This Is My Body

Gospel Reflection for June 2, 2024, the Solemnity of Corpus Christi - Mark 14:12-16, 22-26

Now on the first day of the unleavened bread, when they sacrificed the pasch, the disciples say to him: Whither wilt thou that we go, and prepare for thee to eat the pasch?

And he sendeth two of his disciples, and saith to them: Go ye into the city; and there shall meet you a man carrying a pitcher of water, follow him;

And whithersoever he shall go in, say to the master of the house, The master saith, Where is my refectory, where I may eat the pasch with my disciples?

And he will shew you a large dining room furnished; and there prepare ye for us.

And his disciples went their way, and came into the city; and they found as he had told them, and they prepared the pasch.

And whilst they were eating, Jesus took bread; and blessing, broke, and gave to them, and said: Take ye. This is my body.

And having taken the chalice, giving thanks, he gave it to them. And they all drank of it.

And he said to them: This is my blood of the new testament, which shall be shed for many.

Amen I say to you, that I will drink no more of the fruit of the vine, until that day when I shall drink it new in the kingdom of God.

And when they had said an hymn, they went forth to the mount of Olives. (Mark 14:12-16, 22-26)

Today is the Solemnity of Corpus Christi, the feast day proposed by St. Thomas Aquinas to affirm and celebrate the Real Presence of Jesus Christ in the Blessed Sacrament of the Eucharist. This day focuses on the mystery which is communicated under the sacramental signs of bread and wine at every Mass, clarifying and upholding it as the greatest of the Sacraments, the abiding fulfillment of Christ’s words: “I am with you all days, even to the consummation of the world.” (Mt 28:20) Every other sacrament is oriented toward the Eucharist: Baptism and Confirmation as initiation into it, Confession as preparation for it, Marriage as training and propagation of it to future generations, Holy Orders as the means of confecting it with the priest acting in persona Christi and Extreme Unction offering it as final viaticum for those entering eternal life and giving the infirm the consolation of Christ’s ultimate victory over sin and death. It is therefore fitting for there to be a special day to celebrate this great sacrament.

It is perhaps more important today than ever. Many Catholics will be familiar with the Pew Research Center survey from 2019 which found that 69% or about one third of professed Catholics do not believe in the Real Presence and most do not even know that the Church teaches the dogma of transubstantiation. Understandably, this alarmed many Catholics, as it should, signifying a deeply defective catechesis and formation in the Eucharist today. However, another statistic of this survey went largely unnoticed: about 63% of Catholics who attend Mass on a weekly basis, as is their obligation, do in fact believe in the Real Presence.

So what does this tell us? That a large portion of Catholics, nearly two-thirds, are Catholic in name only, claiming to be Catholic but only believing in the doctrines that suit them and participating in the life of the Church only when they feel like it. This trend is not limited only to laypeople: Catholics on all levels of the Church consistently betray the Deposit of Faith, blatantly speaking against and violating Church teaching and scandalizing others by promoting their errors as authentically Christian. From bishops who allow pro-abortion advocacy in their dioceses or fail to punish public Catholic figures who promote grave sin to priests who carry out pseudo-marriage “blessings” for homosexuals to laypeople who practice contraception, rarely attend Mass, “tolerate” transgenderism and fail to correct the sins of others, including a president who makes the Sign of the Cross while endorsing the murder of unborn children, these so-called Catholics are precisely those who see the Eucharist as merely a symbol. All the while, Catholics who cling to the Tradition of the Church and long for greater continuity and reverence in the Mass are relentlessly persecuted and silenced.

What are the causes of this great scandal? Three are especially influential. Ever since the Protestant Revolution, it has become increasingly difficult to know what someone believes who claims to be Christian. By relativizing the Faith to depend on individual interpretation of Scripture, now every Christian feels entitled to believe whatever they want, without obedience to ecclesial authority or Tradition. This spirit of relativism then combined, in the “Enlightenment,” with the spirit of liberalism which asserted that all religions are equally uncertain and irrelevant to public life and thus should be relegated to private opinion. This “pluralism” with its accompanying scientific materialism has created an attitude of indifference among Catholics, who feel afraid to share the Faith with others for fear of being labeled “intolerant” or accused of forcing their beliefs onto others; accordingly, Catholic doctrine, as well as Catholic history, have become embarrassments, something to be hidden in one’s private life.

This Protestant relativism and Enlightenment indifferentism then combined with the heresy of Modernism to produce a spirit of uncertainty and fluctuation among Catholics, many of whom today believe that no Church teaching or practice is definitive, that all is historically or culturally determined and thus infinitely changeable. Therefore, a Catholic is free to dispute or ignore anything in the Church which they feel to be “behind the times” and substitute it for something more acceptable to the world. In this way, most Catholics today are indistinguishable from non-Catholics, rarely mentioning or practicing their faith in public and blending in with the ways of the world.

Since Vatican II, when Catholics were given the impression that these three evil spirits are now the norm in the Church, what Pope St. Paul VI called “the smoke of Satan” has engulfed the faithful. Most cradle Catholics today are not taught the doctrines of the Faith, either at all or unsatisfactorily; instead, they are taught that all religions are equal, that charity equals liberal tolerance and that Catholicism prior to Vatican II was bigoted and superstitious. All of this has led to 69% of Catholics believing that they can call themselves Catholic, and that they are even truly faithful and good Catholics, while actively denying and violating Church teaching. Even worse, 37% of Catholics who attend Mass regularly also deny the Real Presence, one of the main causes of which, alongside the emptying of churches in the last fifty years, is the deemphasis of sacrifice and Tradition in the Mass and the grave liturgical abuses which have become commonplace throughout the Church. These abuses were highlighted and brought to new extremes during the restrictions enacted for the pandemic, when the Eucharist was treated with appalling disrespect and many were even deprived of Last Rites out of sheer cowardice.

The Solemnity of Corpus Christi is God’s answer to this disaster. All Catholics today must make it clear that those who disregard the teachings of the Church are Catholic in name only and will not be protected from God’s judgment merely because they say to Jesus “Lord, Lord”. (Mt 7:21) The truth of the Eucharist, as beautifully expounded by St. Thomas Aquinas and beloved by every saint throughout history, must be taught with clarity and shared with a world which hungers for it now more than ever, without watering-down or compromise. As faithless Catholics age and their children leave the Church, soon only those Catholics who are truly faithful will remain and have the depth of devotion to become the priests and bishops of the future: this is the light of hope to which we can cling and advance by raising our children in faithful obedience to Christ, with authenticity and charity.

Better that only a few Catholics should be left, staunch and sincere in their religion, than that they should, remaining many, desire as it were, to be in collusion with the Church's enemies and in conformity with the open foes of our faith.

St. Peter Canasius