WORD FOR MISSION
Reflection on mission and
on Sunday Liturgy

THE EUCHARIST:

nourishment and inspiration for MISSION

Solemnity of the Body and Blood of Christ

Year “A” - Sunday 29.5.2005

Deuteronomy  8:2-3;14-16 From Psalm 147 1Corinthians  10:16-17 John 6:51-58

Reflections

Jesus Christ in the Eucharist is the Bread of Life (Gospel) in the desert of the world (1st Reading) so that the Church may bring about, live and proclaim communion and fraternity (2nd Reading). The language of Jesus in the synagogue of Capernaum is realistic and insistent: the Body and Blood of Christ are not just 'holy things', but Christ Himself. He is the Bread of Life, to be welcomed and received with a radical faith, to be lived in this life and the next. Trusting in Him totally. Because only He has the words of eternal (cf. Jn.6:68).

The Eucharist is the new and definitive gift that Christ entrusts to the Church, which is both pilgrim and missionary in the desert of the world. A gift greater than manna (cf. Jn.6:58); a gift to be discovered and pointed out to others: "if you only knew the gift of God..." (Jn.4:10). It is the gift of Bread and of Water, permitting travel in the earthly desert, continually calling to mind (do not forget... remember..." (Dt.8:14,18) the salvation received. "The biblical remembrance reintroduces the  believer into the event of salvation, making real the events of the past in the present context. This is the precise meaning of the word memorial which the New Testament also applies to the Eucharist. With the certainty of the past intervention of God, there is a renewed urge to implore Him regarding the present burden of tension while awaiting the full Messianic liberation... The Eucharist is a remembrance of the Death and Resurrection of Christ, but it is the certainty of his continued presence as the food of pilgrim humanity, while waiting for His coming" (G. Ravasi).

The biblical desert (Reading I) is an ambivalent experience: it is a place of trial and humiliation, but also a time to seek the deep truths of one's own life ("to know your inmost heart": v.2); a terrifying place of snakes and scorpions, but also an experience of liberation from the condition of slavery (v.14); a time of hunger, during which the people feeds both on manna and on the word that comes from the mouth of the Lord (cf. v.3); a dry, waterless wilderness where the Lord makes water pour out of the hardest rock (cf. v.16). Having experienced in his own life and witnessed these events that are typical of human existence, the evangeliser takes along the roads of the world the only valid answer, which is Christ, the good news of true life for all nations. On this topic, Pope Benedict XVI has spoken, right from the start, clear and inspiring words for missionary action. *

The Eucharist is the source and the seal of unity (Reading II): as it is a communion with the Body and Blood of Christ, it must lead all those who partake of the one bread to live in communion. From the Eucharist comes, necessarily, a generous and creative urge towards ecumenical encounter and missionary activity The Eucharist teaches us and gives us the strength to break down the barriers that hinder or suffocate the development of life: to defend the life of every person, in the absolute conviction that nobody is redundant" in the global village of humanity; to overcome the spiral of violence through dialogue, forgiveness and self-sacrifice; to break the chains of the hoarding of goods through sharing, solidarity and the effective use of more just relationships between individuals and among peoples. In a word, the Eucharist is the driving force and the pattern of an authentic development and of the human and Christian betterment of the human person.

The 'global village' can have only one  global banquet, in which all peoples have a right to partake, and from which nobody, for any reason, must be excluded or put aside. This, and only this, has been the eternal project of the common Father of all the human family (cf. Is 25:6-9). This is the dream that He entrusts, so as to be carried to its completion, to the community of believers who have the right and duty to celebrate the Eucharist, 'making memory' of the death and resurrection of His Son. This is the banquet to which all the peoples of earth are invited, united by the one vital lymph that is the Spirit.

The Pope's words

*  “The pastor must be inspired by Christ’s holy zeal: for him it is not a matter of indifference that so many people are living in the desert. And there are so many kinds of desert. There is the desert of poverty, the desert of hunger and thirst, the desert of abandonment, of loneliness, of broken love. There is the desert of God’s darkness, the emptiness of souls no longer aware of their dignity or the goal of human life. The external deserts in the world are growing, because the internal deserts have become so vast. Therefore the earth’s treasures no longer serve to build God’s garden for all to live in, but they have been made to serve the powers of exploitation and destruction. The Church as a whole and all her Pastors, like Christ, must set out to lead people out of the desert, towards the place of life, towards friendship with the Son of God, towards the One who gives us life, and life in abundance”.

Benedict XVI

Homily at the beginning of the Petrine Ministry

Rome, 24 April 2005.

In the steps of Missionaries

- 29/5: Conclusion in Bari (Italy), in the presence of Pope Benedict XVI, the 24th National Eucharistic Congress, with the theme: "Without Sunday, we cannot live!"

- 29/5: Bl Joseph Gérard (1831-1914), a French OMI (Oblates of Mary Immaculate) priest who was a missionary pioneer in South Africa and Lesotho.

- 29/5: St. Ursula (Giulia) Ledóchowska (1865-1939), an Austrian nun, Foundress of the Ursulines of the S. Heart of the Dying Jesus. She made missionary journeys to a number of countries in northern and eastern Europe.

- 30/5: St. Joseph Marello (1844-1895), Bishop of Acqui Terme (Piedmont), Founder of the Oblates of St Joseph, for the Christian and moral formation of young people.

- 31/5: Feast of the Visitation of Mary to Elizabeth: an encounter of Faith and of Praise to the Lord.

- 1/6: St. Justin, a Christian philosopher, born in the Holy Land and martyred in Rome (+165). - 1/6: Bl. John Baptist Scalabrini (1839-1905), Bishop of  Piacenza, Founder of the Oblates of Saint Charles for the pastoral care of migrants.

- 3/6: Solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus: from the pierced Heart of Christ the missionary Church is born.

- 3/6: Sts. Charles Lwanga and 21 companions, the Martyrs of Uganda who were killed between 1885-1887 at Namugongo and other locations around Kampala.

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Editor: Fr. Romeo  Ballan, mcci – Director of CIAM, Rome – Website:   www.ciam.org   “Parola per la Missione”