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[Catholic Caucus] ‘Catholics Got Talent?’: Competition Invites Musicians to Promote Zeal for the EucharistWASHINGTON — Catholic poets, composers, and songwriters are invited to participate in a competition in which the winning piece could be performed before 80,000 people at the 2024 National Eucharistic Congress. The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Secretariat for Evangelization and Catechesis is sponsoring a Eucharistic Revival musical competition in an effort to renew zeal for the Eucharist.The musical competition is one facet of the multiyear National Eucharistic Revival launched on June 19, 2022 — the solemnity of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ,...

Do This in Remembrance of Me......... “This is my body, the body given on your behalf. This you are all to do, for a remembrance of me.” (Lk 22:19) Thus a rather wooden and literal translation, which preserves the word order, and the oddities of the original language, clearly connoting something strange and mysterious. What does it mean? When I was a Protestant, I would hear that the Eucharist is solely a memorial, no different from the Washing of Feet, or Stations of the Cross, because Jesus said so: it was “for a remembrance.” Of course, it doesn’t follow. A...

[Catholic Caucus] The Importance of Kneeling and Prostrations (Read Reverence for the Most Blessed Sacrament)There are four postures for prayers: prostration, kneeling, standing, and sitting. While God will of course hear our prayers no matter our posture, the Church rightfully prescribes in Her rubrics for the public liturgy the postures for Her sacred ministers. Therefore, the priest’s actions are regulated at Mass, and this is also why the rubrics during the Divine Office prescribe certain postures.  Prostrations Prostrations – the full placement of our entire body on the ground – is the most humbling of prayer positions. Prostrations, sometimes involving...

[Catholic Caucus] Here Comes the "Host Bar" A "crisis committee" of St Joseph parish in Bottrop, Germany, decided to preside Eucharist again beginning on May 10th.In order to comply with iron "hygiene rules," wooden bars with notches at appropriate distances were manufactured for the hosts.The faithful must wear a mask and bring their own hymnal.A prerequisite for participation is a prior personal registration by telephone, which is only possible at certain times and on certain days.The chairman of the parish council, Roberto Giavarra, told NeuesRuhrWort.de (10 May) that the feedback from the faithful "fell far short of expectations".

MEMORIAL OF SAINT ATHANASIUS JOHN 6:60-69 Friends, in today’s Gospel we learn that many disciples left the Lord because he said they had no life unless they were to eat his flesh and drink his blood. Why has the gift of the Eucharist been, from the beginning, a source of contention? Why have we, from Jesus’ time to the present day, been fighting over it? Shouldn’t it be the source of our unity and deepest joy? Well, yes. But we can’t overlook the fact that it has always divided—just as Jesus himself divided people: "Whoever is not with me is...

Friday of the Third Week of Easter John 6:52-59 Friends, in today’s Gospel Jesus declares that "unless you eat the Flesh of the Son of Man and drink his Blood, you do not have life within you." The talk that Jesus gave concerning the sacrament of his Body and Blood was quite literally revolting. It is a rather remarkable understatement when John writes, "The Jews then disputed among themselves, saying, ‘How can this man give us his flesh to eat?’" So what does Jesus do when confronted with this objection? One would think that he would offer a metaphorical or...

Thursday of the Third Week of Easter John 6:44-51 Friends, in today’s Gospel Jesus declares, "I am the living bread that came down from heaven." The bread is referred to as living. Bread is good, but it’s not alive. Instead, when we take it in, and it is turned by our bodies into fat or muscle or bone, then it comes alive. But it is just the opposite with the living bread of Christ. This we take in and we become alive in a way that we were not before. And this is why Jesus says that he is bread...

The bishop’s 2,100-word teaching document, titled “The Real Presence,” was released Sept. 16, six weeks after the publication of a Pew Research Center study showing that a majority of Catholics in the United States do not believe that the bread and wine used at Mass become the body and blood of Christ.

Catholics to US Bishops: Restore Eucharistic Belief Through Tradition, Orthodoxy WASHINGTON (ChurchMilitant.com) - Catholics and even non-Catholics are telling the U.S. bishops that only by restoring reverence toward the Blessed Sacrament will they restore belief in the Real Presence. The bishops, however, are offering catechetical booklets. Following a poll showing 7 out of 10 baptized Catholics do not believe that the Eucharist is Christ, U.S. bishops are asking the public for a solution. On Friday, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops posted the following question on its official Facebook page: "A recent PEW study revealed that only 1/3 of Catholics believe in the Real Presence of Christ in the...

Bishop Malone Orders Possible Bleeding Host Destroyed Claims 'Christ was no longer present' in Host Anger is rising in western New York, as the embattled Catholics of Buffalo learned that just days ago, their bishops may have denied them an avenue of grace by refusing to investigate a possible eucharistic miracle.   On Friday, Church Militant spoke with one disaffected Catholic of the diocese, Mary Ellen Sanfilippo, about extraordinary events that began unfolding in late November at St. Vincent de Paul Catholic Church in Springbrook, New York.  Sanfilippo said that a consecrated host was accidentally dropped on the floor of the church during Mass. Retrieving the host,...

Forty ‘miraculously’ preserved, consecrated hosts have been discovered in a church that was destroyed by a large earthquake in central Italy in 2016. The hosts, recovered from a tabernacle recently retrieved from the ruins of the parish church of Arquata del Tronto, have no bacteria or mold, as usually happens to hosts after a few weeks, according to the Italian bishops’ newspaper Avvenire.

Vatican News (February 21) published pictures of an Eucharistic Adoration which took place during the ongoing retreat of the Roman Curia in Ariccia near Rome. The participants of the retreat all kneel in front of the monstrance except Francis who is standing. Rumours that Francis has knee-problems have proven to be false since he has knelt on several occasions in front of refugees on Holy Thursday or when visiting an Anglican shrine in Uganda in November 2015.

Introduction: The Feast Day of Corpus Christi (The Body of Christ) was requested by Our Lord himself. It was not a feast day that the Church in its wisdom decided to include in the liturgical calendar. It was a feast day, rather, that Jesus Christ requested through extraordinary means by appearing to his servant Saint Juliana and showing her a Moon that he said was symbolic of the feast day that was needed, that he wanted, that he requested, the feast day of Corpus Christi. And Saint Juliana said "But Jesus, we have a feast day Holy Thursday". And Our...

Early Church Evidence Refutes Real Presence Introduction The real presence doctrine is probably the most important doctrine to Catholics today because it is the nucleolus of the Catholic mass. The doctrine insists that the eucharistic elements of bread and wine become the glorified body and blood of Christ when blessed by the priest. The doctrine further asserts that the substance of bread and wine are no longer present and only the accidents (characteristics or appearance) remain. Thus, the name derived from the explanation becomes transubstantiation (a change of substance). It is this belief that compels devout Catholics to worship the...

Recognizing Jesus In The Eucharist Apr 11th, 2012by Gary Zimak.  And it happened that, while He was with them at table, He took bread, said the blessing, broke it, and gave it to them. With that their eyes were opened and they recognized Him… (Luke 24:30-31)For the second consecutive day, the gospel reading from daily Mass presents a story of someone who was dejected…and shouldn’t have been! Just as we saw yesterday with Mary Magdalene at the empty tomb, the 2 disciples on the road to Emmaus were sad about the Lord’s death and didn’t realize that He was right...

So, You Just Received Jesus…Now What? Oct 15th, 2011 by Gary Zimak.  I’m sad to admit that, over the course of my life as a cradle Catholic, I have received Our Lord in Holy Communion many times and didn’t have too much to say to Him.  It’s understandable, isn’t it?  There are lots of important things to do after receiving Communion: we have to look around the church and see how many people we know, we have to plan what we’re going to do after Mass and let’s not forget that we have to read the parish bulletin to...

The doctrine of the Real Presence asserts that in the Holy Eucharist, Jesus is literally and wholly present—body and blood, soul and divinity—under the appearances of bread and wine. The Bible is forthright in declaring it (cf. 1 Cor. 10:16–17, 11:23–29; and, most forcefully, John 6:32–71). The early Church Fathers interpreted these passages literally. Renowned historian of the early Church J. N. D. Kelly, writes: "Eucharistic teaching, it should be understood at the outset, was in general unquestioningly realist, i.e., the consecrated bread and wine were taken to be, and were treated and designated as, the Savior’s body and blood"...

  Eucharistic Stations Of The Cross Thy Eucharistic Kingdom Come! Saint Eymard rated the Stations of the Cross among the most important exercises of a retreat. Long experience had taught him to find in the wounds of Jesus the forgiveness, the peace, and all those graces for which the soul hungers while on retreat. Right up to his death, he made the Stations of the Cross every day, in the evening, after the fullest and most wearisome day's work. Therefore he recommended this devotion as one whose full value he knew. In the beautiful words of the Following of...

“How Can It Do Such Great Things? The Power of the Sacrament of the Altar”Two weeks ago we began this series by establishing “The Nature of the Sacrament of the Altar,” asking the question “What Is It?” and hearing Christ’s answer, “This is my body, this is my blood.” Last week we followed that up by asking “What Does It Give?” and Jesus told us, “Given and shed for you for the forgiveness of sins.” We said that this is “The Benefit of the Sacrament” and that “where there is forgiveness of sins, there is also life and salvation.” But...

The Catholic Church claims that Christ is really present in the Eucharist, that the sacrifice of calvary is repeated at every Mass, and that he gives Himself to us in Holy Communion as food unto eternal life. With this in mind, let's look at Scripture. Luke 22, verse 15, our Lord says, "I have earnestly desired to eat this Passover with you." So we are assured that the Last Supper in the Upper Room was a Passover meal. In Mark 14, verses 22 through 26, we hear the words of institution, "And as they were eating He took bread...