The Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ
Eucarist, the source of life
On the first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread, when they sacrificed the Passover lamb, his disciples said to him, «Where do you want us to go and prepare for you to eat the Passover?» He sent two of his disciples and said to them, «Go into the city and a man will meet you, carrying a jar of water. Follow him …. While they were eating, he took bread, said the blessing, broke it, and gave it to them, and said, «Take it; this is my body.» Then he took a cup, gave thanks, and gave it to them, and they all drank from it. He said to them, «This is my blood of the covenant, which will be shed for many. Amen, I say to you, I shall not drink again the fruit of the vine until the day when I drink it new in the kingdom of God.» Then, after singing a hymn, hey went out to the Mount of Olives. Mk 14,12-16.22-26
The earthly life begins and ends with the body, like a candle which eventually goes out. In order to be fully revealed to mankind, God incarnated in the body of Jesus of Nazareth, who saved us by offering his body on the cross, and the Father raised him from the dead with his body. He ascended into heaven with his body, he founded the Church, which is his mystical body, and left us the gift of his Eucharistic Body. The way the body of the resurrected Christ, which is present in the bread and wine of the Eucharist, grant us life is a mystery, we cannot explain it: you can only experience it and, by experiencing it, cope with it. The first creation began with the prohibition against eating the forbidden fruit; salvation is carried out with the commandment to eat the Eucharist. No one is worthy, but the more we receive it, the worthier we become. That broken bread gives us the energy to walk every day along the streets of the world, and has the power to make the longing for God grow in us increasingly, so that we eventually leave our body with joy because we are going to meet God in eternity. Ever since, every day, we started receiving the Eucharist in the sanctuary of Saronno, our life has taken a different fullness, but not only ours. Listen to the testimony by monsignor Riboldi, bishop of Acerra. «On a country road, I always meet an old woman in the morning. She stands up straight, leaning on two crutches, which support her and facilitate her steps. I stopped her one day and asked where she was going to. ‘I’m going to the Mass to receive the Eucharist, like every morning,! I’m eighty. It has been my habit, since I was a young woman, not to spend even a single day without receiving the Eucharist. I struggle a lot. I do not want anyone to accompany me, because while walking I already anticipate the joy of receiving God in my heart and, on my way back home, the infinite joy of being with him. And I do not even feel the effort, as if he supported me’. In front of my astonishment, she said: ‘Father, in life you can do without many things, which often have no taste, or, if they do, it gives no satisfaction. But you cannot help loving and being loved. And if the one who loves you is your Lord, who becomes your own life, this makes you fly. Don’t you want me to not let myself be filled with the love of God? It is the most beautiful gift that God gives me. And as for this hard struggle I do, it seems to me to be walking to Paradise. If people could understand’. She shook her head and went away all taken up by the expectation of receiving ‘the bread of life’ «. If people could really understand it!