Q: In your book Question Time you mention briefly that Juliana of Cornillon had something to do with the feast of Corpus Christi. Do we know anything more about her and her role in the feast?
As you say, when I wrote about Juliana in my book Question Time (Connor Court 2008, n. 150), I mentioned that she had had a vision in which Jesus lamented the lack of a feast dedicated to the Blessed Sacrament.
But there is much more, and the story of her life and her role in the institution of the feast is fascinating.
St Juliana of Liège, also known as St Juliana of Mt Cornillon, was born near Liège in Belgium in 1193. From her early childhood she had great devotion to the Blessed Eucharist.
At the age of five, she and her sister Agnes were orphaned and entrusted to the care of the Augustinian nuns of the convent of Mont Cornillon, just outside Liège. There they worked for many years in the leprosarium run by the nuns.
When she was thirteen Juliana entered the Augustinians and went on to become the Superior of the convent.
At age 16 she had a vision of the Church under the full moon with a dark spot on it. She was given to understand that the spot signified the absence of a special feast in honour of the Blessed Sacrament.
In a later vision Our Lord explained that he desired a separate feast in honour of the Eucharist, since at that time the only celebration was on Holy Thursday, when the Church considered more his sufferings.
He told her that He wanted the feast for three reasons: to confirm people’s faith in the Real Presence, to strengthen them in virtue by their love and adoration for the Eucharist, and to make reparation for the lack of respect shown to the Blessed Sacrament.
Jesus entrusted Juliana with the mission of promoting the new feast. Naturally, she felt frightened at the thought and kept the whole matter secret for many years, wanting to ensure that this was truly the will of God and not just her own imagination.
The vision was repeated over the next twenty years and finally in 1230, when Juliana was elected Mother Superior, she confided the secret to her confessor, Canon John of Lausanne. He was Canon of St Martin’s basilica and had a great love for the Eucharist himself. He explained the idea to numerous theologians and bishops, many of whom received it warmly.
Among them was Jacques Pantaleon, the Archdeacon of Liège, who later became Bishop of Verdun, then Patriarch of Jerusalem and finally in 1261 Pope, taking the name of Urban IV.
It was the Dominican Bishop of Liège, Robert Thourotte, who, after some hesitation, accepted the proposal of St Juliana and in 1246 instituted the feast of the Blessed Sacrament in his diocese. It was to be celebrated on the Thursday after the feast of the Blessed Trinity.
Other Bishops later did the same in their own dioceses.
When St Juliana died in 1258, the feast was not yet extended throughout the world, but a good friend of hers, St Eve, a nun at St Martin’s, took it upon herself to carry on where St Juliana left off.
She persuaded the new Bishop of Liège to write to the Holy Father, Pope Urban IV, asking him to extend the feast to the whole Church.
A few more years passed until the great Eucharistic miracle of Bolsena took place in 1263 (cf. Question Time, n. 150). The miracle was reported to Pope Urban who was residing in nearby Orvieto, and the following year he instituted the feast of Corpus Christi for the whole Church.
In his address on St Juliana on 17 November 2010, Pope Benedict spoke of the importance of Eucharistic devotion: “Joyfully I wish to affirm that there is a ‘Eucharistic springtime’ in the Church today. How many people remain in silence before the Tabernacle sustaining a dialogue of love with Jesus! It is consoling to know that many groups of young people have rediscovered the beauty of prayer and adoration before the Blessed Sacrament. I pray that this ‘Eucharistic springtime’ may become increasingly widespread in parishes, and especially in Belgium, homeland of St Juliana”.