The Holy Eucharist

The Holy Eucharist and the Saints
What is the Holy Eucharist?

“It is God among us. It is the Lord Jesus present in the taber­na­cles of our Church­es with his Body, Blood, Soul and Divin­i­ty. It is Jesus veiled under the appear­ance of bread, but real­ly and phys­i­cal­ly present in the con­se­crat­ed Host, so that He dwells in our midst, works with­in us and for us, and is at our dis­pos­al.” (Jesus Our Eucharis­tic Love, p.10).

The Holy Eucharist: The Holy Mass, Holy Com­mu­nion, and Ado­ra­tion of the Blessed Sacra­ment

We must take care to arrive ear­ly to church to pre­pare our­selves for the Holy Mass because the Holy Mass is the high­est act of wor­ship of God and devo­tion.

Dur­ing the Litur­gy of the Word, we must lis­ten rev­er­ent­ly and atten­tive­ly to allow the Word of God to bear fruit in our lives. We must also lis­ten rev­er­ent­ly to the priests’ homi­ly. The priest instructs us as to how to under­stand the read­ings we have just heard and apply them to our lives.

Dur­ing the Litur­gy of the Eucharist, the priest first offers bread and wine to God as well as the gifts and prayers of the assem­bly of the faith­ful (the Offer­to­ry part of the Litur­gy of the Eucharist). The priest then prays in prepa­ra­tion for the Con­se­cra­tion.

After the “Sanc­tus” (“Holy, Holy”) is sung, the priest pro­nounces the Con­se­cra­tion and the bread and wine become the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divin­i­ty of Jesus.  At this time, through the priest, Jesus offers His Sac­ri­fice of death on the Cross, to God the Father.

Dur­ing the last part of the Litur­gy of the Eucharist, we receive the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divin­i­ty of Jesus in Holy Com­mu­nion. We must pre­pare our­selves well to receive Jesus in Holy Com­mu­nion with faith, love, humil­i­ty, and rev­er­ence. We must be in a state of grace to receive Jesus in Com­mu­nion.

*“Remem­ber that a fer­vent Holy Com­mu­nion 1) pre­serves and increas­es sanc­ti­fy­ing grace in you, 2) takes away venial sins, 3) pro­tects you from falling into mor­tal sin, 4) brings you con­so­la­tion and com­fort, with an increase of char­i­ty and hope of eter­nal life.” (Jesus Our Eucharis­tic Love, pp. 118)

**It is impor­tant to note that we must not receive Jesus in Holy Com­mu­nion if we are con­scious of hav­ing com­mit­ted mor­tal sin. Receiv­ing Holy Com­mu­nion in a state of mor­tal sin is a grave offense against God, so we must go to Con­fes­sion (Sacra­ment of Penance)  to receive for­give­ness of mor­tal sin before receiv­ing Holy Com­mu­nion.

After receiv­ing Holy Com­mu­nion , we should thank God, love God, and pray to God for our­selves and oth­ers. We should make a rev­er­ent Thanks­giv­ing to Him of at least 15 min­utes. Let us remem­ber how incom­pre­hen­si­bly amaz­ing and aston­ish­ing it is that God, the Cre­ator of the uni­verse Him­self comes to down to us in Holy Com­mu­nion!

Jesus loves us so much that He insti­tut­ed the Eucharist in order to stay with us always. At the end of the Holy Mass, we receive a bless­ing from the priest, which is the bless­ing of Jesus, God Him­self.

In Ado­ra­tion of the Most Blessed Sacra­ment, the graces of the Holy Mass and Holy Com­mu­nion are extend­ed because we are in the pres­ence of Jesus in the Most Blessed Sacra­ment. (A Con­se­crat­ed Com­mu­nion Host is placed in a spe­cial con­tain­er called a “mon­strance” for ado­ra­tion.)

The Eucharis­tic Jesus is the true Emmanuel, the “God with us.” (Matthew 1:23) [Jesus Our Eucharis­tic Love,  p.10].

Saints and the Holy Eucharist

“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

“God dwells in our midst, in the Blessed Sacra­ment of the altar.”
St. Max­i­m­il­ian Kolbe

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

On the Cross, Jesus “gave Mary to each one of us as our Moth­er. On the Cross also, Jesus sac­ri­ficed Him­self for our sal­va­tion. Today, Jesus con­tin­ues to offer Him­self to the Eter­nal Father for our sal­va­tion in the Holy Sac­ri­fice of the Mass which is the same sac­ri­fice as the sac­ri­fice of Jesus on the Cross.”
          Pope John Paul II, Fati­ma Homi­ly, May 13, 1982  (Jesus Our Eucharis­tic Love, p.18)

“If we tru­ly Knew how to appre­ci­ate it [the Holy Eucharist], it alone would for­ti­fy and sus­tain us.”~ St. Theodore Guerin

“There is no need or tri­al or per­se­cu­tion that is not easy to suf­fer if we begin to enjoy the delight and con­so­la­tion of this Sacred Bread.” ~ St. Tere­sa of Avi­la

“It would be eas­i­er for the world to sur­vive with­out the sun, than to do so with­out the Holy Mass.”                                                                                                   ~St. Padre Pio of Pietrel­ci­na

“I believe that if there were no Mass, the world would by now have sunk into the abyss under the weight of its own wicked­ness. The Mass is the pow­er­ful sup­port which sus­tains it.”                                                                                                   ~  St. Leonard of Port Mau­rice

St. Bernard would urge his lis­ten­er as fol­low, “O you delud­ed peo­ple, what are you doing? Why do you  not has­ten to the Church­es to hear as many Mass­es as you can? Why do you not imi­tate the Angels who, when a Holy Mass is cel­e­brat­ed, come down in squadrons from Par­adise and take their sta­tions about our altars in ado­ra­tion to inter­cede for us?”
[Jesus Our Eucharis­tic Love,  p.20–21]

“With prayer we ask graces from God; in the Holy Mass we con­strain God to give them to us”                                                              St. Philip Neri   [Jesus Our Eucharis­tic Love,  p. 21]

“In Holy Mass our prayer is unit­ed with Jesus’ prayer of agony as He sac­ri­fices Him­self for us. In a spe­cial way dur­ing the Canon, which is the heart of the Mass, the prayer of all of us becomes also the prayers of Jesus. present amongst us. The two Memen­toes of the Roman Canon dur­ing which the liv­ing and the dead are remem­bered, are pre­cious moments for us to present our peti­tions. Also, in those supreme moments when Jesus in the priest’s hands under­goes His Pas­sion and Death, we can beg for our own needs and we can rec­om­mend both liv­ing and deceased per­sons who are dear to us.” [Jesus Our Eucharis­tic Love,  p. 21]

“With Com­mu­nion, Jesus enters my heart and remains  cor­po­ral­ly present in me as long as the species (the appear­ance) of bread lasts; that is, for about 15 min­utes. Dur­ing this time, the Holy Fathers teach that the angels sur­round me to con­tin­ue to adore Jesus and love Him with­out inter­rup­tion.” [Jesus Our Eucharis­tic Love,  p. 37]

Accord­ing to St. Bernard, “When Jesus is cor­po­ral­ly with­in us, the angels sur­round us as a guard of love.” [Jesus Our Eucharis­tic Love,  p.37]

One day, while Saint Mary Mag­da­lene di Pazzi was kneel­ing down among the novices, she raised her eyes heav­en­ward and said: “O Sis­ters, if only we could 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.” [Jesus Our Eucharis­tic Love,  p.48]

The Saints loved, revered and val­ued the Holy Eucharist and Holy Mass.  They encour­aged dai­ly Holy Mass. For instance, St. Maria Goret­ti trav­eled on foot for 15 miles going and return­ing from Sun­day Mass. St. Fran­cis of Assisi would attend two Mass­es each day. St. John of the Cross point­ed out that his great­est suf­fer­ing while he was impris­oned was the fact that he was not able to cel­e­brate or receive Holy Com­mu­nion while in prison.

Saint Cather­ine of Sien­na would say to her con­fes­sor: “Father, I am hun­gry; for the love of God give this soul her food, her Lord in the Eucharist .… When I am not able to receive my Lord, I go into the Church, and there I look at Him … I look at Him again .… and this sat­is­fies me.” [Jesus Our Eucharis­tic Love,  p.14]

Saint Gem­ma Gal­gani once wrote“It is now night, tomor­row morn­ing is approach­ing and Jesus will pos­sess me and I will pos­sess Him.” Jesus said, ” He who eats My Flesh and drinks My Blood abides in Me and I in him”(John 6:56).

From child­hood, St. Mar­tin de Por­res was drawn to a life of prayer. Jesus in the Holy Eucharist was the love of his life and He gave him many gifts: to per­form mir­a­cles, bilo­cate, heal, coun­sel and min­is­ter to the poor, sick and all those in need. St. Mar­tin de Por­res also found­ed an orphan­age. [Mis­sion­ar­ies of the Blessed Sacra­ments]

Saint Charles Bor­romeo was a great the­olo­gian. He became a Bish­op at a very young age. In addi­tion to orga­niz­ing famine and plague relief, he helped return dis­ci­pline among the cler­ics and sec­u­lar lead­ers. St. Charles was devot­ed to the Holy Eucharist. He allowed the pub­lic into his per­son­al epis­co­pal chapel to pray with him [Mis­sion­ar­ies of the Blessed Sacra­ments]

Saint Mar­tin of Tours (Patron of Sol­diers) was char­i­ta­ble to beg­gars. He became a priest because of his great love for Jesus in the Eucharist short­ly after he left the mil­i­tary. He was also a great edu­ca­tor and preach­er.  [Mis­sion­ar­ies of the Blessed Sacra­ments]

“When­ev­er I go to the chapel, I put myself in the pres­ence of our good Lord, and I say to him, ‘Lord, I am here. Tell me what you would have me to do’ … And then, I tell God every­thing that is in my heart. I tell him about my pains and my joys, and then I lis­ten. If you lis­ten, God will also speak to you, for with the good Lord, you have to both speak and lis­ten. God always speaks to you when you approach him plain­ly and sim­ply.”
St. Cather­ine Laboure (Mirac­u­lous Medal)

THE EUCHARIST IS THE HEART OF THE CHURCH
(Excerpt from Our Holy Father, Pope John Paul II’s homi­ly)

“I Am the Liv­ing Bread” (John 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” (John 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.” (John 6:53–56).

THE EUCHARIST IS THE HEART OF THE CHURCH
(Excerpt from Our Holy Father, Pope John Paul II’s homi­ly)

“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.” (John 6:57).

“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.” St. Fran­cis of Assisi

“Take refuge often at the feet of 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

“Go to Jesus. He loves you and is wait­ing for you to give you many graces. He is on the altar sur­round­ed by angels ador­ing and pray­ing. Let them make some room for you and join them in doing what they do.”   St. Mary Joseph Rosel­lo

“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 ( Mar­i­an Appari­tion, Lour­des, France)

“Go and find Him when your patience and strength run out and you feel alone and help­less. Jesus is wait­ing for you in the chapel. Say to Him, ‘Jesus, you know exact­ly what is going on. You are all I have, and you know all things. Come to my help.’ And then go, and don’t wor­ry about how you are going to man­age. That you have told God about it is enough. He has a good mem­o­ry.” St. Jeanne Jugan

Anna Maria Tai­gi was one of the great­est mys­tics of the 19th cen­tu­ry. She was a wife and moth­er who achieved her sanc­ti­fi­ca­tion by liv­ing her life in accor­dance with God’s will. Her great­est desire was to love God and to serve Him in every­thing. She attend­ed Mass dai­ly and vis­it­ed the Blessed Sacra­ment sev­er­al times dur­ing the day.

Blessed Mary Mag­da­lene Of The Incar­na­tion (Foundress of the Per­pet­u­al Ador­ers of The Blessed Sacra­ment) had a vision in which Jesus told her, “I have cho­sen you to estab­lish the work of per­pet­u­al ador­ers who, day and night, will offer me their hum­ble ado­ra­tion…”. She spent her whole life ador­ing Jesus in the Eucharist.

“How sweet, the pres­ence of Jesus to the long­ing, harassed soul! It is instant peace, and balm to every wound.”
St. Eliz­a­beth Ann Seton (Founder of the Sis­ters Of Char­i­ty in the Unit­ed States)

“The Blessed Sacra­ment should be hon­ored by hear­ing Mass, receiv­ing Com­mu­nion fre­quent­ly, vis­it­ing the Blessed Sacra­ment, and mak­ing spir­i­tu­al com­mu­nions. The rosary should be said dai­ly, all three parts or at least one part. We should med­i­tate on the mys­ter­ies, apply­ing them to the cir­cum­stances of our own lives.”
St. Antho­ny Mary Claret

 

Perpetual Eucharistic Adoration

“And he cometh to his dis­ci­ples, and find­eth them asleep, and he saith to Peter: What? Could you not watch one hour with me?”  (Matthew 26:40)

Spend one hour a week to adore Jesus in the Holy Eucharist.  Do not aban­don Our Lord, Our Sav­ior Jesus Christ in the Holy Eucharist at the altar. Please talk with your local priest and Bish­op about start­ing Per­pet­u­al Eucharis­tic Ado­ra­tion in your parish and Com­mu­ni­ty if you do not already have one in place.

Comportment at Holy Mass and Afterwards
A Letter from St. Padre Pio to Annita Rodote (Pietrelcina, July 25, 1915), one of his spiritual daughters on how to comport oneself at Mass and afterwords.

 

Prayer of St. Padre Pio After Communion
Stay With Me Lord

Stay with me, Lord, for it is nec­es­sary to have You present so that I do not for­get You. You know how eas­i­ly I aban­don You.
Stay with me, Lord, because I am weak and I need Your strength, that I may not fall so often.
Stay with me, Lord, for You are my life and with­out You I am with­out fer­vor.
Stay with me, Lord, for You are my light and with­out You I am in dark­ness.

Stay with me, Lord, to show me Your will.
Stay with me, Lord, so that I hear Your voice and fol­low You.
Stay with me, Lord, for I desire to love You very much and always be in Your com­pa­ny.
Stay with me, Lord, if You wish me to be faith­ful to You.

Stay with me, Lord, as poor as my soul is I want it to be a place of con­so­la­tion for You, a nest of Love.
Stay with me, Jesus, for it is get­ting late and the day is com­ing to a close and life pass­es, death, judg­ment and eter­ni­ty approach­es.
It is nec­es­sary to renew my strength, so that I will not stop along the way and for that,
I need You.
It is get­ting late and death approach­es, I fear the dark­ness, the temp­ta­tions, the dry­ness, the cross, the sor­rows. O how I need You, my Jesus, in this night of exile!|
Stay with me tonight, Jesus, in life with all its dan­gers, I need You.
Let me rec­og­nize You as Your dis­ci­ples did at the break­ing of the bread, so that the Eucharis­tic Com­mu­nion be the Light which dis­pers­es the dark­ness, the force which sus­tains me, the unique joy of my heart.

Stay with me, Lord, because at the hour of my death, I want to remain unit­ed to You, if not by Com­mu­nion, at least by grace and love.
Stay with me, Lord, for it is You alone I look for, Your Love, Your Grace, Your Will, Your Heart, Your Spir­it, because I love You and ask no oth­er reward but to love You more and more.
With a firm love, I will love You with all my heart while on earth and con­tin­ue to love You per­fect­ly dur­ing all eter­ni­ty. Amen.

The Holy Mass Explained in Span­ish (La San­ta Misa Expli­ca­da)

Lo que occure en la San­ta Misa

La San­ta Misa y Sus Partes

La San­ta Misa Expli­ca­da por Padre Pio

La San­ta Misa Expli­ca­da

 

Miracles of the Eucharist
The Eucharistic Miracle of Lanciano (youtube video)

Mila­gro Eucaris­ti­co Buenos Aires Argenti­na (video)

Eucharis­tic Mir­a­cle 1(video)

Eucharis­tic Mir­a­cle 2 (video)

Eucharis­tic Mir­a­cle 3 (video)

For more on Eucharis­tic Mir­a­cles vis­it the fol­low­ing sites:

Mir­a­cles of the Eucharist -Mis­sion­ar­ies of the Blessed Sacra­ment

Mir­a­cles of the Church — Mir­a­cles of the Eucharist

Cir­cle of Prayer -Eucharis­tic Mir­a­cles

Mir­a­cles of the Saints — Mir­a­cles of the Eucharist: Total Fast from Food

Eucharis­tic Mir­a­cles: The Real Pres­ence Asso­ci­a­tion

 

Resources
Jesus Our Eucharis­tic Love by Father Ste­fano Manel­li (Mass Mar­ket Paper­back — 1973)
(Avail­able new and used at Amazon.com and Catholic book­stores)

The Eucharis­tic Mir­a­cles Of The World (Book avail­able: Eter­nal Life , or call  1–800-842‑2871; also avail­able at Amazon.com and eBay.com. Cheap­er at Eter­nal Life Book­store)

Mis­sion­ar­ies of the Blessed Sacra­ment (web site: www.ACFP2000.com)

 

Say the Rosary Daily
Our Lady of Fatima