Ave Maria!

When the priest says to us at the altar, “The Body of Christ,?? do we really know what (Who) we’re receiving? In this episode, guest Raymond deSouza gives a powerful catechism on the Eucharist in the hopes of reevanglizing baptized Catholics. During His earthly ministry, Christ performed many miracles, then asked for one act of faith: “Believe in the Eucharist because I ask you to.?? Unlike a lot of priests & even bishops today, Christ was not afraid of losing the entire congregation when He taught on the Eucharist. Raymond also gives a fascinating explanation & answer to a question posed by host John Primeau: “Why is the body of the dead incensed during a funeral mass??? Hint: it’s also tied into the reality of the Eucharist.

Ave Maria!

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The Real Presence: From Advent and Christmas

to Calvary and to the Blessed Sacrament

Neither Advent nor the tomb is Christ’s final rest in the world. He rests in the midst of the world now, in the Host. He is as silent, as secret and hidden, in the Host as He was in Advent or in the tomb. He trusts Himself to His creatures in the Host as He trusted Himself to our Lady in Advent; only then He gave Himself into the keeping of the one human creature who was sinless and in whom He could have His will, and now He gives Himself into the keeping of sinners.

In the Host He is immobile, dependent. He rests in the priest’s hands, on the paten, in the tabernacle. He remains with us, resting in all the cities and all the lonely and unexpected places of the world. Wherever human creatures are, He rests in their midst.

Christ could show His power and glory; He could show that the Host is God; He could break down the pride of those who have no fear of God. He does not. While injus­tice and arrogance prevail, He remains silent and helpless, and seems to do nothing at all. It has always been Christ’s way to come first in secret, to come in a hidden way, to be secret even in those in whom He abides, whose life He is, to be known first by His love, gradually becoming known by the quickening of His life.

On Calvary Christ is set between two thieves; in Bethlehem He is set between two animals.  On Calvary He is poor, with the poverty of destitution; in Bethlehem He is poor, with the poverty of destitution.

He is deprived of his home in Nazareth; the cradle made ready for Him is empty: On Calvary He was naked, stripped of His garments and of all that He had; in Bethlehem He was naked and stripped of all that He had.

On Calvary He was stretched and straightened and fastened down to the Cross; in Bethlehem He was stretched out and straightened and fastened in swaddling bands.

On Calvary He was lifted up, helpless, and held up for men to look upon; in Bethlehem He was lifted up, helpless, to be gazed upon.

On Calvary He was laid upon a wooden cross; in Bethlehem He was laid in a wooden manger.  By the Cross stood Mary His Mother; by the crib knelt Mary His Mother.

He was crucified outside of the city wall; He was born outside of His own village and crowded out of Bethlehem.

At His birth He was called “King of the Jews”; at His death He was called “King of the Jews.” The claim to be king threatened His life in Bethlehem; the claim to be king cost Him His life in Jerusalem. Three times this mysterious title is heavy with doom: at His birth, His trial, and His death.

At His birth: “There came wise men from the East to Jerusalem, saying, ‘Where is He that is born King of the Jews? For we have seen His star in the east, and are come to adore Him?” At His trial: “And Jesus stood before the governor, and the governor asked Him, saying: ‘Art thou the King of the Jews?”

At Bethlehem myrrh was brought to Him; and myrrh was brought to anoint His body for burial. Each time, it was brought by a rich man who came by night: first by the wise king and then by Nicodemus.

Another king brought incense: frankincense that was poured into a censer of gold and lit with a flame, filling the stable with an aromatic smell to mingle with the smell of hay and the ox’s breath of clover. Myrrh and frankincense were poured out for Him in Bethlehem; and spikenard and ointment were poured over His body in Bethania, for His burial.

There, in the stable at Bethlehem, began the lovely waste that is the extravagance of love, that is and will always be scandal to the loveless. Already, as the useless crown of gold that the infant’s head could not support shone at His feet, as clouds of incense hung in the rafters of the stable, and as the air grew fragrant with the smell of myrrh, the box of precious oint­ment was broken to anoint the Beloved for His burial.

At Bethlehem He was wrapped in swaddling bands and laid in a manger; on Calvary He was wrapped in swaddling bands and laid in a tomb.

Both the manger and the tomb were borrowed. Both had been made for their owners. They were not made for Christ. All that had been prepared for Him God had set aside. God chose what men should give to His Son.

In Bethlehem the Mother of Christ gave Christ’s human body to us. She had given her own flesh and blood to Him to be His flesh and blood. Now she gave herself to us in Him, by giving Him to us. She gave His body to cold, to thirst, to light and darkness, to sleep.

In Bethlehem began the thirst of Calvary, the terrible thirst caused by loss of blood, the thirst that withers the tongue and the hands and feet and the whole body.

In Bethlehem came the infant blindness; and blindness came again on Calvary, filling Christ’s eyes with the darkness of dying.

In Bethlehem Christ slept His first sleep in His Mother’s arms; on Calvary, Christ slept His last sleep in His Mother’s arms.

Christ came out of the darkness of the womb. He was the Light of the World. He came to give the world life. The life of the whole world burnt in the tiny flame of an infant’s life; it began the age-long fight with death in the least and frailest that human nature can be; in the helplessness, the littleness, the blindness of an infant, life prevailed. The Light of the World shone in darkness. At Bethlehem love and death met in the body of Christ, and love prevailed.

from Wood of the Cradle, Wood of the Cross by Caryll Houselander

top artwork from Tommy Canning, used with permission

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Homily #090704 ( 07min) Play – Fr. Bonaventure explains today’s Gospel that the fasting of the new testament will be done in the name of Christ and in conjunction with the sacraments and so be new wine.
Ave Maria! Mass readings

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Homily #100421 ( 07min) Play – “…everyone who sees the Son and believes in him may have eternal life, and I shall raise him on the last day.” Give thanks to the Lord that we are able to receive the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity, under the appearance of bread and wine.
Ave Maria! Mass readings

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The post Apr 21 – Homily – Fr Bonaventure: Really It Is Difficult To Lose Our Souls first appeared on AirMaria.com.

Homily #100423 ( 06min) Play – The Jews quarreled among themselves, saying, “How can this man give us his Flesh to eat?”

Here in the Blessed Sacrament is the same Jesus that live in Nazareth and died on Calvary.

Ave Maria! Mass readings

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How Beautiful (song lyrics)

How beautiful the hands that served
the Wine and the Bread
and the sons of the earth.
How beautiful the feet that walked
the long dusty roads
and the hills to the Cross.

How beautiful…
how beautiful…
How beautiful is the Body of Christ.

How beautiful the Heart that bled,
that took all my sin
and bore it instead.
How beautiful the tender eyes
that chose to forgive
and never despise.
How beautiful…
how beautiful…
How beautiful is the Body of Christ.

And as He laid down His life
we offer this sacrifice,
that we will live just as he died:
willing to pay the price
willing to pay the price.

How beautiful the radiant bride
who waits for her Groom
with His light in her eyes.
How beautiful when humble hearts give
the fruit of pure lives
so that others may live.

How beautiful…
how beautiful…
How beautiful is the Body of Christ.

How beautiful the feet that bring
the sound of good news
and the love of the King.
How beautiful the hands that serve
the Wine and the Bread
and the sons of the earth.

How beautiful…
how beautiful…
How beautiful is the Body of Christ.

The post How Beautiful (lyrics) first appeared on AirMaria.com.

Let us be renewed so that we may thus attend the new feast of the new Lamb, for today we shall not be feasting on the flesh and blood of brute animals as the Jews did, but on God himself, on our Lord Jesus Christ who was sacrificed as our Passover. He is our new, completely sufficient, and rich banquet.

This banquet is new because of its nature; it is free from the staleness of sin, which is shown because it imparts its own newness to us if we eat it worthily. It is completely sufficient because Christ was sacrificed as the one true victim offered once for all in place of the many prefigurative and inadequate victims offered over and over in accordance with the Law. For although Christ is sacramentally offered, sacrificed, and broken daily on many altars, he was in fact sacrificed only once as the one true victim, for Christ, having risen from the dead, dies no more. And whereas the many sacrifices of the Jews – their sacrifices for sin, their peace offerings, their votive offerings, their victims – were insufficient, Christ is a sufficient sacrifice for everything and for everyone: to atone for sins, restore peace between God and humankind, win a hearing for human prayers, and overcome enemies.

Finally, this banquet is a rich one because our Lord Jesus Christ is, as it were, “fat” with the fullness of grace, charity, and mercy. He is the fatted calf which the father ordered to be slain when his son returned from the land of unlikeness. So now that we have been invited to this new, bountiful, and rich banquet, let us be careful to do as the wise man says: If you sit at a lavish table, know that you must prepare a sim­ilar one. Since we have been invited to the table of Christ, let us prepare a similar one for him: let us love him as he has loved us, humble ourselves for him as he humbled himself for us, and be ready to die for him as he died for us.

Ralph the Fervent  (+1101) was a priest in the diocese of Poitiers, France.

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Homily #120508 ( 08min) Play – Our Lord points out how things are in the eyes of God and seeks to strengthen His disciples. We as members of the body of Christ must also share in suffering.
Ave Maria!
Mass: Tuesday 5th Week of Easter – Wkdy – Form: OF
Readings: 
1st: act 14:19-28
Resp: psa 145:10-11, 12-13, 21
Gsp: joh 14:27-31

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2 Pillars #44 ( 05min) Play – We reflect on the presence of God on the Eucharist and with Our Lady for the feast of Corpus Christi.

Meditations read in front of the exposed Blessed Sacrament for our Daily Holy Hour at our Bloomington, Indiana friary from the two books: “Real Presence” by St Peter Julian Eymard. Today this is followed by a prayer in preparation for Corpus Christi.

Ave Maria!

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