Praise the Lord!
Here is my homily for this coming Sunday,
Feast of the Most Holy Sacrament.
May God bless you, through Mary!

Canon Dr. Daniel Meynen
http://meynen.homily-service.net/




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Homily for the feast of the Most Holy Sacrament - Year B - Mk. 14:12-16,
22-26




" On the first day of Unleavened Bread, when they sacrificed the
passover lamb, his disciples said to him, 'Where will you have us go
and prepare for you to eat the passover?' And he sent two of his
disciples, and said to them, 'Go into the city, and a man carrying a
jar of water will meet you; follow him, and wherever he enters, say to
the householder, "The Teacher says, Where is my guest room, where I am
to eat the passover with my disciples?" And he will show you a large
upper room furnished and ready; there prepare for us.' And the
disciples set out and went to the city, and found it as he had told
them; and they prepared the passover.

" And as they were eating, he took bread, and blessed, and broke it, and
gave it to them, and said, 'Take; this is my body.' And he took a cup,
and when he had given thanks he gave it to them, and they all drank of
it. And he said to them, 'This is my blood of the covenant, which is
poured out for many. Truly, I say to you, I shall not drink again of
the fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new in the kingdom
of God.' And when they had sung a hymn, they went out to the Mount of
Olives. "



Homily:


" On the first day of Unleavened Bread, when they sacrificed the
passover lamb... "

The feast of the Most Holy Sacrament plunges us back into the
celebrations of Holy Week. We shall remember today all that the Lord
Jesus did for us during the days of his sacrifice and of his eternal
triumph. Indeed, if the Church celebrates on this day a feast that is
specially dedicated to the Eucharist, it is because the very tight
schedule of Holy Week does not allow us to dedicate sufficient time to
worthily honor this very great sacrament. So today we extend, in a
manner of speaking, Holy Week. The Lord gives us a surplus of time, as
it were, in order for us to render glory and honor to him in his
Eucharist.

It is truly the Lord himself who grants us this grace today, since, if
the Church celebrates a special feast dedicated to the Most Holy
Sacrament, she does so at the invitation of Heaven which, through the
intermediary of Saint Juliana of Mont-Cornillon, asked that we add to
the solemnities of the Church a celebration solely consecrated to the
Eucharist. On this subject, we must remember that Saint Juliana lived
in Belgium, near Liège, in the first half of the thirteenth century.
So it is with very special attention that we in Belgium should
celebrate this solemnity of the Eucharist!

" Go into the city, and a man carrying a jar of water will meet you;
follow him, and wherever he enters, say to the householder, 'The
Teacher says, Where is my guest room, where I am to eat the passover
with my disciples?' And he will show you a large upper room furnished
and ready; there prepare for us. "

The Lord Jesus had prepared everything for the institution of the Holy
Eucharist. He left nothing to chance. Above all, he chose a place
that was beautiful and well-decorated, with choice furniture and fine
ornamentation. In the celebration of this great sacrament, all that is
beautiful and well-decorated, all that makes visible the order that God
established in Creation, and all that sets in relief the order that man
himself, following God, has maintained in creation, all of this is
honored on this day! The Order of God is spiritual, and this is its
fundamental aspect; but this Order of God, which the Lord Jesus
transmitted to his Church, also possesses a corporeal and material
dimension through which the entire universe participates in the
glorification of its Creator in the sacrament of the Eucharist.

Christ wants everything to be ordered in the celebration of the
Eucharist. This is why the Mass is always celebrated on the very Order
of Christ who said to his Apostles: "Do this in memory of me." (Lk.
22:19) And this order is now transmitted to the Church by way of the
Sacrament of Order, which thus bears the name of its own mission: the
Sacrament of Order is that through which the very Order of Christ is
transmitted to those who represent him on earth in the Church. It is
thus that the sacrament of the Eucharist and that of Order are
indissolubly linked, having the same origin in the words of Jesus we
have just cited. If Christ said to the Apostles: "Do this in memory
of me," it is to confer upon them the sacrament of Order, a sacrament
that is directly ordered to the celebration of the Eucharist.

" Truly, I say to you, I shall not drink again of the fruit of the vine
until that day when I drink it new in the kingdom of God. "

The Eucharist proclaims the Kingdom of God to come. The Church does not
celebrate the Eucharist without referring to the glorious Christ who
reigns forever in Heaven. If the Lord instituted this sacrament under
the form of a memorial, since he said: "Do this in memory of me," it
is to invite us, in this privileged moment, to remember him. The
Church, when she celebrates the Eucharist, is the one who remembers her
Lord and all that he has done for her: those who, in Church, truly
want to participate in the Eucharist are invited to remember all the
blessings they have received from God, such as the Creation, the
Redemption, and the Heaven that the Lord promises us as our
inheritance.

The Kingdom of God must be at the center of our attention on this feast
day! Let us ask the Most Blessed Virgin Mary, who is the Queen of
Heaven, to draw us ever closer to that thrice holy place, that place
which must be the object of all our desires! May Mary, the Door of
Heaven, help us to enter into an ever more intimate and profound
communion with her divine Son present in the Eucharist!



Canon Dr. Daniel Meynen



http://meynen.homily-service.net/