Ordinary Time, 19th Sunday (B) The Eucharist looks like bread and it tastes like bread but it's really Jesus. Catholics have started to lose a sense of God's presence in the Eucharist. But first we lost a sense of the sacramentality of the whole world. Creation speaks to us about the Creator. Humans reveal who God is, and the nature of God reveals what we were made to be.

As we began to uncover the precise mathematical laws that govern creation, we started to miss the sacramental nature of the world. Many Catholics now see the Eucharist as the last refuge of God's presence in a secular world. My hope is that the National Eucharistic Congress will help us to recover the Eucharist, not as the last place we can find God, but rather as the interpretive key that unlocks the sacramental reality of everything.

Elijah wants to curl up and die. He needs a sense of meaning and purpose, and to be reminded that he is not alone. The Eucharist does these things for us. The Eucharist calls us to enter into Communion with God and to begin to live every moment of our lives from this place of Communion. I think that the reason so many Catholics have stopped coming to church is that they never learned to live from a place of Communion with God.

Where did I notice Jesus? Where did I let him do the "heavy lifting" -- things were easy, clear, and simple? Where did I experience struggle or difficulty? How did I respond? When I live my life with Jesus, he does the heavy lifting. In the places that haven't received the Gospel: Jesus, love me there. 

(11 Aug 2024)

Going Deeper: Where have you seen God's presence in your daily life? How have you responded to his presence? Where do you need God to remind you of your meaning and purpose and that you are not alone?

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