Feast Homilies
THE FEAST
OF THE BODY AND BLOOD OF CHRIST
This is the life-giving
bread that came down from heaven
(John 6:51-59).
INTRODUCTION
The church celebrates the feast of Corpus
Christi on the Thursday after the Feast of the Most Holy Trinity, which
is two months after the Holy Thursday. Some dioceses postpone it to the
Sunday after the Feast of the Holy Trinity for full participation of the
faithful. When we commemorate Holy Eucharist’s institution on Holy
Thursday, we also reenact and reflect the washing of the feet,
institution of the priesthood, and remembrance of the agony of Jesus in
the garden of Gethsemane. So a separate feast was necessary to give
enough focus to the Body and Blood of Christ. Our Lord asked to
celebrate the feast of Corpus Christi through the visions to St. Juliana
in Belgium from 1208 for 20 years. Church approved this feast in Liège,
Belgium in 1246 and later in the universal church in 1264.
BIBLE TEXT
(John 6:51)
“I am the living bread which has come down from heaven;
whoever eats of this bread will live forever. The bread I shall give is
my own flesh and I will give it for the life of the world.” (52) The
Jews started arguing among themselves, “How can this man give us his
flesh to eat?” (53) So Jesus replied, “I am telling you the truth, if
you do not eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have
no life in you. (54) Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has
eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. (55) My flesh is
real food and my blood is real drink. (56) He who eats my flesh and
drinks my blood, lives in me and I in him. (57) Just as the Father, who
is life, sent me and I have life from the Father, so he who eats me will
have life from me. (58) This is the bread which came down from heaven,
unlike what your ancestors ate and still died, he who eats this bread
will live forever.” (59) Jesus said all this in Capernaum when he taught
them in the synagogue.
INTERPRETATION
Background
The background of this gospel passage will
help us understand better the segment we reflect today. Jesus fed a
multitude of 5,000 men and an equivalent number of women and children
with the miraculous multiplication of five loaves of barley bread and
two fish. Because of this, people considered Jesus as a prophet and
wanted to make him king. However, he withdrew from there (John 6:1-15).
The same crowd searched and found Jesus on the next day. He told them:
“I tell you the truth, you are looking for me, not because of the signs
you saw, but because you ate bread to your satisfaction. You must work,
not for perishable food, but for the lasting food which gives eternal
life. This is the food that the Son of Man will give you, for the
Father’s seal has been put on him.” (John 6: 26-27). Thus, Jesus
introduced his body and blood for the spiritual nourishment, comparing
it with the material food that he served through the multiplication of
the bread and the manna that God gave to the Israelites for 40 years in
the desert.
(51) I am the living bread which has
come down from heaven; whoever eats of this bread will live forever. The
bread I shall give is my own flesh and I will give it for the life of
the world.
I am
1. “I am the bread of life; whoever
comes to me shall never be hungry, and whoever believes in me shall
never be thirsty.” (John 6:35)
All the above seven attributes give a glimpse
of who Jesus is for us. Here we are focusing on the first of the above,
“I am the living bread.”
The living bread
We make bread from the plants or trees using
their leaves, stems, roots, seeds, or nuts. Besides, we nourish
ourselves by eating the fruits, fish, and meat of animals and birds. The
food production involves a partial or full sacrifice of the life of
plants or animals. Likewise, our spiritual food requires the sacrifice
and death of Jesus. By his self-sacrifice, Jesus became our living and
life-giving bread for our souls.
In the Lord’s prayer, Jesus taught us to
pray, “Give us this day our daily bread.” That bread is not just the
physical bread that we make or buy from market, but the supernatural
bread, the Holy Eucharist. God fed Israelites with manna daily in the
desert for forty years for their physical survival until they reached
the promised land. Jesus is nourishing Christians with another
supernatural bread, his body and blood, until we reach heaven, the next
and perfect promised land.
Bread that came down from heaven
As per God’s instruction, Moses asked Aaron
to put a full omer (measure) of manna in a jar and place it in front of
the Lord’s covenant in the tabernacle (Exodus 16:33-34). Thus, the
Israelites kept manna in a jar close to the Ark of the Covenant in the
Holy of Holies. In its place, we keep the new manna, the Holy Eucharist,
in a tabernacle in the church sanctuary.
Whoever eats this bread will live
forever.
(52) The Jews started arguing among
themselves, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?”
The Jews, who could not understand what Jesus
meant, argued, asking how he could give his flesh to eat while he was
alive. It was beyond human reasoning. The Jewish groups differed in
their opinions on what Jesus said. That led them to quarrel among
themselves. Eating the flesh of a human or of any live creature was
unlawful for Jews. Some might have taken it in a literal and others in a
metaphorical sense. But they could not understand what Jesus meant by
this strange statement.
(53) Jesus said to
them, “Amen, amen, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of
Man and drink his blood, you do not have life within you.”
Amen, amen, I say to you.
Unless you eat the flesh
of the Son of Man
The Old Testament Passover had a second part;
that was eating the roasted meat of the Passover lamb with unleavened
bread and bitter herbs (Exodus 12:8). Likewise, when we take part in the
Holy Mass, we join the sacrifice of Jesus and we complete its second
part by consuming his body, the Holy Eucharist. That is the bread
necessary for our spiritual life and the required nourishment for our
heavenly journey.
The flesh of the Son of Man
Drink his blood
Since Torah prohibits consumption of blood,
the Israelites felt it scandalous when Jesus asked them to drink his
blood. But Jesus had a different meaning when he offered his blood to
drink. Through his precious blood, Jesus offers his life to the humans.
So, when we drink the blood of Jesus in the Holy Eucharist, he makes his
dwelling within us as the temple of God.
Israelites used blood to make a covenant. At
Mount Sinai, when God made a covenant with the Israelites, “Moses then
took the blood and sprinkled it on the people saying, ‘Here is the blood
of the covenant that the LORD has made with you in accordance with all
these words.’” (Exodus 24:8). At the Last Supper, Jesus took the cup and
said, “Drink from this, all of you, for this is my blood, the blood of
the Covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.”
(Matthew 26:27-28). So, when we partake in the cup of Jesus during the
Holy Mass, we are renewing our covenant with Jesus.
… You do not have life within you.
Showbread of the Old Testament and Holy
Eucharist in the Church tabernacle
The bread of presence or
Showbread was a foreshadow of the Holy
Eucharist in the tabernacles in our churches. This consisting of 12
loaves of unleavened bread representing the 12 tribes of Israel, made of
fine flour. The priests arranged them in two piles on a table made of
acacia wood and covered with pure gold. The Israelites called them “the
bread of presence” because the priests placed them at the Lord’s
presence in the Holy place of the tabernacle and later in the Temple.
The priests kept the bread always on the table and replaced on every
Sabbath day. When removed for replacement, Aaron and his sons ate the
bread in the holy place (Lev. 24:5-9). Jesus pointed to this bread of
presence and declared, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me
shall never be hungry, and whoever believes in me shall never be
thirsty.” (John 6:35).
Origin of the Corpus Christi Feast
The feast of the Most Precious Body and Blood
of Jesus, also known in Latin as “Corpus Christi”
(The Body of Christ), was not a separate feast from the Holy Thursday
until the 13th century. Corpus Christi feast is the
celebration of the actual presence of Jesus Christ with his body, blood,
soul, and divinity in the Holy Eucharist. A visionary nun St. Juliana
and an Eucharistic miracle made the feast popular.
Visions to St.
Juliana
Juliana (1193-1258 April 5) and her twin
sister Agnes became orphans at five. Augustinian nuns of Mont Cornillon
educated her in Belgium. She joined the convent at 13 and later became
superior of the convent. She had a great devotion to the Blessed
Sacrament, and she wished for a special feast of the Holy Eucharist.
When she was 16, she had a vision of the church under the appearance of
a full moon with a black spot on it. Jesus revealed to her that the full
moon stood for the ecclesiastical calendar and the black spot was the
absence of the feast of the Blessed Sacrament. Jesus asked her to
communicate to the church authorities to establish a feast of the Holy
Eucharist. The visions that started in 1208 continued for 20 years. She
shared her experience to the church authorities. Local Bishop Robert
called a synod in 1246 and ordered a feast in his diocese in the
following year. However, he died in the same year and the church
celebrated the feast the next year.
The Eucharistic
Miracle
Theologians had doubt and debate during the
13th century on the real presence of the Body and the Blood
of Christ in the consecrated bread and wine. Under its influence, a
German priest Fr. Peter of Prague also had the same doubt. During his
pilgrimage to Rome in 1263, while he celebrated Holy Mass at the Church
of St. Christina in Bolsena, Italy, an Eucharistic miracle happened.
While Fr. Peter recited the consecration prayers during the Holy Mass,
blood flowed from the host onto the altar and corporal. Fr. Peter
reported this to the then Pope Urban IV, who had moved from Rome to
Orvieto. The pope assigned delegates to investigate the miracle and
ordered to move the host and the blood-stained corporal to Orvieto. The
church then placed the relics in the Cathedral of Orvieto.
Based on the visions of St. Juliana and the
confirmation of its truth through the Eucharistic miracle at Bolsena,
Pope Urban IV established the Corpus Christi Feast by his bull
“Transiturus” on September 8, 1264. At the request of the pope, St.
Thomas Aquinas composed beautiful hymns for the feast.
MESSAGE
1. Let us acknowledge and thank the Lord who
provides us with material and spiritual bread that we need daily.
Without God’s support, the efforts of humans to produce food would be in
vain.
2. Let us behave well in the church where we
have the altar representing the throne of the Almighty God and the
tabernacle where we have the real presence of Jesus in the form of
consecrated bread.
3. Since we take part in the Holy Mass and
receive the Holy Eucharist on very Sunday or even daily, they become a
routine for us. We need to make sure we take part in it with much
preparation and keeping the sanctity of the sacrament.
4. Jesus did not give the vision of the full moon with a black spot and reveal its interpretation to the pope, bishop, theologians like St. Thomas Aquinas, or Catholic King but only to Juliana, a humble nun. God allowed many other apparitions and visions of Jesus and Mary to simple and humble people or children. Let us find value in humility and simplicity and believe in the Holy mysteries.