence of Jesus, we tend to forget that Jesus is not confined to a host, but is really present in us when we leave the chapel and, most especially, he is present in other people as we encounter them in our daily life.

The historical roots of the practice of adoration are in the breakdown of the Eucharist as covenant meal. Very few were eating and drinking during an extended period of the Church's history. We had to do something with it, so we blessed people with it (benediction), carried it in processions, and prayed in front of it (adoration). But now that we have recovered the meaning of the Eucharist as covenant meal, we should not do anything to take our attention from it.

Now, this is so wrong it just plain hurts.

Before we mention anything else, it begs the question, why can't we do both Adoration and taking Christ into the world? Which would be the obvious and first answer to the overall objection raised above.

Let me toss out there a few things in refutation of the very wrong teachings contained above. I will go with my instinctive reactions, though there will be much more that could be said, I know.

First I must comment about the statement, "There is nothing in scriptures that supports adoration." This would only be true if one does not really believe it is Christ Himself present in the Eucharist. Which is heretical. The doctrine of the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist has been the constant belief of the Church from the time of the Apostles.

We are presented with myriad forms of adoration of Christ throughout the Gospels. I will just mention the most obvious one which would spring to mind for most people. The news of Christ's birth saw angels and shepherds adoring him as he was laid in a manger (from which animals eat grain) in the town of Bethlehem (one translation of the word Bethlehem: city of bread).

If I didn't know better, I'd think Someone was making a point.

I can't resist pointing out here that Jesus is not "active." His presence is enough to inspire worship and adoration for all that He simply is. Period.

Several modern popes point us squarely toward Adoration and do not seem to think it is better left in the past or "takes our attention" away from the true meaning of the Eucharist. Pope John Paul II, who was a great believer in the power of Adoration of the Eucharist spoke about it on numerous occasions. A few excerpts:

"I hope that this form of perpetual adoration, with permanent exposition of the Blessed Sacrament, will continue into the future."

International Eucharistic Congress in Seville, Spain June 1993

"Public and private devotion to the Holy Eucharist outside Mass is highly recommended: for the presence of Christ, who is adored by the faithful in the Sacrament, derives from the sacrifice and is directed towards sacramental and spiritual communion."

Inaestimabile Donum, #20, 1980

"The Church and the world have great need of Eucharistic adoration. Jesus waits for us in this sacrament of love. Let us be generous with our time in going to meet Him in adoration and contemplation full of faith. And let us be ready to make reparation for the great faults and crimes of the world. May our adoration never cease."

Dominicae Cenae: Letter to Priests, Holy Thursday, 1980

"Closeness to the Eucharistic Christ in silence and contemplation does not distance us from our contemporaries but, on the contrary, makes us open to human joy and distress, broadening our hearts on a global scale. 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 Eucharistic Savior draws the whole world with him and raises it to God."

Letter to the Bishop of Liege, Reported in L'Osserv. Romano, 1996

Finally, as a quick commentary, the 11th General Synod of Bishops called by Pope Benedict XVI was about the Eucharist. You can see the summary document of the meeting (issued by the Vatican) here.

Strikingly, this excerpt speaks directly to the handout's points:

It is widely held that Christ’s presence is a result of the community and not Christ himself, who is the font and centre of our communion and head of his Body, the Church.

Neglect of prayer, contemplation and adoration of the Eucharistic mystery has weakened the sense of the sacred in relation to this great Sacrament.

This situation can lead to compromising the truth of Catholic teaching concerning the change of the bread and wine into the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ, traditionally called transubstantiation. It can also threaten faith in the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist, a belief which suffers from ideas which intend to explain the Eucharistic mystery not so much in itself but rather from a subjective point of view, for example, in the use of terms like “trans-finalization” and “trans-signification.”

Specifically pointing out Adoration, the document says:

40. Furthermore, it must not to be forgotten that faith in the Real Presence of the dead and risen Lord in the Blessed Sacrament has a culminating point in Eucharistic adoration, a firmly grounded tradition in the Latin Church. Such a practice—rightly highlighted in many Lineamenta responses—should not be presented as something apart from the Eucharistic celebration but as its natural continuation. The responses also indicate that some particular Churches are experiencing a reawakening in Eucharistic adoration, which, in each case, is to be done in a dignified and solemn manner.

There are books that can be written and, of course, have been written on this subject. I am not clever enough to cover every point and, in any case, that would take more time than I have now. However, I did want to give a few basics on this very precious privilege that should be made available to Catholics whenever the possibility exists.

I know that this local church is far from being the only one perpetuating wrong teachings. I pray for the priests and I pray for the parishioners who are being thus denied.

Note: Heather has some very good thoughts about the Eucharist as center and all of our Catholic faith and as the True Presence of Jesus.

More Relating to That "Boot Camp" for Love

My morning's reading of Jesus of Nazareth (yes, I'm finally back to reading it) dovetails perfectly with yesterday's personal revelation. I think someone's trying to tell me something ...

Let us recall that the parable of the vine occurs in the context of Jesus' Last Supper. After the multiplication of the loaves he had spoken of the true bread from heaven that he would give, and thus he left us with a profound interpretation of the eucharistic bread that was to come. It is hard to believe that in his discourse on the vine he is not tacitly alluding to the new wine that had already been prefigured at Cana and which he now gives to us -- the wine that would flow from his Passion, from his "love to the end" (Jn 13:1). In this sense, the parable of the vine has a thoroughly eucharistic background. The parable of the fruit that Jesus brings forth: his love, which pours itself out for us on the Cross and which is the choice new wine destined for God's marriage feast with man. Thus we come to understand the full depth and grandeur of the Eucharist, even though it is not explicitly mentioned here. The Eucharist points us toward the fruit that we, as branches of the vine, can and must bear with Christ an by virtue of Christ. The fruit the Lord expects of us is love -- a love that accepts with him the mystery of the Cross, and becomes a participation in his self-giving -- and hence the true justice that prepares the world for the Kingdom of God.

Purification and fruit belong together; only by undergoing God's purifications can we bear the fruit that flows into the eucharistic mystery and so leads to the marriage feast that is the goal toward which God directs history. Fruit and lo e belong together: The true fruit is the love that has passed through the Cross, through God's purifications. "Remaining" is an essential part of all this. In verses 1-10 the word remain (in Greek menein) occurs ten times. What the Church Fathers call perseverantia -- patient steadfastness in communion with the Lord amidst all the vicissitudes of life -- is placed center stage here. Initial enthusiasm is easy. Afterward though, it is time to stand firm, even along the monotonous desert paths that we are called upon to traverse in this life -- with the patience it takes to tread evenly, a patience in which the romanticism of the initial awakening subsides, so that only the deep, pure Yes of faith remains. This is the way to produce good wine ...

Jesus of Nazareth by Joseph Ratzinger (a.k.a. Pope Benedict XVI)

The Institution of the Eucharist

Continuing catching up on posting the bulletin inserts commenting on excerpts from Sacramentum Caritatis. This is #7.

10. This leads us to reflect on the institution of the Eucharist at the Last Supper. It took place within a ritual meal commemorating the foundational event of the people of Israel: their deliverance from slavery in Egypt. This ritual meal, which called for the sacrifice of lambs (cf. Ex 12:1-28, 43-51), was a remembrance of the past, but at the same time a prophetic remembrance, the proclamation of a deliverance yet to come. The people had come to realize that their earlier liberation was not definitive, for their history continued to be marked by slavery and sin. The remembrance of their ancient liberation thus expanded to the invocation and expectation of a yet more profound, radical, universal and definitive salvation. This is the context in which Jesus introduces the newness of his gift. In the prayer of praise, the Berakah, he does not simply thank the Father for the great events of past history, but also for his own “exaltation.” In instituting the sacrament of the Eucharist, Jesus anticipates and makes present the sacrifice of the Cross and the victory of the resurrection. At the same time, he reveals that he himself is the true sacrificial lamb, destined in the Father’s plan from the foundation of the world, as we read in The First Letter of Peter (cf. 1:18-20). By placing his gift in this context, Jesus shows the salvific meaning of his death and resurrection, a mystery which renews history and the whole cosmos. The institution of the Eucharist demonstrates how Jesus’ death, for all its violence and absurdity, became in him a supreme act of love and mankind’s definitive deliverance from evil.

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As the Holy Father has carefully shown us in past excerpts, the Eucharist is a radical, self-giving of Jesus for our sakes. It makes sense then that Jesus would carefully select the most meaningful time to institute it. Just as a speech made from “Ground Zero” on September 11 has many layers of meaning for us, presenting this special, new gift at the Passover would have been deliberate and the disciples would have understood that.

In the context of the Passover, the apostles would have noticed the significance of historical and cultural clues necessary to help understand the significance of this salvific gift. They would not have full understanding until they received the gift of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, but the basic grounding in their faith provided a solid foundation upon which was built our understanding of the Eucharist. This is confirmed by the verses quoted by Pope Benedict from The First Letter of Peter (1:18-20): ... realizing that you were ransomed from your futile conduct, handed on by your ancestors, not with perishable things like silver or gold but with the precious blood of Christ as of a spotless unblemished lamb. He was known before the foundation of the world but revealed in the final time for you ...

We no longer have the cultural markers that the disciples did. Our connection with this reality is through the liturgy, especially during Holy Week before Easter. We may identify it as a ritual and be moved only by the drama and passing sentiment of the moment, without ever experiencing more. How do we achieve this? Our thoughtful reflection and prayerful contemplation, as noted in the Holy Father’s words, should awaken within us the deepest appreciation of the Eucharist as living and transforming reality - present in our lives yet also a promise of what is to come. We must acknowledge that there is so much more for us - in Christ and in the Eucharist - than we are asked to consider in everyday life.
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This is one of a weekly series of excerpts from Pope Benedict XVI’s Apostolic Exhortation Sacramentum Caritatis. You are encouraged to read the entire document. The Vatican link to that document as well as to Pope Benedict’s first encyclical can be found on the website, www.stthomasaquinas.org.

The Eucharist: Jesus the True Sacrificial Lamb

Another in the series of bulletin inserts featuring excerpts from Sacramentum Caritatis that have been running weekly. I'm way behind in sharing these with you. This is #6.

The new and eternal covenant in the blood of the Lamb

9. The mission for which Jesus came among us was accomplished in the Paschal Mystery. On the Cross from which he draws all people to himself (cf. Jn 12:32), just before “giving up the Spirit,” he utters the words: “it is finished” (Jn 19:30). In the mystery of Christ’s obedience unto death, even death on a Cross (cf. Phil 2:8), the new and eternal covenant was brought about. In his crucified flesh, God’s freedom and our human freedom met definitively in an inviolable, eternally valid pact. Human sin was also redeemed once for all by God’s Son (cf. Heb 7:27; 1 Jn 2:2; 4:10). As I have said elsewhere, “Christ’s death on the Cross is the culmination of that turning of God against himself in which he gives himself in order to raise man up and save him. This is love in its most radical form.” (18) In the Paschal Mystery, our deliverance from evil and death has taken place. In instituting the Eucharist, Jesus had spoken of the “new and eternal covenant” in the shedding of his blood (cf. Mt 26:28; Mk 14:24; Lk 22:20). This, the ultimate purpose of his mission, was clear from the very beginning of his public life. Indeed, when, on the banks of the Jordan, John the Baptist saw Jesus coming towards him, he cried out: “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world” (Jn 1:29). It is significant that these same words are repeated at every celebration of Holy Mass, when the priest invites us to approach the altar: “This is the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. Happy are those who are called to his supper.” Jesus is the true paschal lamb who freely gave himself in sacrifice for us, and thus brought about the new and eternal covenant. The Eucharist contains this radical newness, which is offered to us again at every celebration. (19)

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It is a sobering thought that Jesus came to us specifically with a mission to die. Unlike the rest of us, who wonder about vocations, marriage, and what to do with our lives in general, Jesus always was headed for one specific purpose ... to give himself in complete sacrifice for our sins.

Perhaps Jesus’ time among us has become so familiar in the retelling of the Gospel stories that the edges have been worn off. It is easy to not stop to really consider just how radical and complete Jesus’ sacrifice was, as Pope Benedict says, “that turning of God against himself in which he gives himself in order to raise man up and save him. ”

In this we see the true meaning of covenant. Unlike a contract in which often each party seeks to protect his own interests, in a covenant each party gives of self without condition on the other person. In his sacrifice Jesus the Lamb of God surrendered his will and laid down his life, securing the covenant and redeeming us from sin. Contemplating the Eucharist we are allowed to see God steps out of himself, going to extraordinary lengths for our sakes. How could we neglect, how could ignore, how could we not be happy to be “called his supper”?
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(18) Encyclical Letter Deus Caritas Est (25 December 2005), AAS 98 (2006), 228.
(19) Cf. Propositio 3.

This is one of a weekly series of excerpts from Pope Benedict XVI’s Apostolic Exhortation Sacramentum Caritatis. You encouraged to read the entire document. The Vatican link document as well as to Pope Benedict’s first encyclical can found on the website, www.stthomasaquinas.org.

The Blessed Trinity and the Eucharist: A Free Gift

I realize that I have forgotten for some time to put up our parish's bulletin inserts that have been running with excerpts and commentary about Sacramentum Caritatis. Here is insert #5.

The Blessed Trinity and the Eucharist

A free gift of the Blessed Trinity

8. The Eucharist reveals the loving plan that guides all of salvation history (cf. Eph 1:10; 3:8- 11). There the Deus Trinitas*, who is essentially love (cf. 1 Jn 4:7-8), becomes fully a part of our human condition. In the bread and wine under whose appearances Christ gives himself to us in the paschal meal (cf. Lk 22:14-20; 1 Cor 11:23-26), God’s whole life encounters us and is sacramentally shared with us. God is a perfect communion of love between Father, Son and Holy Spirit. At creation itself, man was called to have some share in God’s breath of life (cf. Gen 2:7). But it is in Christ, dead and risen, and in the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, given without measure (cf. Jn 3:34), that we have become sharers of God’s inmost life. (16) Jesus Christ, who “through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God” (Heb 9:14), makes us, in the gift of the Eucharist, sharers in God’s own life. This is an absolutely free gift, the superabundant fulfilment of God’s promises. The Church receives, celebrates and adores this gift in faithful obedience. The “mystery of faith” is thus a mystery of trinitarian love, a mystery in which we are called by grace to participate. We too should therefore exclaim with Saint Augustine: “If you see love, you see the Trinity.” (17)

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If we will truly pause to reflect after receiving the Eucharist, we are drawn into contemplating the special intimacy with Jesus to which we are invited when we receive His Body and Blood. This is a true and fair reflection for we receive the whole Christ — Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity. Pope Benedict asks us to open our minds and hearts to be led through intimacy with Christ into a deeper and more real relationship with the Triune God through Jesus Himself. Here the Holy Father reminds us, “God is a perfect communion of love between Father, Son and Holy Spirit.”

As this is the case, we come unfailingly with Pope Benedict to the understanding that, when we par­take of the Eucharist, we participate, not simply in the life of Christ, but we are partaking in that very life possessed by the Triune God. “Jesus Christ, who “through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God” (Heb 9:14), makes us, in the gift of the Eucharist, sharers in God’s own life.”

This gift, this grace, this life is ours — freely given and unmerited — the participation and sharing in uncreated, that is, God’s own life. It is what we grew up calling Sanctifying Grace. This grace is ultimately relationship with the Trinity, life-sharing with God, motivated by and producing, bearing fruit in Love.

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(16) Cf. Propositio 4.
(17) De Trinitate, VIII, 8, 12: CCL 50, 287.
* Deus Trinitas: Triune God. In other words, God as Trinity, a single being existing simultaneously as three distinct persons: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
This is one of a series of excerpts from Pope Benedict XVI’s Apostolic Exhortation Sacramentum Caritatis. You are encouraged to read the entire document. The Vatican link to that document as well as to Pope Benedict’s first encyclical can be found on the website, www.stthomasaquinas.org.

Corpus Christi ... The Reality of the Eucharist

For me, Eucharistic chat is all well and good, but it does not make me believe in the Real Presence. What does that is the Eucharist itself - with each encounter, with each breaking of the bread, with each hour of Adoration, Jesus’ Real Presence becomes more undeniable as he reels me in and I flop down before him, a landed grouper, both unable to escape and not wanting to. For me, His Presence in the Eucharist cannot be talked…it must be experienced. A half-hour before the monstrance, an hour before a closed tabernacle in an empty church…nothing compares, nothing instructs so sweetly, or sears me with such unrelenting gentleness. John Paul II wrote every one of his encyclicals while seated before the Tabernacle in his chapel.

This is also my experience of the reality of the Eucharist. The Anchoress has given us a veritable feast for contemplation in preparation of this coming Sunday's Solemnity of Corpus Christi. Included in that, she leads us to a deacon whose site I certainly shall be visiting often in the future.

In 1995, a Gallup poll reported that only 30 percent of Catholics – less than a third -- believe in the Real Presence, that the bread and wine truly become the body and blood of Christ. Another 30 percent said it’s just a symbol.

I wish they could see what I've seen.

A few years ago, my wife and I had the good fortune to make a pilgrimage through Italy. One of the stops was in a town called Lanciano.

About 1200 years ago, a priest there had begun to doubt the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist. Then one morning, during mass, he was stunned to discover that the bread and wine in his hands had become actual flesh and blood.

Today, it’s been preserved in a glass case, on its own altar. You can walk around it and see the host from many different angles. The blood has congealed naturally into five distinct pellets – just like the five wounds of Christ. In 1970, scientists were given permission to take samples and analyze it.

They weren’t prepared for what they found.

The bread is actually myocardial tissue -- tissue from the heart.

And what had been wine is, in fact, type AB blood. The universal recipient blood type.

It has been so perfectly preserved, the investigators ruled out any kind of fraud. They determined it was human, and could not have come from a cadaver, or it would have spoiled.

Instead, the flesh and blood that were hundreds of years old appeared new.

In other words: ageless.

Do go read all of both, as well as The Anchoress' linked posts at the bottom.

Bread From Heaven

The most recent of the series that has been running in our bulletin with excerpts from Sacramentum Caritatis

The Blessed Trinity and the Eucharist

The bread come down from heaven7. The first element of eucharistic faith is the mystery of God himself, trinitarian love. In Jesus’ dialogue with Nicodemus, we find an illuminating expression in this regard: “God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God sent the Son into the world, not to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him” (Jn 3:16-17). These words show the deepest source of God’s gift. In the Eucharist Jesus does not give us a “thing,” but himself; he offers his own body and pours out his own blood. He thus gives us the totality of his life and reveals the ultimate origin of this love. He is the eternal Son, given to us by the Father. In the Gospel we hear how Jesus, after feeding the crowds by multiplying the loaves and fishes, says to those who had followed him to the synagogue of Capernaum: “My Father gives you the true bread from heaven; for the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven, and gives life to the world” (Jn 6:32-33), and even identifies himself, his own flesh and blood, with that bread: “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). Jesus thus shows that he is the bread of life which the eternal Father gives to mankind.

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In this passage Pope Benedict XVI traces the connection between Jesus and the Eucharist. In so doing, he makes it easier for us to understand the source of the apostles’ faith in Jesus as “the bread of life come down from heaven.” Their faith is the same that has been passed to us 2,000 years later and it is good to be reminded of the original sources. If we take the time to go read the scriptural references for ourselves they come to life even more as we see the context.

We also are reminded that God’s generosity to us knows no bounds. In the Eucharist Jesus does not give us a “thing,” but himself; he offers his own body and pours out his own blood. As Saint Catherine of Siena says, “We are purchased not with gold, nor merely with love’s sweetness, but with blood.” Jesus gives literally everything that he has and is. What is more, he does it every time Mass is celebrated which is something to contemplate before we go to Holy Communion.

A Mystery to Be Believed

Another from the weekly installments that have been appearing in our church bulletin. I can't believe I forgot to post this until now. I really have been enjoying the way that this is taking us through the document so slowly ... it makes me really think about each paragraph.

The Eucharist:
A Mystery to Be Believed

“This is the work of God: that you believe in him whom he has sent” (Jn 6:29)

The Church’s eucharistic faith
6. “The mystery of faith!” With these words, spoken immediately after the words of consecration, the priest proclaims the mystery being celebrated and expresses his wonder before the substantial change of bread and wine into the body and blood of the Lord Jesus, a reality which surpasses all human understanding. The Eucharist is a “mystery of faith” par excellence: “the sum and summary of our faith.” (13) The Church’s faith is essentially a eucharistic faith, and it is especially nourished at the table of the Eucharist. Faith and the sacraments are two complementary aspects of ecclesial* life. Awakened by the preaching of God’s word, faith is nourished and grows in the grace-filled encounter with the Risen Lord which takes place in the sacraments: “faith is expressed in the rite, while the rite reinforces and strengthens faith.” (14) For this reason, the Sacrament of the Altar is always at the heart of the Church’s life: “thanks to the Eucharist, the Church is reborn ever anew!” (15) The more lively the eucharistic faith of the People of God, the deeper is its sharing in ecclesial life in steadfast commitment to the mission entrusted by Christ to his disciples. The Church’s very history bears witness to this. Every great reform has in some way been linked to the rediscovery of belief in the Lord’s eucharistic presence among his people.

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The “mystery of faith” that is the Eucharist is something that we may not really consider much when in the habit of going to Mass regularly. It is human nature for us to become dulled to splendor when it is presented time after time. However, Pope Benedict reminds us that we are participating in a reality that “surpasses all human understanding” in the Eucharist. We actually are partaking of the body and blood, soul and divinity, of Jesus Christ himself. Indeed, how is it possible to adequately understand such a thing? The answer is that we cannot understand it, at least not with the ordinary comprehension that we apply to everyday things.

Saint Augustine said, “I believe, that I may understand.” Our understanding of the Eucharist grows not through any proof or scientific understanding but because of God’s grace. By partaking in the sacraments which nourish our faith and keeping the fact of this “mystery” in our minds during the Mass we may be privileged to see just a bit better when Heaven comes to earth as the Eucharist comes to us during Holy Communion.
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(13) Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1327.
(14) Propositio 16.
(15) Benedict XVI, Homily at the Mass of Installation in the Cathedral of Rome (7 May 2005): AAS 97 (2005), 752.
* Ecclesial: of or relating to a church

What is Adoration?

Now that's a good question and one that I didn't think to explain when mentioning that I'd take prayer requests this weekend when I go to Adoration.

Eucharistic adoration is a practice in the Roman Catholic and some Anglican Churches, in which the Blessed Sacrament is exposed to and adored by the faithful. When this exposure and adoration is constant (that is, twenty-four hours a day), it is called perpetual adoration. In a parish, this is usually done by volunteer parishioners; in a monastery or convent, it is done by the resident monks or nuns...

The host is displayed in a monstrance, typically placed on an altar. The Blessed Sacrament may not actually be exposed, but left in a ciborium, which is likewise placed on an altar. This exposition usually occurs in the context of a service of Benediction or similar service of devotions to the Blessed Sacrament. In services of perpetual adoration, parishioners volunteer to attend for a certain period of time, typically an hour, around the clock. Because of the difficulty of maintaining twenty-four hour attendance, many parishes no longer provide perpetual adoration. In many parishes, the Blessed Sacrament is reserved in an enclosed tabernacle so that the faithful may pray in its presence without the need for volunteers to be in constant attendance (as must be the case when the Blessed Sacrament is exposed).

Wikipedia

This is all based around the Catholic belief that the Eucharist is the body and blood, soul and divinity of Christ. So when you sit with the Eucharist, you are sitting with Jesus Himself. (Much more information can be found here.)

I remember being intensely curious about this practice about three years ago. I ordered and read No Wonder They Call It the Real Presence: Lives Changed by Christ In Eucharistic Adoration which just fueled my curiosity. (I highly recommend that book, by the way. You can read an excerpted chapter here.)

About three weeks after I finished reading the book I had an opportunity for Adoration and the result was ... nothing. Oh, it was peaceful and nice but that was all.

Upon subsequent occasions I have had much more of a connection, words popping into the back of my mind, answers to questions about a course of action to take, the sort of thing that leave my husband shaking his head. He is not exactly disbelieving but just ... shakes his head. He's used to my crazy ways. I don't need adoration for that. It happens quite frequently in front of the tabernacle during Mass.

You can simply sit peacefully with Jesus the entire time, read a devotional book, write in a journal, that sort of thing. It depends on the person. No matter what, the experience is one of peace. That is pretty much a universal result. And if you mention that to my husband he won't move his head at all ... except to nod in agreement!