Christ in the Eucharist provides us with a “here but not yet” encounter. We receive who we desire to imitate, and we pray to become more and more like that which we receive. We run to the altar with pain and longing, receive the Host, and then enter back into the longing and pain with redemption pumping through our veins.
[I still pray today]: "May my hunger for you far exceed my reach." So, too, with the Eucharist—that this Bread may satiate for a moment, but inevitably it awakens within me a longing to be closer, an eternal closeness that the saints called beatitude. And when you receive the Host at the next Mass that you attend, may your entire person be renewed beneath the weight of his glory. We all know that there are many among us who do not believe in the Real Presence, my brothers and sisters, that burden is ours to bear. For if we are not transformed by the reception of him who we profess to be present under the appearance of bread, then how does one become convinced of the renewal offered therein?
Hunger for Christ. Reach for Christ. And may our collective hunger far exceed our reach so much so that all of our lives will be leaning toward eternity with him so that we may finally be filled with the food that we long for.
--Rachel Bulman
Source of images: Akili Ron Anderson, Last Supper, https://www.washingtonian.com/2019/10/11/a-massive-sculpture-of-an-african-american-last-supper-hidden-for-years-has-been-discovered-in-columbia-heights/
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