The Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ

by Rev. Gabriel Baltes, O.S.B.  |  06/11/2023  |  A Message from Our Pastor

Dear Parishioners,

Today the church celebrates the great solemnity of The Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ, more popularly referred to as Corpus Christi. This feast emerged in the 13th century after a Belgian nun, Juliana of Liege had a vision. In her vision, Juliana saw a disc-like image that resembled the full moon. A portion of the disc was darkened. She however, interpreted the disc to represent the church’s official Liturgical Year, and the darkened portion to represent a feast that was absent. Juliana maintained that the absent feast was one that focused solely on the Holy Eucharist. Although the annual celebration of Holy Thursday has the Eucharist and the Last Supper as its focus, she felt that Good Friday and Easter Sunday overshadowed this focus and so convinced Pope Urban IV to inaugurate the feast of Corpus Christi.

Originally this feast was a specific Mass with prayers and hymns proper to the mystery of the Eucharist. Soon however, other devotional practices accrued themselves to this celebration including a public procession with the Blessed Sacrament that was displayed in a large reliquary that came to be called a monstrance, from the Latin word monstrare, meaning “to show.” This monstrance/vessel, not only allowed the consecrated host to be shown for an extended period of time, it enabled it to be carried through villages, streets and fields in order to bless those places where people lived and worked. Processions with the Blessed Sacrament became extremely popular in the Middle Ages and following as a way to make a public profession of what we believe as Catholics, namely that Christ is truly present, Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity, in the consecrated gifts of bread and wine.

This is one of the great hallmarks and doctrines of Catholicism, which is why the US Bishops have initiated the 3 year initiative being referred to as “A Eucharistic Revival.” We have completed the first year of this revival that emphasized diocesan efforts. The second year of this revival beings today on Corpus Christi, and is directed to the local parish. We will learn more about this in the weeks ahead, but essentially there are four invitations for this year of the parish.

The first is an invitation to reinvigorate worship by paying special attention the manner in which the liturgy is regularly celebrated – the ars celebrandi, (art of celebration.) The second invitation is designed to foster a deeper personal relationship with Jesus who is present in the Eucharist. To that end, parishes are being encouraged to host a monthly “Encounter Night” that would include adoration of the Blessed Sacrament. The third invitation is to deepen one’s knowledge of the Eucharist by means of homilies and catechetical sessions. And the fourth invitation is called a “Missionary Sending.” This is an invitation for regular church goers to become missionaries by inviting people, who have left the church, back to the liturgy.

This fall, I will outline more specifically what we at St. Joan of Arc might do to honor these invitations and provide what is most needed to nurture the Eucharistic life of our faith community. May God who has begun this good work, bring it to completion.