Eucharistic Reflection - Treasure The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass

(Image Source: Wikimedia Commons)

"… I will treasure more than anything else the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. It is often said that it is the Mass that matters. This means that Mass is the most important thing in the world. It is very true. But I really think that sanctifying grace matters most of all. Still, where do I get that from if not through the Sacrifice of the Cross which is continued in the Sacrifice of the Mass. I am afraid.  I do not think as highly of Holy Mass as I should. And this reminds me of a story I have often read about the Sacred linen in Greenland. It was in the sixteenth century. There had been a religious persecution in the island and all priests had been killed or driven out, so that for fifty years there was no Mass at all in Greenland.

After fifty years, there were still some scattered Catholics left. They used to meet every year for a Christmas celebration in a lonely house almost covered by snow. On one such night they all gathered together in the house. First, they said some prayers. Then an old man arose, went to a bureau, and took from it what used to be a white cloth, like a big, square napkin. Now it was yellow with age and tattered. It was a corporal, that linen cloth on which, during Holy Mass, rest the Body and Blood of Christ. The old man said: ‘Brethren, fifty years ago Mass was last said in this country. I served that last Mass. Let us kneel down and thank God for this precious relic, on which rested the Body and Blood of Jesus. And let us pray that God may send us priests to offer the Holy Sacrifice in our midst again.’

Tears streamed from all eyes as they knelt to pray. And all around me there are now so many churches and so many Masses are being offered. I do not think I value enough the chances that I have to assist at Holy Mass. Where there is a persecution and hearing Mass is forbidden under pain of torture or death, good Catholics nevertheless go to Mass, even if it is in caves under the ground.

Those good people in Greenland knelt down and thanked God for that precious Sacred linen. How happy and how devout they would have been if they could have bowed down before Jesus Himself in the Blessed Sacrament! And I am often so careless and thoughtless in my genuflections and in my way of kneeling or sitting or standing in the presence of my Eucharistic Savior. And it seems that the more I have to do around the Blessed Sacrament, the more like a pagan I become."

 

(The Way to God - Father Winfrid Herbst, S.D.S.)

 

 

Pondering Tidbits Of Truth - May 27, 2021

Pondering Tidbits of Truth is my simple and inadequate way of providing nuggets of spiritual wisdom for you to chew on from time to time

 

 

 

Father Jacques Philippe

The Eucharist is the highest expression of Divine Charity, of God's love for His creations. Through it, God shows how much He wants to be with us forever, sharing His own life with us, living with us and in us. As Father  Jean-Claude Sagne said, ‘What makes the Eucharist the Sacrament of love is that Jesus here gives Himself in person, in the fullness of His presence. He gives all that He is, the entirety of His life. More than any word or action, it is Jesus Himself who comes to us and delivers Himself into our hands. The Eucharist is a giving without limit on Jesus’ part: ‘This is My body, given up for you.’ What we receive in the Eucharist is Jesus in the very act of giving His life for all mankind, the act in which He personally loves each of us with the greatest of loves: ‘Greater love has no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends’ (John 15:13). Each time we receive the Eucharist, we should be moved with the same awe that Saint Paul had, in knowing: [He] loved me and gave Himself for me (Galatians 2:20).

(From Fire & Light – Learning to Receive The Gift of God)

 

St. Leonard of Port Maurice

“Treasures, however great and precious, are never appreciated until examined, counted over, and summed up. Hence it is, dear reader, that by many there is formed no due estimate of the holy and awful Sacrifice of the Mass. Though the greatest treasure which glorifies and enriches the Church of God, it is still a hidden treasure, and known to few. Ah, if this jewel of paradise were but known, who would not give up all things to obtain it! No one would then permit to escape from his mouth the scandalous words, ‘A Mass more or less makes little difference.’

Rather, like the merchant in the Gospel, would each man sink his whole fortune to render himself master of a treasure so precious: Abiit et vendidit omnia quae habuit, et emit eam, ‘he went and sold all that he possessed, and bought it’.’ (St. Matthew 13:46).

(From The Hidden Treasure)

 

Venerable Bruno Lanteri

“We proclaim God's holiness ‘with Angels and Archangels, with Thrones and Dominions, and with all the hosts and Powers of heaven.’ When we pray, ‘Holy, Holy, Holy Lord God of hosts. Heaven and earth are full of Your glory,’ we say this prayer together with the Heavenly Court. Joined with them in praise, Venerable Bruno invites us to pray these words with their same sentiments and heart, with deep gratitude for God's saving love, with hearts raised in thanksgiving and adoration, and with the joy of those who sing the heavenly song.

Have you ever considered that, when the priest prays the Preface, when you join your heart to his words as you listen, and when you say or sing the 'Holy, Holy, Holy,' you are praying with the Angels, the Archangels, and all the heavenly host? Stop briefly now and consider this truth.

Contemplate the Heavenly Court for a moment. ‘See’ and ‘hear’ the Angels and the blessed gathered around the throne as they worship, adore and sing God's praises with glad hearts. Let the warm and joyful sentiments of their hearts fill your own heart.”

(From A Biblical Way of Praying Mass - The Eucharistic Wisdom of Venerable Bruno Lanteri)

There Is Nothing on This Earth More Magnificent Than The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass

 

Eucharistic Reflection - The Most Magnificent Feast

(Photo by Josh Applegate on Unsplash)

“My sisters, I regard the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass as the most magnificent feast, for in it we eat the flesh of the Son of God and we drink His Blood, so that the guests’ souls are completely filled with Jesus Christ. Consider we are filled with His divinity and His humanity, with His holy soul and all His infinite perfections and by concomitance, with the Farther and the Holy Spirit. This is what is offered in this precious mystery, which being too common is neglected and being so excellent is still understood only by a few…”

 

(Venerable Catherine Mectilde de Bar from The Mystery of Incomprehensible Love)

Of Priests, the Eucharist and the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass

Of Priests, the Eucharist and the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass

(Slightly modified version of a March 28, 2013 post)

When Jesus told His followers that unless they ate His Body and drank His Blood, they could not have eternal life, large numbers left and never returned. Their initial repulsion to this direction was understandable: who would want to eat the flesh and drink the blood of another living human being?

Yet, many had come to believe that Jesus was the long-awaited Messiah. They had either heard of or actually witnessed countless miracles evidencing His Divine nature.  Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. Why did they not realize that He would never ask the impossible of them or fail to provide them the means with which to fulfill His command?

His apostles had no greater understanding of, or fondness, for what Jesus was commanding them to do. But when Jesus asked them if they too would leave, Peter, answering for himself and for the other apostles save for Judas, replied: “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.”
 

So they stepped out in faith, accepting this “difficult” teaching without fully understanding it. Their faith was rewarded at the Last Supper when Jesus, using the basic elements of a common meal - bread and wine – transformed the substance (but not the outward appearance of those items), into His Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity, gave them to His apostles to eat and to drink, and empowered His newly ordained priests and their legitimate successors to do likewise.  This world has never been the same.

[Today] This Holy Thursday as we commemorate the institution of the Eucharist, the ordained priesthood and the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, we would do well to spend a few minutes reviewing and reflecting on the three questions and answers that follow.

Are The Masses You Attend Celebrated Worthily and Holily? – Part I

 [The following is an excerpt from my book,  I Thirst For Your Love]

 Are The Masses You Attend Celebrated Worthily and Holily? – Part I

(Image Source: Wikimedia Commons)

For some time now, I have been reading The Priest In Union With Christ written by the late Father Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P., described by some as “probably the 20^th century’s greatest theologian” and “one of the Church’s all-time greatest authorities on the spiritual life”.

Given the on-going attack on the nature of the priesthood, our priests and the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, this is a book you should read and gift to any priest you treasure.

In it, this gifted Dominican urges all of his readers to always remember “that the principal Priest in the sacrifice of the Mass is Christ, and that the celebrant must be striving for an actual and closer union with Him.” Does this truth come as a surprise to you?

He then goes on to describe the different ways of celebrating Mass: the sacrilegious Mass, the Mass which is said hurriedly, the Mass which is outwardly correct but lacks the spirit of faith, the Mass which is faithfully and worthily celebrated, and the Mass of the Saints.

We would all do well to read, reflect and ponder these various descriptions. But I want to focus on the Mass which is faithfully and worthily celebrated – “a Mass offered in a spirit of faith, of confidence in God and of love for God and one’s neighbor”.

  “In such a sacrifice, we witness the impulse and guidance of the Theological Virtues which inspire the virtue of religion. The Kyrie Eleison is a genuine prayer of petition; the Gloria in Excelsis Deo is an act of adoration of God on high; the Gospel of the day is read with keen belief in what it contains; the words of Consecration are pronounced by a minister in actual union with  Christ the  principal  Offerer, by one who

realizes to some extent the wide diffusion of the spiritual effects of his offering and sacramental immolation to the souls in this world and to those in Purgatory. The Agnus Dei is a sincere request for the forgiveness of sin; the priest’s Communion leaves nothing to be desired– it is always more fervent and more fruitful than the day before because of the daily growth in charity produced by the Sacrament of the Eucharist. The distribution of Holy Communion is not approached in any perfunctory spirit, but is treated as the means of bestowing on the faithful, superabundant life, of giving them an even greater share in the divine life…Afterwards the priest will make his private thanksgiving, which, if time permits, will be prolonged on certain feast days in the form of mental prayer. There is no more suitable time for intimate prayer than when Christ is Sacramentally present within us, and when our soul, if recollected, is under His actual influence.”

But you might be saying that Father Garrigou-Lagrange wrote those words prior to the Mass changes implemented after Vatican II, so they have no relevancy to us today. An expert, I am not, but I do know this: Vatican II never mandated the removal of Latin from the Mass and never, and could never, change its supernatural nature or the reverence with which it must be celebrated. Man did this and we are now paying dearly for those errors.

In my simple layman’s mind and with the aid of Father Peter Girard, O.P. and other holy priests, I have come to understand that when we participate in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass we are really being transported spiritually beyond the realm of earthly time and space and enter into the on-going heavenly liturgy which someday we hope to enjoy. Please correct me if I am in error.

Is this how you experience Mass? How blessed you are!