​​Dear Eucharistic Family,
 
We have entered the Easter season abandoning our wills, grasping hold of our Heavenly Father’s hand, and imagining being in the Acts of the Apostles. The Kingdom of Heaven is our eternal reality, and we see it now through the Eucharist. I recently heard someone say we live in a hostile world. True, bizarre things are happening all around us. The God of all creation has called us by name. We are blessed to be invited to set fire to the earth with his love. The hostilities and unusual happenings will be taken over by a longing of the heart as humanity finds the sacred.
 
“Before birth the LORD called me, from my mother’s womb he gave me my name.” (Isaiah 49:1)
 
I attended a summit this past week, a gathering of ministry leaders, with deacons, priests, and sisters present. The importance of the faithful coming together in prayer with the Eucharist, the Liturgy as the central focus, enraptured something new in me. We who love our Catholic Church have much work to do, together, to keep Christ alive in our world today.
 
Jesus tells us to “Do This in Memory of Me” (Luke 22:19). The Eucharist must be everything for us, as St. Peter Julian, the Apostle of the Eucharist, reminds us. 
 
The Savior of the world, our risen Jesus, longs to heal, forgive and set fire to the earth. Miracles are waiting to happen. By grace, in deep silent prayer and the reception of Holy Communion, the Kingdom of Heaven will be brought to the world. The inner cenacle lives in our souls united to the heart of God during our consuming of the Sacred Host for us to become a consuming fire of love for our God. Miracles will happen. We will keep the Acts of the Apostles in motion by growing our Church in faith and love. Charity will fall into eternal life with us by our own apostolic lives. 
 
One of the speakers at the summit recommended we create a personal mission statement, handwrite it, check it regularly, rewrite it quarterly, and follow up on its goals.
 
Imagine if we all make a conscious effort to be our brother’s keeper (Genesis 4:9), to pray for every person we encounter and take an interest in their souls. Our desire to become saints will be blessed in this effort.
 
I am in the middle of renewing my consecration to Jesus through Our Lady of the Blessed Sacrament. Each year our mother calls me to this time with her. Mary is with us always, yet going on retreat with her helps us be comforted in the care of a mother. She helps direct us and guides the fires Jesus would wish to be set. St. Peter Julian tells us the Eucharist can transform the bitterness of suffering in our lives. Mary is the one to show us this way to salvation.
 
What legacy of love can we leave upon this earth? Believe we will see a gift of God’s promise from the heavens one day, one that the faithful will take sight of as they see everything through the Eucharist.  
​

Does this sound familiar to you? “It’s not your fault. You are not to blame… the fault lies somewhere else.” This seems to be the message behind most self-help programs out there… “this problem you have, it is not your fault, but you can fix it. You don’t need God. All you need is to follow these steps, because, after all… it is not your fault.” And guess what? We eat that stuff up. We love it when we can shift the blame. This started in the Garden of Eden when Eve said, “The serpent made me do it.” And then Adam said, “The woman made me do it.” We know how things turned out for them.
​
There was some truth in their statements… there were others involved in the scenario, but they still had freedom to choose, and they chose to disobey God. And when they were confronted with the truth, rather than take responsibility for their actions, they hid from God and from themselves. They could have pleaded to God for mercy, but perhaps, He had not revealed that part of Himself to them yet. Maybe they did not know how much He loved them. Perhaps they did not know He would be willing to die for them.
​
Contrast the message the world gives us (that nothing is our fault) with one of the prayers we say at Mass… striking at the breast we pray The Confiteor (I Confess):

​“Through my fault, through my fault, thought my most grievous fault…”  It is when we admit that we sin through our own fault, and when we repent, that we open ourselves to receive God’s mercy. When we admit something is our fault, we have now something we can change. And we know God is at the ready, waiting for us to come to Him for help, for “where sin increased, grace overflowed all the more” (Romans 5:20). 

This weekend we celebrate Divine Mercy Sunday. Jesus has opened wide the gates of mercy and is waiting for us to come to Him. He sits at the confessional waiting, longing, ready to pour His grace on us. When we fail, let us not hesitate to run to Him and beg for mercy. And when things are truly not our fault, let us then be merciful to others. Let us forgive and extend the same mercy God has given us.
​
Let us then constantly accept that we have failed and that we need His mercy, that we need His love. This is the only self-help program we need… taking an honest look at ourselves, and saying, “I Confess…”

God is always speaking to us, showing us many things through our relationship with Him. The Holy Spirit walks with us; through the Eucharistic mystery, Christ is in us. Are we aware? Do we listen? Do we give Him the time and silence He needs to commune with us properly?
 
It never escapes me that the length of our Saturday of the Holy Week has been called the “long silence.” I always thought of this day as when our Lord was ‘gone,’ before He came back in His resurrected glory, but the more I think on it and embrace His silence, the more I am convicted that I have always had it backward. The silence is not His but ours. It is a gift for us, a moment chosen for us, so we can search closely for His teachings conveyed, not just in the words, but in the “being on the expectation of the moment,” in the waiting for what is to come.
 
It is not every day that I find myself without words to describe something, but when it happens, it is usually related to God. It is somewhat of a habit of mine that when a thought to ponder comes to mind, I write it down. Sometimes this is easy to do, like, “Remember that you were loved from the beginning,” to describe my parents’ acceptance of the fact that I was conceived and born of their love, a continuation of God’s love for them and me. But other times, it is not so simple, especially when trying to explain how God speaks to me. Nonetheless, I try to scribble some words to remind me later of the wisdom I received from Him.
 
It is good for us to write down what God has shared with us, ideas and concepts, in the hope that, in the future, we will be walking closer to God’s wisdom and may be able to both understand and express them better. That is probably why Our Lord Jesus spoke in parables. The scenes described in the parables contain the reality of His teachings much better than any sermon, definition, or description would. They engage our imagination and put us inside the scene. How would we put the fullness of that into words?
 
So, what are we to do? We must put in the time. We must separate ourselves from the bustle of the world for a bit and attempt to grab those images, feelings, and experiences and ponder on them so that we will grasp not just the words, but the meaning intended for us, and then maybe we write that down. And I think that it is a gift for us if we can do this. We can later sit down, apart from most, and read from these bits of wisdom that He has shared with us. It is part of deepening our faith and strengthening our relationship with Him who loves us. Yet, it is about more than writing and reading; it is about experiencing.
 
Christ died for us; He also comes back as the conqueror of death for us. This only sounds like words; in reality, it is world changing. The concept conveyed is more significant than we can describe, and maybe we fail to describe it adequately with words. Thus, let us invite ourselves to let go of words for a little while and experience what happens today and every day in our relationship with God. Let us find Christ Jesus in the very moments that define our lives and glean wisdom from His concepts, ideas, and thoughts, that we may experience Him; that during the long silence, His words may transcend beyond letters and sounds and become, for us, an authentic experience of life in Him.
 
Let us pray: Christ, you have died for our redemption. You also rose again to life so that we would live in the hope for eternal life in Heaven, help us live, paying attention to all You share with us. Help us gain more of Your wisdom every day so that we may grow ever closer to You. Amen.