Corpus Christi

Corpus Christi
Love and friendship are central to our lives even as very young children.  I heard recently of a little girl who was not invited to sleep over after a birthday party.  Realising that other children at the party had been invited to stay, this little girl was devastated by being excluded.  In order to help assuage her pain, her own mother pretended that it was she, the mother, who would not allow her to stay.  This mother then lovingly took the brunt of the child’s fury thinking this better than that her daughter should experience rejection.

Our childhood reactions stay with us throughout life.  As adults we still feel being over-looked with the same intensity and Jesus understood this.  “I call you friends”, he said and gathered his disciples around a supper table meal where they were to “Do this in memory of me”.  Mary E Hunt says that friendship is characterised by it’s ‘… intention to enhance the well-being of a friend and to improve the quality of life in one’s community in the process.’ (Fierce Tenderness)

In establishing the Eucharist Jesus did both and gives us the means to perpetuate this.  He went even further, giving us his own substance. Our ancestors did not have our delicacy about incarnational or bodily matters, as this ancient prayer shows:
                    Soul of Christ sanctify me, Body of Christ save me,  Blood of Christ inebriate me, Water from the side of Christ wash me.  Passion of Christ strengthen me.  O good Jesus, hear me….
And he does hear us, to this day.  As Ronald Rolheiser writes, ‘God still has skin in this world, in the Eucharist and in the community of believers. The incarnation is still going on.’

If you would like to respond please send an e-mail to:  kskeane@eircom.net