Day four of their pilgrimage to Quito and our Aussie delegates are marvelling at the natural beauty and many blessings of the congress so far.
“What a beautiful place this is thousands of miles away from our beautiful Australia,” said Fr John Knight from St Andrew’s Parish in Malabar.
“I can see there’s a lot of people with my own faith, and the city itself is quite romantic and beautiful,” said Roman Pilch, A Project Delivery Specialist from Sydney Catholic Schools.
But the most fruitful blessing has been gaining a deeper understanding of the Eucharist from the daily talks during the International Eucharistic Congress.
Our delegates were enriched by a talk called “Eucharist and transfiguration of the World” from US Bishop Andrew Cozzens of Minnesota.
Bishop Andrew revealed how the Last Supper and Jesus’ death on the cross and the resurrection were interdependent of each other.
“If we had not had the Last Supper, if we had not had the ritual anticipation of his death, we would never have been able to grasp how the carrying out of his being condemned to death could have been in fact the act of perfect worship, pleasing to the Father, the only true act of worship, the only true liturgy,” he said.
“The death without the Last Supper, would be the death of an innocent man.
“But together with his death, it becomes a gift of life for us. And both become for us, the perfect act of worship.
“His death on the cross would be meaningless without the resurrection. The resurrection fulfils and makes true the death on the cross.
“The Last Supper, death on the cross, and the resurrection—together make up the one reality—the Paschal mystery. This is the mystery of the sacrifice of the Mass,” he revealed.
Inspired by the wonderful presentation Bishop Andrew gave, Fr John felt overwhelmed, as it highlighted Calvary and the Last Supper.
“They are two important moments. You cannot just have the Last Supper all by itself or the crucifixion.
“It is in the Pascal mystery that we are healed, and we are brought together. And he spoke about suffering. We should bring all, as Mary brought herself, to enter the Passion of Jesus.”
“She was one with Christ in Calvary, as we are. So, when we come to the Eucharist to be one with him; he who can heal, he can give us that healing, so when we are healed, then we can go out in love.
“What God has, in the person of Jesus, given to us is our Eucharistic King,” he said.
Roman believes the talk also revealed how the Eucharist relates to his own daily struggles.
“It was fantastic. It made me reflect on how we all kind of suffer, in a sense. And we all try our best and give our love in everything we do.
“I know we might not suffer and die or anything, but we do all suffer with the world around us and the challenges we have. But we all do our best to strive and strive to do our best to help,” said Roman.
“I am really looking forward to further talks to understand what they are all about and reflect a little bit more on what they are saying,” he added.
But as the announcement of the host for the 2028 IEC approaches, a sense of anticipation and excitement is also building among the Australian group.
“As we journey together, our only hope is that in 2028 we will have an International Eucharistic Congress in Sydney. We had one in 1928. It will be a century if we have it again in 2028,” said Fr John.
What a wonderful, wonderful gift it is going to be for us to once again centre upon what the Eucharist is to us, as an archdiocese, as an Australian Catholic people.”