This Long Lent

Deepening Eucharistic faith during the corona crisis

03/15/2020

John 4:5-15, 19b-26 Jesus came to a town of Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of land that Jacob had given to his son Joseph. Jacob’s well was there. A woman of Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her, “Give me a drink.” His disciples had gone into the town to buy food. The Samaritan woman said to him, “How can you, a Jew, ask me, a Samaritan woman, for a drink?” Jesus answered and said to her, “If you knew the gift of God and who is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink, ‘ you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.” The woman said to him, “Sir, you do not even have a bucket and the cistern is deep; where then can you get this living water?” Jesus answered and said to her, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again; but whoever drinks the water I shall give will never thirst; the water I shall give will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water, so that I may not be thirsty or have to keep coming here to draw water.”

Last week I started reading a new book by Brant Petri called Jesus and the Jewish Roots of the Eucharist. The Introduction recounts the story of Brant and his fiancée, Elizabeth, visiting her Protestant pastor, whose permission they needed to get married in her church. They thought it would be a polite ten-minute exchange of pleasantries, but it turned out to be a three-hour inquisition of Brant’s boyhood Catholic beliefs. At the height of the examination, the minister asked menacingly: “And what about the Lord’s Supper? How can you Catholics teach that bread and wine actually become Jesus’ body and blood? It’s ridiculous!” The pastor persisted: “Don’t you understand that if the Lord’s Supper were really Jesus’ body and blood, then you would be eating Jesus. That’s cannibalism!” He finally concluded: “Don’t you realize that if you were really able to eat Jesus, you would become Jesus? Do you really believe that?” Ironically, the pastor’s protests demonstrated he understood Eucharistic theology far better than most Catholics do!

All Brant could blurt out was “Of course I believe that. The Eucharist it the most important thing in my life.” By the way, he said that with his fiancée sitting right next to him. Brant Petri was caught off guard that day, and felt completely unprepared for that confrontational conversation. But that was not all bad. Why? He explains a little later: “It was a major turning point for me…In effect, my exchange with that pastor poured gasoline on the fire of my interest in Scripture.” Brant would actually change majors in college from English literature to religious studies and eventually earn a Ph.D. in the New Testament from Notre Dame. In other words, adverse conditions can have astonishing consequences, especially when it comes to growth in faith.

In the fourth chapter of John a Samaritan woman also experiences a major turning point when she is outmatched in her conversation with Christ. But that was not all bad either. Jesus tries to deepen the woman’s faith by challenging her religious assumptions, and even pointing out her failed love-life with five husbands. She learns she’s been looking for love in all the wrong places; looking for love in too many face. She finally discovers that only Jesus can quench her thirst for love. Her controversial conversation with Christ had poured gasoline on the fire of her faith.

My friends, the whole world is experiencing very adverse conditions these days due to the coronavirus. Even Catholics are about to feel a major disruption in our sacramental life. In the bulletin this weekend I have published the changes Bishop Taylor has mandated for our diocese, and consequent changes for our parish. Please take it home and read it. The biggest change will be no more Sunday Masses until the end of April. That period of time includes Palm Sunday and even the glorious feast of Easter. Think about it: this weekend will be the last public Mass here at Immaculate Conception for a month and a half. Since this is the last homily you’ll have to hear in a long time, I’m going to make it really long!

Like for Brant Petri and for the woman at the well, though, I would suggest to you that this time of adversity is not all bad for us either. How so? Well, we read in James 1:3, “For you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance.” Being tested in faith is a good thing. Or, as Brant Petri discovered, adversity can “pour gasoline on the fire of our faith” so that it blazes out of control. May I offer three things you can do during this long Lent without the Lord in the Eucharist? Perhaps these adverse conditions will produce astonishing consequences of growth in our faith.

First of all, pray together as a family at home every night, but especially on Sunday. That is, make your home into a “domestic church.” When I visit my parents in Little Rock, every evening around 6 p.m. my mother lights two candles on the mantle above their fireplace. On the fireplace stand statues of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, and various other saints they love. It’s their home altar, at the center of their house and their hearts, where my dad serves as the high priest and my mom is the mother superior. I’ll give you one guess who is in charge of that domestic church! My father never tires of telling us: “The family that prays together, stays together.” Even if your family cannot pray together here at church, at least pray together at home, and stay together.

Secondly, Sunday mornings you could watch Mass on television and make a “spiritual communion.” Have you ever heard of that ancient practice? St. Teresa of Avila described the value of a spiritual communion saying: “When you do not receive communion and you do not attend Mass, you can make a spiritual communion, which is a most beneficial practice; by it the love of God will be greatly impressed upon you.” That is, when the people on television receive Communion, close your eyes, and ask Jesus to come into your heart spiritually, even if he cannot sacramentally. Ask Jesus to help you love him like he taught the woman at the well to thirst for his love. Absence makes the heart grow fonder, and makes faith firmer.

And thirdly, spend some time in serious study about the Eucharist. And I urge you to do your spiritual reading in front of the Blessed Sacrament in the Tabernacle here in the church. Archbishop Fulton Sheen spent a “holy hour” every day of his priesthood in front of the Blessed Sacrament. He wrote: “The Holy Hour…kept my feet from wandering too far (that is, it kept him from leaving the priesthood). Being tethered to a tabernacle, one’s rope for finding other pastures is not so long…I had the sensation of being at least like a dog at the master’s door, ready in case he called me.” For the next month and a half every Catholic should feel “tethered to the tabernacle.” Come sit in this silent church, read, pray and wait. And maybe once in a while, God will yank your chain.

Folks, how do you feel about this month or more without Mass? Some may feel like rejoicing, “Yay! We get a vacation from our vocation!” Some priests may feel that way, too. But is that how we should feel? No. We should feel more like Brant Petri who said: “The Eucharist is the most important thing in my life.” And we should feel that way no matter who we’re sitting next to.

Praised be Jesus Christ!