So you’re on a quest for immortality and divinity in the heart of the Trinity. How can you start living that life now?
It’s not difficult, because in Australia we can practise our religion and worship God pretty much where and when we want to.
It’s also very difficult because we don’t want to. Not really.
After all, there are so many other things in the amusement park of life that are more interesting, like scrolling through the world’s weirdest questions from the world’s most random people on social media forums.
I’m appalled at how compelling I find this, and how much time I waste on it while Jesus is sitting in the adoration chapel of my local church less than five kilometres away, waiting.
Just waiting. He doesn’t get bored, thankfully – but he would far prefer to see me than not see me.
This Sunday’s feast celebrates the sacrament that, in this life, is our everything. It should be the source and summit of our lives.
And it’s not a what; it’s a who. A real live person with a beating heart and human feelings, who sits waiting to see us.
Jesus came down from heaven, and while he went back, he also stayed with us. He got the best of both worlds, because the thought of leaving us here bereft was too sad.
He promised to be our bread of life, our manna in the desert. And here he is, keeping that promise over two thousand years later.
But, hey, keep scrolling if you really want to.
Today’s feast brings together adoration, the priesthood, and the Mass. Adoration is a great thing to do, and I don’t do enough of it.
To look at Jesus really and truly present, looking right back at you, is a great thing. I’ve seen monstrances that try to capture this reality.
For example, one monstrance had figures of the twelve apostles in a circle, but no figure of Jesus among them – because he’s present in the monstrance instead.
Another was in the shape of the pregnant Virgin Mary, and the lunette for the monstrance was over her womb.
The priesthood is bound inextricably to adoration of the Blessed Sacrament. Most of the young vocations in seminaries today discerned their vocations and nourished them with long periods of adoration.
It makes me both sad and angry to hear about seminaries, even still in Australia, where the practice of adoration is discouraged by priestly formators.
It’s not idolatry to worship God on earth in this form. And if a priest can’t bring himself to adore Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, then he’s just a social worker in a funny outfit.
And I can get myself a better social worker any day of the week, and almost certainly in an even funnier outfit.
But this silly and inappropriate idea only crops up occasionally now when poorly formed Boomers oversee the seminary.
Thankfully their time is passing. Meanwhile, the rest of the church has moved on joyfully to revive adoration from the doldrums it fell into in the 1980s.
There are now adoration chapels all over Australia with busy rosters. Parishes everywhere are rediscovering what a powerhouse this devotion is.
But you have to remember that the Mass is the most important thing connecting heaven and earth.
Adoration shouldn’t be a substitute for Mass. If you have a choice between the two, you should always go to Mass.
But adoration continues the Mass by other means. If I were artistic, I’d design a monstrance that was in the shape of the priest’s hands as he elevates the host.
Rejoice today that God came down from heaven and chose to stay. Think of all the hints he dropped in the Old Testament – manna from heaven, showbread in the Temple. Think of the multiplications of the loaves and fishes that Jesus did for hungry and tired people.
Believe him when he says to you that he will give you his flesh to eat and his blood to drink.
Prepare yourself for each Holy Communion. Don’t be a zombie who just sleepwalks up and back to your pew.
When you do that, you seal Jesus in a tomb in your heart from which he can’t rise again because you won’t let him.
Receive him joyfully and mindfully every single time. Let him go to work like yeast in you.
If you ask him, he can and will slowly transform your cramped and tired heart into a cozy home for himself.
