Feast of the Body and Blood of Jesus

Corpus Christi 7:30 2007 Ruth went to her mail box and there was only one letter. She picked it up and looked at it before opening, but then she looked at the envelope again. There was no stamp, no postmark, only her name and address. She read the letter: Dear Ruth, I’m going to be in your neighborhood Saturday evening and I’d like to stop by for a visit. Love Always, Jesus Her hands were shaking as she placed the letter on the table. “Why would the Lord want to visit me? I’m nobody special. I don’t have anything to offer.” With that thought, Ruth remembered her empty kitchen cabinets. “Oh my goodness, I really don’t have anything to offer. I’ll have to run down to the store and buy something for dinner.” She reached for her purse and counted out its contents. Five dollars and forty cents. “Well, I can get some bread and cold cuts, at least.” She threw on her coat and hurried out the door. A loaf of French bread, a half-pound of sliced turkey, and a carton of milk...leaving Ruth with grand total of twelve cents to last her until Monday. Nonetheless, she felt good as she headed home, her meager offerings tucked under her arm. “Hey lady, can you help us, lady?” Ruth had been so absorbed in her dinner plans, she hadn’t even noticed two figures huddled in the alleyway. A man and a woman, both of them dressed in little more than rags. “Look lady, I ain’t got a job, ya know, and my wife and I have been living out here on the street, and, well, now it’s getting cold and we’re getting kinda hungry and, well, if you could help us, lady, we’d really appreciate it.” Ruth looked at them both. They were dirty, they smelled bad and, frankly, she was certain that they could get some kind of work if they really wanted to. “Sir, I’d like to help you, but I’m a poor woman myself. All I have is a few cold cuts and some bread, and I’m having an important guest for dinner tonight and I was planning on serving that to Him.” “Yeah, well, okay lady, I understand. Thanks anyway.” The man put his arm around the woman’s shoulders, turned and headed back into the alley. As she watched them leave, Ruth felt a familiar twinge in her heart. “Sir, wait!” The couple stopped and turned as she ran down the alley after them. “Look, why don’t you take this food. I’ll figure out something else to serve my guest.” She handed the man her grocery bag. “Thank you lady. Thank you very much!” “Yes, thank you!” It was the man’s wife, and Ruth could see now that she was shivering. “You know, I’ve got another coat at home. Here, why don’t you take this one.” Ruth unbuttoned her jacket and slipped it over the woman’s shoulders. Then smiling, she turned and walked back to the street...without her coat and with nothing to serve her guest. “Thank you lady! Thank you very much!” Ruth was chilled by the time she reached her front door, and worried too. The Lord was coming to visit and she didn’t have anything to offer Him. She fumbled through her purse for the door key. But as she did, she noticed another envelope in her mailbox. “That’s odd. The mailman doesn’t usually come twice in one day.” She took the envelope out of the box and opened it. Dear Ruth, It was so good to see you again. Thank you for the lovely meal. And thank you, too, for the beautiful coat. Love Always Jesus This, of course, is a fictitious story but it does put flesh on Jesus’ words, Whatsoever … In receiving Jesus in Communion, you may be as solemn as a cloistered monk, as fervent as a first communicant. But the proof of your devotion to Jesus Eucharistic extends beyond the moment of Communion. The proof, for example, is not what you do or how you act here in church but how you care for others out there in your daily life. You all know from your experience that it is much easier to be pious here in church than to be patient, forgiving and loving in your daily interpersonal relationships. Just as Jesus feeds you here with himself as the bread of life, so you are to feed those in need with the bread of your life with generosity as did the woman in our story. You are to feed them not only with material food as is done, forexample, in a soup kitchen but also you are to feed them with your concern, your time, your helpfulness, your kindness, your affirmations. You come here to Eucharist not so much to serve God but to learn how God breaks bread that you can do it in the same way. Like David, for example, who shared the sacred bread of the Temple with his soldiers, like Jesus who shares the bread become his flesh, so too you are to share the bread of your life with everyone, deserving or not. Bread is sustenance. So you are to sustain others with the nourishment of your Christian love. Not by being “preachy” but by the way you live his word. E.g. living his parable of the prodigal son by forgiving someone before he or she is able even to say, I’m sorry. Your loving service to those in need will make your devotion to Jesus in the Eucharist more concrete, more intimate. Macrina Wiederkehr in her book, A Tree Full of Angels, offers us a wonderful connection between the Eucharist and ourselves. She writes, Each of us is called to be bread for the world. Can’t you at least be bread for those around you just as Jesus is bread for you, feeding them with the nourishment of your own spirituality? Humorous: A man climbs to the top of the snow- covered mountain. He is wondering, “Can God really hear me from here?” So he yells, “God, what should I do with my life?” God answers, “Feed the hungry.” “Oh,” said the man. “I was just testing.” “So was I,” God retorted. Thought: Always be bread for others.