Thursday June 19, 2025

Luke 19:11-17

Today we celebrate the solemnity of the body and blood of Christ. Most churches will also celebrate this feast this coming Sunday. Whenever this feast comes around, I become nostalgic. I remember as a young boy in the blistering hot sun of my motherland serving mass and then taking Jesus into the streets. This feast and Palm Sunday were the mother of processions. People would line up, the sick would be brought out as the priest carried the Blessed Sacrament from the church to the different stations, walking all the way. I really never saw father in the gym but that day he had the muscles and stamina.

The jesuits changed this feast for me. One Jesuit priest asked us later in life: Does it make sense to have Jesus leave the church once a year? Shouldn’t our Lord leave the church every time you leave the church? Yes this feast is important but the full meaning of it is that there is also real presence in you. Become what you receive!!! Become the body and blood of Christ!!