This is My Body!
Homily preached Sunday, June 11, 2023
by Monsignor Michael Deering

Throughout our society today there’s a definite attitude of pride and arrogance ...

in the way that many people treat their bodies.

We notice on TV, that many athletes like in the NBA have elaborate “inkwork” all over their bodies. Like walking billboards they seem to be saying, “This is my body!”

Then too, there are the glamorous people of Hollywood who appear in movies and magazines in various stages of dress and undress where they too seem to be saying, “Hey, look, this is my body!”

In the underworld of pornography there are great numbers of men & women ...

   who expose themselves to the camera saying in effect,   “This is my body.”

And we know that the whole abortion rights effort is based on the contention that women should be absolutely free to do whatever they want to do to their bodies and they don’t have to answer to anyone else. For the past 50 years, “Pro-choice” advocates have been proclaiming, “I’m free to choose what I do. This is my body.”

Now all of these examples are quite different from Our Lord’s use of this particular phrase.           Recall how, at the Last Supper, Jesus raised

the Unleavened Bread, blessed it, broke it, and said, “This is my body.”

Here He was referring to the fact that He was actually holding Himself in His hands.          Yes, by His design and with His power, He made Himself...

truly and completely present under the appearance of Bread and Wine.

In doing this, He established the process by which He would be able ...

to be with us for all time and thereby personally nourish generation after generation of “Believers” ...  on their road to the Heavenly Kingdom.

So you see, the use of this phrase can have very different meanings. When Pro-abortionists say, “This is my body,” they’re affirming their authority to take life. When Jesus said, “This is my body,” He was affirming His authority to give life.

Society’s use of this phrase stems from pride and selfishness.

     Jesus’ use of this phrase stems from humility and generosity.

Today’s feast of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Jesus, is intended to heighten our appreciation for the generosity of God, a generosity that God made clear ...

when He established the Holy Eucharist.

Not many years ago this feast was referred to as the feast of “Corpus Christi”.

That’s the Latin expression for “Body of Christ”.        Today the Church ...

       refers to this feast as the “Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ”.

This title refers more completely to what Our Lord did at the Last Supper,

when He gave Himself up for us… His Body and His Blood.

In Mass, Jesus is fully and substantially present under both the Bread and the Wine. So no matter which one we consume, we receive the whole Jesus.

The beauty of receiving both species is that it more fully represents what took place at the Last Supper where Jesus gave Himself to the Apostles

under the appearance of both Bread & Wine.

Do you believe that Jesus is truly present in the Eucharist? You know from time to time polls will come out that show that only a percentage of Catholics really believe in the True Presence of Jesus Christ in Holy Communion. I’ve heard of polls taken in this country and in other countries that indicate that less than 50% of the Catholic people really believe in the Eucharist … that it really is Jesus!

How would you respond to such a poll?

You know, there’s no scientist in the world that can prove that Jesus is really there in the Eucharist. Even Albert Einstein, the master physicist, who developed the amazing Theory of Relativity couldn’t do it.  I understand that before he died, he asked a Catholic Chaplain to give him all the books that were available on Transubstantiation … that’s the big word that refers to the process whereby Bread and Wine are miraculously changed to become the Body and Blood of Christ.

Albert Einstein wanted to know how the process took place. But science couldn’t explain it then & it can’t explain it now. It’s a miracle. In fact, St. Thomas Aquinas called the process of Transubstantiation: “the Greatest Miracle in the world”!

What makes it the greatest miracle? Well, we all believe that God is infinite, right? And we also believe that Jesus is fully present under the appearance of Bread & Wine.

So what we’re saying is that our infinite God ...

is fully present under the finite substances of bread and wine!

As St. Thomas Aquinas marveled, “The finite is capable of holding the infinite!” That’s why He called it the “Greatest Miracle in the world”!

But still we wonder, “How can that be? How can the infinite be contained in the finite?” Well, don’t we believe that Jesus was born as a human person some 2000 years ago? If we do, then we’re admitting that the infinite God was capable of being contained in the finite Human Person! So how is that any different from the infinite God containing Himself in the finite Host or the finite Cup of Wine???

If we believe in the Incarnation, God becoming man, then it shouldn’t be so hard

   to believe in Transubstantiation, God becoming ... our food and drink.

In our First Reading from the Book of Deuteronomy, we heard

how God cared for His Chosen People as they journeyed through the desert ...

on their way to the Promised Land ... the Land flowing w/ milk and honey

by “(feeding them) w manna, a miraculous food unknown to them or their fathers.”

It’s easy to see that today, we ...  the Baptized, as God’s chosen ones ...

are still journeying through the desert of this world on our Earthly Pilgrimage to the Promised Land ...namely Heaven ...and we hunger to be there with the Father..

God has filled us with a hunger that can only be satisfied by Him!

In our Gospel today, Jesus clearly indicates that He will feed us on our journey to the Kingdom. And just like we heard in our First Reading from Deuteronomy,

it would be by “a miraculous food unknown to them or to their fathers.”

It would be by His own Flesh & Blood!

Jesus says, “The bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the world.”

How incredible this had to sound to the Jews.    Scripture says they quarreled

among themselves saying, “How can this man give us His flesh to eat?”

Then Jesus states, no fewer than 4 times, the necessity of feeding on Him.  He says, “Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood

you have no life within you.”

“Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life

and I will raise him on the last day.”

“For my flesh is true food and my blood is true drink.”

“Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in Me and I in him.”

Exactly one year later, at the Last Supper, Jesus revealed how we would actually feed on His flesh and blood.

It would be in a Holy Meal where we would consume bread and wine ...

   that had been blessed and transubstantiated into His Body and Blood.

Writing 20 years after the Last Supper, Paul verifies that this is what happens in Holy Mass. In his 1^st Letter to the Corinthians, Paul reminds the faithful:

“Is not the cup of blessing that we bless a participation in the Blood of Christ?

And the bread we break, is it not a participation in the Body of Christ?”

In our Psalm today, the Psalmist writes, “With the best of wheat he fills you.”

And indeed He does ... For He feeds us with Himself! This truth is represented on the front of our Altar: showing a mother Flamingo feeding her flock ... with herself!

As God has done down through the ages, He has always fed us in the desert.

And today, in the Eucharist, He feeds us with the best of food. For He feeds us with the Body and Blood of His only Begotten Son. And Jesus assures us in the Gospel

that whoever feeds on Him ... will have life ... because of Him.

Do you really believe in the True Presence of Jesus in the Eucharist?

Remember that the Apostles looked in disbelief at the Risen Jesus when He appeared to them in the Upper Room.     They thought they were seeing a ghost.

But Jesus brought them back to reality by saying,    “be not afraid ... it is I.”

As you come forward to receive Holy Communion, hear Jesus say to you, “It is I.”

Recognize that it’s really Him in Holy Communion, that The Creator comes to the Creature. Jesus comes to love us, to heal us, to transform us and to strengthen us.

Jesus is there in the Bread each time the Priest says the words, “This is my Body.”

Jesus is there in the Wine each time the Priest says the words, “This is my Blood.”

Let’s treasure the food we’ve been given.

God feeds us with the finest wheat when He feeds us with Himself.

Here at Holy Mass we are present to the Greatest Miracle in the world … for here  

we get to receive the Most Holy Body and Blood of Jesus, the Son of God!

This is the intimate Union that God wants us to have with Him.

It is essential that we worthily receive Him in Holy Communion ...

so as to one day have Eternal Union with Him in Heaven!