Jesus, our Lord and our God, does not wish to stand aloof from us, or keep His distance from us. Rather, He is inviting us into a relationship of affection, of trusting faith and of love, Perth Archbishop Timothy Costelloe SDB has said.
Delivering his homily during the feast of Corpus Christi/Solemnity of the Body and Blood of the Lord on Sunday 7 June at St Mary’s Cathedral, Archbishop Costelloe said the feast was a celebration of Jesus’ presence in our lives.
“As we receive Him in the Eucharist, as we eat His body and drink His blood as He invites us to do in this morning’s gospel, He comes to live in us, and we come to live in Him,” he suggested.
“As Jesus also says in John’s gospel, just as a branch cannot live if it is cut off from the parent stock, from the vine, so we, if we remain united to Jesus the vine, will live and grow; will flourish and bear good fruit; will grow in that peace that only the Lord can give,” he added.
“It is this unity with the Lord Jesus which brings about in us – if we allow it to – exactly what Saint Paul once said about himself: “I no longer live, for it is Christ who lives in me”. This is why our Catholic belief in the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist is so important.
“Far from being a symbol in the weaker sense of that word,” he continued, “the bread and wine of the Eucharist really are the living Christ who comes to us, dwells with us, strengthens us and lifts us to a new and deeper life which is a sharing in His own life.”
“This is why, when we approach the altar to receive the Eucharist, the priest or minister does not hold the host before us and say “Here is a sign that Christ stays with us”. Rather the priest or minister says, simply but truly, “the Body of Christ”.”
Archbishop Costelloe said the Sacrament of the Eucharist drew Catholics together as members of the Body of Christ – members of the Church.
“We say Amen as we receive the Eucharist, and many of us will walk in procession with the Blessed Sacrament after Mass today. But unless these actions lead us to be the living, powerful, unmistakable and faithful presence of Christ among all people in the daily reality of our lives, these actions will ultimately be empty or fruitless gestures rather than powerful signs that our faith is real and active, as the Lord wishes it to be,” he suggested.
“May our faith in the Eucharist, in the living presence of Christ, be a living faith which transforms our own lives and the lives of all those we encounter.”
Following Mass, Archbishop Costelloe led a procession around the cathedral of the Blessed Sacrament displayed in a monstrance – a symbolic reminder that Jesus is not confined to the church but rather lives among us.
Joining parishioners in the procession were members of the Italian community (also celebrating Italian National Day); Knights of the Southern Cross; The Equestrian Order of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem; St Vincent de Paul Society; and Cathedral Young Adults.
Pope Leo XIV celebrates in Spain
In Madrid, Spain, more than 1.2 million people joined Pope Leo XIV to celebrate the feast and participate in the procession through the Plaza de Cibeles and surrounding streets.
In his homily, Pope Leo said the Eucharist, “the gift of Christ’s living presence among us…the living Bread come down from heaven”, had the power to transform lives.
The feast of Corpus Christi/Solemnity of the Body and Blood of the Lord affirms the Catholic doctrine that the bread and wine consecrated during Mass become the body and blood of Christ – the transubstantiation. The feast originated in the 13th century and was declared universal by Pope Urban IV in 1264.
