The Eucharist 102: Miracles

   

I mentioned in yesterday's blog post that transubstantiation can be difficult to wrap our heads around, and that the entire concept is one of the great mysteries of the Church. And it is, the spiritual transformation of something is a little hard to wrap our very human minds around, and that's okay. The whole point of the Eucharist was to give us outward signs of an inner workings; physically receiving Jesus helps us better understand how He nourishes us each week.

But God has provided us other outward signs about this incredible gift. These miracles often happened when someone, usually the priest, struggled with believing in the true presence of Christ in the Eucharist. For over 250 years in Italy, consecrated hosts have been perfectly preserved. Scientists have studied them and have yet to understand why the consecrated hosts have not rotted yet. In Bolsena-Orvieta, Italy, a priest doubting the true presence was convinced when real blood began to seep out of the bread immediately after consecrating. Pope Urban IV commissioned the feast day of Corpus Christi in honor of this miracle. Other Eucharistic miracles include saints or blessed indiciduals who survived on the Eucharist alone, including St. Catherine of Genoa, St. Catherine of Sienna, and most famously, Blessed Alexandra da Costa of Egypt, who died in 1955.

Miracles are not uncommon in the Church, but they are severely scrutinized before they are declared miracles in the first place. The Church has its own process and group of people responsible for investigating and understanding any and all other explanations before they reach the conclusion, that this was indeed a miracle.

Most importantly, what can be drawn from this is that Eucharist (and other sacraments) are physical representations of God's love and mercy on earth, outward signs of God's grace to help us better understand and believe in God, His Son, the Spirit, and the Church.

Tota tua.

"He Sprang Up"

Sunday's Gospel was another one of those we've heard a thousand times. Oh lookie, Jesus performed a miracle, and we kind of phase in and out of listening to it and the homily that follows. We've heard over and over about how awesome and powerful Jesus is.

But this Sunday at Mass I was reminded how important the details are in the Bible. After all, these weren't typed on a computer or even a typewriter; these books were originally carefully handwritten, so anything within them is important. This isn't just a little detail Mark felt like adding, each of these are important. With that reminder, my mom and I were questioning why it was important that Bartimaeus was even named. Wouldn't it have made more sense to leave him nameless, so that this poor blind man could stand for anyone?

It was my dad who solved it for us though. Bartimaues was called to by Jesus, called by name to come to Him and ask Jesus to heal him. Without sight, literally with blind faith, Bartiemaues had to believe as we all do now, by only hearing about Jesus had done. But by believing, Bartimaues was able to not only have his sight given to him, but also given the opportunity to follow Christ. He "sprang up" and went to the Lord.

Do you spring up to follow Christ when the opportunity arises? Even on a Monday? Even on a cold, dark Monday when all you want to do is stay under those warm blankets and not force yourself up and out of bed earlier than you have to, so that you can do your devotional before the day has truly began?

Spring up this morning! Be thankful for the opportunities before you, and get after it. You're called to do something today, what is it? Go and do it!


Tota tua,

LeAnn