Dear Friends,
We could come at today’s feast – Corpus Christi – The Body
and Blood of Christ – from many angles. We could spend this blog talking about
Jesus in the Scriptures, and how he talked about food in his parables, ate with
many, provided food for many and gave himself as food and drink for his
disciples and for the ages. That could lead us to talk about the hungers of the
world for essentials as basic as food and drink. We could talk about the ways
nations and groups have politicized food and water, using them as a weapon to
keep the poor in submission. We could look at Wegmans which provides the year-round varied and abundant food we have come to deem our right. And how
about our national outbreak of obesity, countered by cool-sculpting the body to
get rid of “love handles” of fat around our midriffs? There’s dieting of course
– South Beach, paleo and more.
Instead,
let’s recall that from the first Eucharist, Christians, throughout history have
received the Body and Blood of Christ.
A second
meaning of the Body and Blood of Christ is given to us by Paul, when he
describes the relationship of Christ and His followers. Paul refers to us as
members of the Body of (Romans 12.5). That membership is given in baptism as is
the work of a lifetime, as we
become the Body and Blood of Christ.
There’s an ancient phrase which links these two elements as we
receive the Body and Blood of Christ and become the Body and Blood of Christ.
That phrase is simple and profound. It says to us:
Become
what you receive.
The Consecrated Bread and Cup and the Consecrated People.
Let’s think
of that phrase “become what you receive” each week, as we come to the table of
the Lord. This call and consecration is true of each of us – our loved ones,
the people who make us irritable, those who do evil deeds, the unborn and the
recently born, the soon to die. Our bodies and blood are energy sources,
sources of nourishment for one another as we give blood and body parts to one
another, as well as mouth to mouth resuscitation.
Through our
hugs, handshakes, as we nurse babies and make gestures of love toward one
another, and go about the many other things we do daily in life, we are the
Body and Blood of Christ. Somehow, we don’t easily make the transition to
grasping that each day, in our lives, we are Christ’s body being offered to the
world.
Let’s offer
this prayer today to our generous God and tuck it somewhere we’ll remember to find it and repeat it on Sundays as a way of renewing our baptismal consecration
to be the Body and Blood of Christ:
Bread of Life, Jesus, Holy and
Risen One, keep us as fresh as the bread we break and the wine we pour, that like these simple gifts which
become your Body and Blood, our lives may become a source of freshness to all we meet. Amen.
~Sister Joan
Sobala
