What Can You Do?

Adoration Chapel,
National Shrine of the Little Flower,
Royal Oak, Michigan

18th Sunday in Ordinary Time
Ex 16:2-4, 12-15/Eph 4:17, 20-24/Jn 6:24-35

We live in a society of high-tech. There is an app for just about everything imaginable. Our cell phones, notebooks, and laptops make us available 24/7. Social networking and the Internet makes us privvy to information about other people, sometimes I think to the point of voyerism. We know more about each other than ever before. Googling is a verb and surfing nowadays has little to do with water. Think about it--for all the technology that allows us to be informed and communicate, we are little better off than in the days of smoke signals and carrier pigeons. We still have a hard time opening up and having meaninful relationships.

If you don't believe me, check out the divorce rate, surveys about satisfaction in the workplace, and  the multitude of reality shows. All prove we can be a pretty sorry lot. What will it take to bring us together? That is truly what God wants for us--unity with each other and with Him.

Jesus offers that--not only in His life, death, and resurrection, but through the lasting gift of the Eucharist. Through His Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity offered at Mass, the Eucharist is the connection not only to God through Christ, but also unites us to all those who receive, who have received, and who will receive. The Catechism of the Catholic Church notes that the Eucharist is the "source and summit of the Christian life" (CCC, 1324). Through the Power of the Holy Spirit, the Eucharist is truly communion, drawing all as one.

That's why John's Gospel is so telling. We, like those gathered around Jesus, are still asking, "What can you do (for me)? When we contemplate the magnitude of the gift Christ has given, I cannot help but think we should, rather, fall on our knees in humility and grateful praise. How many do we know who would lay down their life for us? For me?

As we meditate on the precious gift of the Eucharist, let us, like St. Paul, put away our former self and put on the new self.. Let us allow Christ to live through us so that we may be the image of Christ--His love, mercy, and forgiveness, building relationships that draw all into one. Communion is just that--a unity of heart, mind, and soul so that we, as a people, reflect Christ and thus, through His saving Power, invite others to know Him in profound ways.