The Eucharist as a Strange Notion

The Eucharist as a Strange Notion

Father Jay Kythe

This is the article format of a homily I gave for the Feast of Corpus Christi on the weekend of June 1-2, 2013 at the Church of Saint Pius X, White Bear Lake, MN.  So may people have asked me for it, so I post it here.

Have you ever considered how strange our Catholic faith is?  Take, for instance, the Crucifix.  It is an image of an execution.  If you walked into my office and saw a photograph of someone being electrocuted in an electric chair, beheaded in all its gore, or hung from a noose, you would think there is something seriously wrong with my mental health and perhaps I should not be functioning as a priest.  Yet, no one says anything about a crucifix or makes a judgment about the person who owns the crucifix.  As for myself, I like to collect crucifixes; five of them hang over my bed.  People buy crucifixes, call them beautiful or pretty, with an image of a dead body on it and all, and they ask me to bless it!  Strange!

Our faith is filled with strange notions!

We believe in one God but three persons in this one God.  Strange!  We even go so far as to say that one of these three persons chose to become human, chose to be born of a woman.  And not just any woman, but a virgin, who still remains a virgin before, during, and after this birth of this God!  This God is born, cries, burps, poops, laughs, teaches, heals, does everything that man does—except for sin—and even—now this gets weird—even dies!  Dies on a cross!  And we put crucifixes on display on our walls and around our necks! 

All right, I can accept all that.  I can even accept the claim that this person who died on the Cross rises from the dead.  I mean, He’s God, isn’t He?  Seriously, if He weren’t, there would be no resurrection.  Man can’t rise from the dead on his own power.  But there is something more, something I think is even stranger to accept.  Stranger than all the things I’ve mentioned.  Something we live with every day and don’t give it a second thought.  Or if we do, we end up becoming more fervent in our faith or rejecting this strange notion and the Catholic faith entirely.  Not because it doesn’t make any sense—believe me, it doesn’t—but because if we really, truly believed it, we would have to change our lives!

Here it is: We believe that bread and wine to change into the Body and Blood of Christ!  Now that’s really, really strange.  Bread and wine change into the Body and Blood of Christ but still looks like bread and looks like wine?  Really?  Its stranger than having crucifixes on the walls, stranger than virgins giving birth to God, stranger than, well, anything!

I mean, if you really believed in something this strange, you wouldn’t be yawning at Mass and considering it boring, would you?  You’ll be on your knees and praying fervently at every Mass!  Your faith would be a sure and solid rock in your life.  (Or you may want to be become a monk!  Now that’s pretty strange too!)  Churches would be packed to overflowing, and Father would have to add 20 more Masses per weekend. 

You’d have to trust this Church that teaches this, believe in this teaching and everything else she teaches.  I mean, if she got this wrong, what else could be wrong?  If the Eucharist is not the Body and Blood of Christ but just cardboard tasting bread and sweet wine, then we should throw out the Bible.  For that’s where this strange notion begins, from all the places in three of the Gospels in which Jesus takes bread and says, “Take this and eat it, for this is my body,” and takes wine and says, “Take this and drink of it, for this is the chalice of my blood.”  Then there is that powerful chapter of John 6, in which Jesus repeats several times—lest there be any doubts—that  “unless you eat the flesh of the son of man and drink his blood, you do not have life within you.”  And St. Paul speaks about eating the Body and drinking the Blood in worthy manner.   Seriously, if the Church is wrong about this, we really need to throw the Bible in the trash.

What else should we get rid of?  Perhaps marriage shouldn’t be restricted to just one man and one woman.  Maybe priests should be allowed to marry.  And maybe Communion should be given to anyone who wants it, not just Catholics. 

The doctrine of the Eucharist is at the very center of the Catholic faith, isn’t it?  If it’s not true, then everyone can believe whatever he or she wants and do whatever he or she wants. 

Believing in the Eucharist is not only strange but also dangerous.  For a demand is made in our lives to conform our lives to Christ, to change our lives and get rid of sin. This is the reason why people leave the faith or don’t become fervent Catholics to begin with.  We would actually have to change our lives!  I would actually have to trust Christ and the Church more!  By receiving Holy Communion, I would have to trust the Church and believe in everything she teaches (this is the reason why those who are not in communion with this Church generally should not be receiving Holy Communion in this Church).  I would have to realize that I am actually in communion with all those who share in this Holy Communion, even people I don’t like.  Finally, I would have to trust that when I receive Holy Communion, I am being changed into Christ. 

If you think it a strange notion that bread and wine change into the Body and Blood of Christ, then here’s something equally strange: mere human beings are being changed into the Real Presence of Christ in the world.  As the old saying goes, “You are what you eat.”  God needs people to bring Christ into the world. And as unworthy as I am, He chooses me.  He chooses you.  He chooses us to receive Him in Holy Communion and bring Jesus into the world out there by transforming us into—as I told the First Communion students this year—“little Jesuses!”

So am I willing to believe?  If I am, then am I willing to change my life so it doesn’t contradict with this belief?  It is not good to be a hypocrite.  It is better to be hot or cold, a fervent Catholic or one who doesn’t go to Church; God doesn’t like lukewarm people.  Either all of this is true or its not.  There’s no middle ground. 

What will you choose?  What impact will you allow it to happen on your life?