The Nineteenth Sunday of Ordinary Time (B)
Great River Teens Encounter Christ Picnic
My dear brothers and sisters in Christ,
Why did the angel of the Lord say to the prophet Elijah, “Get up
and eat, else the journey will be too long for you” (I Kings 19:7)? Why did Elijah
go “a day’s journey into the desert” (I Kings 19:4)? Because the Israelites
wobbled back and forth in infidelity, Elijah proved Ba’al to be a false god and
slew 450 of his priests. Being displeased at the loss of so many of her
priests, Queen Jezebel wanted Elijah dead. This is why he went into the desert,
but where was he going?
He was going to Mount Horeb, a mountain in
Egypt also known as Mount Sinai, to the very mountain where the Lord God had so
often revealed himself in driving winds, earthquakes, and fires. But Elijah did
not find the Lord in any of these
powerful demonstrations of force, but rather in “a still small voice,” or, as the
Hebrew puts it, in “a sound that was no sound” (I Kings 19:12). Before that
stillness, before the very presence of God, the prophet “wrapped his face in
his mantle” and presented himself before God in humble fear (I Kings 19:13).
Elijah, then, was actively seeking the
presence of God to beg his assistance; he was, we might say, on a pilgrimage, a
journey of “forty days and forty nights” (I Kings 19:8). However, to make this
pilgrimage, he needed to “get up and eat, else the journey [would] be too long
for [him].”
Having found the presence of God, Elijah
could rightly sing with the Psalmist, “I sought the Lord and he answered me and delivered me from all my fears”
(Psalm 34:5). But without the proper nourishment, Elijah could not have arrived
at the end of his pilgrimage, he could not have arrived in the presence of God;
without the proper nourishment, he could only say, “This is enough, O Lord!
Take my life” (I Kings 19:4)! Is it any different for us?
Each of us is on a pilgrimage to the house
of the Father, a pilgrimage that began the moment we were baptized into Christ
Jesus and that will conclude – successfully or not – the moment we die (see
John 14:2). Our pilgrimage is also one of a symbolic forty days and forty
nights, that is, of continual repentance and conversion. We, too, must have the
proper nourishment on our pilgrimage, else the journey will be too long for us
and we will be unable to root out “all bitterness, fury, anger, shouting, and
reviling … and malice” from our lives. Without the proper nourishment we will
be unable to forgive one another as Christ has forgiven us; we will be unable to
gaze upon the beauty of his face (Ephesians 4:31; see also Ephesians 4:32).
On this pilgrimage to the house of the
Father, we have many helps and guides. We have the Ten Commandments to mark out
the narrow way before us (cf. Matthew 7:13). We have the witness of the saints
who shine as great lights upon the path pointing out the way we should walk. We
have the Sacred Scriptures through which the Lord continues to speak to his
people. We have the Catechism of the
Catholic Church, which lays out for us a detailed and inspiring
understanding of the faith we profess and how the faith should be lived and
expressed. Each of these serve as nourishment on our journey, but none is as
satisfying as the Bread of Life Himself.
We also have Great River Teens Encounter
Christ, which makes use, in one way or another, of all of these various helps.
The TEC movement has been in the Quincy area now for nearly 44 years with the
express purpose of providing young men and women “a space to reflect upon one’s
own ideals, hopes, dreams, and problems; to discover a God that you can believe
in … a Christ you can encounter as risen and alive in your midst.” What better
space is there to do such reflecting than before the Blessed Sacrament?
This Christ whom we seek to help others
encounter is he who says of himself today, “I am the living bread that came
down from heaven; whoever eats this bread will live forever; and the bread that
I will give is my flesh for the life of the world” (John 6:51). Just a few
verses later, he will declare with great authority, “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 in you” (John 6:53). We must strive to help others encounter, to know, to
love, and to serve Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar because Christ
is counting on us.
This is a daunting mission, but it is one
to which each of us is called, not only through our participation in the Teens
Encounter Christ movement, but also – and more fundamentally - by virtue of our
baptism. Tonight we give special thanks to God for those men and women who,
through their roles as Lay Directors, have helped lead others to Christ and, in
a particular way, we pray for those who will serve as Lay Directors this coming
year. At the same time, we honor those recipients of the Spirit of TEC award
and await a “big announcement” of some sort (that remains a secret even to me).
Because we have gathered here at the altar
of the Lord for all of this - and to rejoice in the communion that binds us
together in Christ – it is only right that we reflect for a moment on the One
we seek to encounter on our retreats: Christ Jesus, the Bread of Life, who has
promised, “I am with you always, until the end of the age” (Matthew 28:20).
As if in anticipation of the plea of the
two disciples to “stay with us,” the Lord Jesus commanded at the Last Supper,
“Do this in memory of me” (Luke 24:29; Luke 22:19). It is through the Eucharist
that the Lord Jesus remains in his Church, present in every tabernacle
throughout the world. Christ is counting on us to help others encounter him in
the Eucharist, to help them hear what J.R.R. Tolkien called “the never-ceasing
silent appeal of [the] Tabernacle,” and to help them satisfy “the sense of
starving hunger” in their souls.[1]
Even more than raising funds to defray the
cost of our retreats, the primary goal of the members of Great River TEC must
be to help others encounter the Eucharistic Lord. This is why the Eucharist is
always at the heart of every TEC retreat, reserved in the Wheat Chapel where
the Wheaties spend so much of their time praying before him.
The only way to help others encounter Jesus
in the Eucharist is if we – each of one of us, young or old, Catholic or
Protestant - first hear the never-ceasing silent appeal of the tabernacle
ourselves and recognize the sense of starving hunger in our hearts that can
only be satisfied by him who is the Bread of Life. This is why Pope Francis
said this past Friday, “To see young people like you
who believe in Jesus present in the Eucharist … gives me great hope.”[2]
Everyone
who believes in Jesus present in the Eucharist gives great hope not only to the
Pope but also to the entire world because he or she becomes a reflection of
Jesus’ love. They spend so much time in his presence, enjoying a foretaste of
the glory and wonder of heaven as they “look to him that [they] might be
radiant with joy [and their] face[s] not blush with shame” (Psalm 34:6). As
they adore the Eucharist inside or outside of the tabernacle, they look at
Jesus and Jesus looks at them. They learn to look upon others with his gaze of
love. They learn to “be imitators of God” and to make of their lives “a
sacrificial offering to God” which they express whenever they genuflect before
him remembering that the Lord himself said, “To me every knee shall bow” (Ephesians5:1, 2; Isaiah 45:23).
It
is a lamentable reality that in a recent survey of active Catholics in the
Diocese of Springfield in Illinois less than 10% of the respondents cited the
Eucharist as one of the principle reasons they go to Mass.[3] This demonstrates a lack of understand,
appreciation, and love of one of the central tenants of the faith. The
Eucharist is not just a mere symbol, but the very Body and Blood, Soul and
Divinity of Jesus himself; if it were just a symbol, our genuflection would be
an act of idolatry toward a piece of bread. To deny the Real Presence of Our
Lord in the Blessed Sacrament is to, as Tolkien put it, “call Our Lord a fraud
to his face.”[4] This we cannot do; we must instead
approach him with faith, saying to him in all humility, “I do believe, help my
unbelief” (Mark 9:24)!
If
the Lord gently beckons to us from his tabernacles, how do we learn to detect
his still, small voice? Like Elijah, we, too, must actively seek his presence.
We must strive to make the words of the Psalmist our own: “I sought the Lord and he answered me” (Psalm 34:5).
Like Isaiah, we must “seek the Lord
while he may be found” and “call upon him while he is near” (Isaiah 55:4). If
we call upon the Lord present in the Blessed Sacrament, where he is nearer to
us than anywhere else, he will answer us and we will slowly learn to recognize
his presence, but, like Elijah, only in stillness, as if the eye of a hurricane.
If
we quiet ourselves in the presence of the Eucharistic King, approaching him
with humble confidence, we will begin to discern a stillness unlike any other,
one that can only be found in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament. If we
remain quiet and still, we will begin to feel a peace that the world cannot
give, we will recognize his majesty, and will begin to take refuge in him (see
John 14:27; Psalm 34:9). The more time we spend in his presence, the more like
him we will become and our efforts to help young men and women encounter Christ
will bear ever-greater fruit because they will see him in us – and not
ourselves.
The
sub-creator of the elven way bread, lembas,
called the Blessed Sacrament “the one great thing to love on earth.” There, he
said,
you will find romance,
glory, honour, fidelity, and the true way of all your loves on earth, and more
than that: Death. By the divine paradox, that which ends life, and demands the
surrender of all, and yet by the taste - or foretaste - of which alone can what
you seek in your earthly relationships (love, faithfulness, joy) be maintained,
or take on that complexion of reality, of eternal endurance, which every man's
heart desires.[5]
The
Blessed Sacrament is the bread for our pilgrimage through this life, the bread
without which the journey will be too long for us. This is why we must always
seek to live in such a way that we will be able to receive him without eating
or drinking judgment on ourselves and why we should seek to bring others into
the full communion of the Catholic Church (see I Corinthians 11:29).
What
do we do, then, if we find our faith in the Blessed Sacrament is somewhat weak?
What if all of this seems too much to believe? Tolkien gives us the answer:
The only cure for sagging
or fainting faith is Communion. Though always Itself, perfect and complete and
inviolate, the Blessed Sacrament does not operate completely and once for all
in any of us. Like the act of Faith it must be continuous and grow by exercise.
Frequency is of the highest effect. Seven times a week is more nourishing than
seven times at intervals.[6]
We
must learn to listen to the never-ceasing silent appeal of the Tabernacle and
place ourselves often in his presence.
In just a few moments we will look upon the
one great thing to love on earth and will receive him into our hearts. May he
increase our hunger for him; may he strengthen our love for him; and may he
fill us with zeal to help others encounter him. Amen.
[1]
J.R.R. Tolkien, “Letter 250, To Michael Tolkien,” 1 November 1963. In The Letters of Tolkien: A Selection Edited
by Humphrey Carpenter with the Assistance of Christopher Tolkien. (New
York, New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2013), 340.
[2]
Pope Francis, Audience to the Eucharistic Prayer Movement, August 7, 2015. In
“Pope: ‘In a world at war, you are a sign of hope.’ A meeting with the
Eucharistic Youth Movement.” Asia News, August 7, 2015. Accessed August 8,
2015. Available at http://www.asianews.it/news-en/Pope:-In-a-world-at-war,-you-are-a-sign-of-hope.-A-meeting-with-the-Eucharistic-Youth-Movement-34987.html
[3]
Joy and Grievance in an American Diocese:
Results from Online Surveys of Active and Inactive Catholics in Central
Illinois (Lisle, Illinois: Benedictine University, September 10, 2014). See
also Thomas John Paprocki, Press Release: “Reflections on ‘Joy and Grievance in
an American Diocese,’” November 24, 2014.
[4]
J.R.R. Tolkien, “Letter 250, To Michael Tolkien,” 338.
[5]
J.R.R. Tolkien, Letter to Michael Tolkien, March 6-8, 1941, The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien, 54.
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