The Holy Eucharist | EMHC Gathering (4/17/2024) (UPDATED 5/3/2024)

I had the blessed opportunity to talk with a group of our amazing Extraordinary Ministers of Holy Communion (EMHC) on the Eucharist and Eucharistic miracles. Below are my talking points and notes that I shared with him. I pray that we all grow deeper in our love and reverence for our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ in the Eucharist.

1. Opening Prayer - “I Devoutly Adore You” (Daily Missal) (see below)

2. Introduction:

1. I served when my goddaughter received First Holy Communion 2 years ago. I am planning to serve when my nephew receives First Holy Communion next month.

2. As a convert, I did not fully understand the Real Presence until I started Diaconal Formation because of Adoration & Holy Hour and serving as an EMHC.

3. Share one parishioner’s reason for not being a EMHC for a long time: they did not feel worthy to touch the Body of Christ with their hands.

4. [DcnP: We are so privileged and blessed to be given the great responsibility to giving our Lord to another during Holy Communion.]

3. Talk on Eucharistic Miracles

1. Scripture

1. Jesus’ Bread of Life Discourse - John 6:22-59 (after feeding of the 5,000 & walking on water) [DcnP" I would invite you all to read and reflect on John, Chapter 6, in the presence of our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament in Adoration.]

1. Manna not from Moses but from Father in heaven.

2. Jesus is the bread of life come down from heaven.

3. Christ’s flesh is true food and blood is true drink.

4. “This saying is hard; who can accept it?” {DcnP: This was what Jesus said that was so hard to them (and many of us today) to accept: "Amen, amen, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life within you." So they left Jesus, except for the apostles.]

5. “You have the words of eternal life.”

2. The Lord’s Supper (celebrate on Holy Thursday) [DcnP: Jesus is very intentional, exact, precise, purposeful in the words that he uses because he wants us to know that it is HIS body and HIS blood given for us.]

1. Matthew 26:26-30 & Mark 14:22-26: “Take and eat; this is MY body. . . Drink from it, all of you, for this is MY blood. . .”

2. Luke 22:14-20: “This is MY body, which will be given for you; do this in memory of me. . . This cup is the new covenant in MY blood, which will be shed for you.”

3. 1 Corinthians 11:23-25

1. “This is MY body that is for you. Do this in remembrance of me. . . This cup is the new covenant in MY blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.”

2. A few Eucharistic miracles of note [DcnP: There are 32 Eucharistic miracles that Blessed Carlo Acutis cataloged on this web-site. I want to focus on these three because the two of a result of priests (in persona Christi) who did not believe and the third is an attempt to desecrate the host.]

1. Lanciano, Italy (8th Century, Circa 750) {DcnP: The priest doubted the real presence of Jesus in the Eucharist. As he spoke the words of consecration, the host and the wine became flesh and blood that coagulated into five (5) globules for the five (5) wounds of Christ.]

2. Bolsena-Orvieto, Italy (1236) [DcnP: The priest doubted the transubstantiation. The host started to bleed during the prayer of consecration.]

3. Santarém, Portugal (13th Century) [DcnP: A woman was having marital problems so she sought out a sorcerer whose "payment" was a consecrated host. The woman received communion, spit out the host, and dried it. The host started to bleed. She did not know what to do so she put the bleeding host in her trunk. In the night, a light emanated from the trunk. The next day, she brought the bleeding host to the priest and repented.]

4. Read about them here: "10 Amazing Eucharistic Miracles" https://catholicworldmission.org/amazing-eucharistic-miracles/

3. The Eucharist and the Saints

1. Saint Tarcisius (young Roman boy during the reign of Emperor Valerian, Christian persecution) - LESSON: protect the Eucharist in the face of threats and death

2. Saint Teresa of Calcutta (“when you look at the crucifix you understand how much Jesus loved you then; when you look at the Sacred Host, you understand how much Jesus loves you now”) - LESSON: spend time with Jesus in Adoration / Holy Hour before the Blessed Sacrament [DcnP: One of my favorite stories about Saint Teresa of Calcutta is, she and her sisters were always busy helping the poorest of the poor. One day, her sisters griped to her about not doing a Holy Hour because they have so much to do. Mother Teresa added another Holy Hour to their day and that made all the difference.]

3. Blessed Carlo Acutis - at 14 years old, created a web-site dedicated to Eucharistic miracles - LESSON: deepen our love for and understanding of the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist [DcnP: Here is a link to an article on Blessed Carlo Acutis with a link to his web-site: https://www.ncregister.com/blog/five-eucharistic-miracles.]

4. Read about them here: "Six Saints' Devotion to the Eucharist" https://catholicexchange.com/six-saints-devotion-to-the-eucharist/

4. The Legend of a Little Girl Named Li (inspired Venerable Fulton Sheen to do a Holy Hour daily)

1. READ from excerpt from Treasure in Clay https://aleteia.org/2022/03/31/how-a-little-girls-eucharistic-faith-inspired-fulton-sheen/

2. Elsewhere in China, a priest had just begun Mass when Communists entered and arrested him and made him a prisoner in a house adjoining the little church. From a window in that house he could see the tabernacle. Shortly after his imprisonment, the Communists opened the tabernacle, threw the Hosts on the floor, and stole the Sacred Vessels. The priest then decided ­­ to make adoration to Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament as much as he could day and night. About three o’clock one morning, he saw a child who had been at the morning Mass open a window, climb in, come to the sanctuary floor, get down on both knees, press her tongue to the Host to give herself Holy Communion. The priest told me there were about thirty Hosts in the ciborium. Every single night she came at the same time until there was only one Host left. As she pressed her tongue to receive the Body of Christ, a shot rang out. A Communist soldier had seen her. It proved to be her Viaticum.

1. Priest adored the Lord from his place of captivity

2. Li consumed a host a day with her tongue for 32 days

3. Viaticum (food for the journey)

5. We experience a Eucharistic miracle at every Mass

1. Is each of us a Doubting Thomas? Jesus said to [Thomas], “Have you come to believe because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed.” (John 20:29)

4. ACTION ITEM: Encounter Jesus in the Eucharist - spend time in Adoration before the Blessed Sacrament (experience from Diaconal Formation and leading Holy Hours for parish) [DcnP: What Jesus said to the disciples during his agony in the garden, he says to us today: Can't you spend an hour with me? The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak.]

1. “There are two things the devil is deadly afraid of: fervent Communion and frequent visits to the Blessed Sacrament.” Saint John Bosco

2. “The Eucharist is the secret of my day. It gives me strengthen and meaning in all my activities of service to the Church and to the whole world.” Pope Saint John Paul II

3. Read more here: "12 Quotes from the Saints on the Holy Eucharist" https://www.catholic365.com/article/29961/12-quotes-from-the-saints-on-the-holy-eucharist.html

5. Closing Prayer - “The Litany of the Holy Eucharist" (https://ewtn.co.uk/prayer-litany-of-the-most-blessed-sacrament/)

. . .

"I devoutly adore you" Prayer

I devoutly adore you, O hidden God, truly hidden beneath these appearances.

My whole heart submits to you, and in contemplating you, it surrenders itself completely.

Sight, touch, taste are all deceived  in their judgment of you,

But hearing suffices firmly to believe.

I believe all that the Son of God has spoken;

There is nothing truer than this word of truth.

On the cross only the Divinity was hidden,

But here the Humanity is also hidden.

I believe and confess both,

And ask for what the repentant thief asked.

I do not see the wounds as Thomas did,

But I confess that you are my God.

Make me believe more and more in you,

Hope in you, and love you.

O memorial of our Lord’s death!

Living bread that gives life to man,

Grant my soul to live on you,

And always to savor your sweetness.

Lord Jesus, Good Pelican,

wash me clean with your blood,

One drop of which

can free the entire world of all its sins.

Jesus, whom now I see hidden,

I ask you to fulfill what I so desire:

That on seeing you face to face,

I may be happy of seeing your glory. Amen.

. . .

UPDATE (5/3/2024): Why is Jesus called the Good Pelican in the "I Devoutly Adore" Prayer? I found the information below from a post on a Catholic social media site. What a beautiful image of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Good Pelican.

THE PELICAN

The pelican is one of the symbols or representation of Christ. The pelican, to prevent its chicks from starving in times of scarcity or famine , wounds its chest with its own beak and feeds them with it’s own blood. According to other legends, if the pelican chicks die, this one opens its side and brings them back to life, at the expense of his own, spraying them with his own blood.

In light of this pre-existing tradition, the early Christians adopted the motif as a symbol of Christ.

The Redeemer who gives His life to bring His own from death which is sin and feeds them with His Body and Blood in the Eucharist.

“Lord Jesus, good pelican, cleanse us purify us with your blood.

For with a single drop you can free the whole world of her crimes

Heal and set us free with the power of your Precious Blood!!! Strengthen us with the bread of angels. Feed us with your body and blood ,the food that gives life to our soul