Why do they see apparitions… this time in the Eucharist in our church -- By Sheena George

The perfect food for this life and beyond

By Sheena George

  It was a chilly Wednesday evening just two weeks ago, but the Little Flower Church, our parish church situated on a hillock in Nerul, Navi Mumbai, and encompassed by several Hindu temples, was humming with activity.
The occasion was the weekly Eucharistic adoration led by our parish priest. When the service reached its crescendo, Vivek (name changed), a non-Christian, who comes to the church frequently, saw something unusual on the monstrance, a vessel in which the consecrated Host is exposed for the Eucharistic adoration. Vivek couldn’t believe his eyes.

  He saw the image of a lady and child in the Eucharist displayed in the monstrance. The Benediction service was going at that time with the priest blessing the people with the monstrance.

  A flabbergasted Vivek, who uses a walker after a recent accident, kept on looking at the apparition. He asked himself: who are this lady and child? He rubbed his eyes in disbelief. He looked at others. The amazing thing is that nobody else seemed to have seen anything unusual.

 After the service, he asked the priest about what he had seen. The priest, pleasantly surprised, explained to him. We all know that, without doubt, it was Mother Mary and child Jesus he saw in the Eucharist, the real body of Jesus Christ. But the question is: why nearly 300 people assembled in the church could not see this apparition? Why only a non-Christian like Vivek saw this image? Is it our lack of faith or our take it for granted attitude?  It’s a fact that most of the faithful are indifferent to the fact that Jesus is present in the Eucharist

  A few years ago I was fortunate to visit the Catacombs in Rome, Italy. The Catacombs are ancient underground burial places originated about the middle of the second century by early Christians. They were also used for regular worship, memorial services and celebrations of the anniversaries of Christian martyrs and Popes buried there. One of the wall paintings there, showed the agape scene (love feast) with only seven people. I asked the priest, the official tour guide of the site, why only seven people were shown? He said, “it shows they are having a perfect food.” As we know in the Bible, number seven symbolizes completeness or perfection. Yes the Eucharist is the perfect food. About the Eucharist, the real Body of Christ, Pope Francis in his apostolic exhortation had said although it is the fullness of sacramental life, is not a prize for the perfect but a powerful medicine and nourishment for the weak.

  When the priest celebrates the Holy Mass, the bread and wine become Christ’s Body and Blood (Transubstantiation) after the priest says the Christ’s words and with invocation of the Holy Spirit. It is not man that causes the things offered to become the body and blood of Jesus or by the righteousness of either the celebrant or the recipient, but by the power of God, says the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC).

  In the old testament we see God provided Manna, the food from heaven for their journey through the desert. About this John 6:48-50 in Bible says, Jesus said “I am the bread of life. Your ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness, yet they died. But here is the bread that comes down from heaven, which anyone may eat and not die.”

  The growth in Christian life needs the nourishment of Eucharistic Communion, the bread for our pilgrimage until the moment of death, it says.

 We can never thank the Lord enough for the gift of the Eucharist. "That is why it is so important to go to Mass on Sundays, to go to Mass, not only to pray, but to receive Communion, the bread which is the Body of Jesus Christ, that saves us, forgives us, and unites us with the Father," Pope Francis said.

  The Lord addresses an invitation to us, urging us to receive Him in the sacrament of the Eucharist: "Truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of man and drink his blood, you have no life in you." To respond to this invitation we must prepare ourselves for so great and so holy a moment.

  The first announcement of the Eucharist divided the disciples, just as the announcement of the Passion scandalized them. "Will you also go away?" the Lord's question echoes through the ages, as a loving invitation to discover that to receive in faith the gift of his Eucharist is to receive the Lord himself.