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Office of Readings - The Eucharist - Wednesday 4th Week of Easter - 2nd Reading
After Mass this morning I prayed that God would deepen my
faith, especially in His presence in the Eucharist. Well, a few minutes later I was doing the
office of readings and the second reading (and then responsory and concluding
prayer) were just beautiful expositions on the Mystery of Christ’s presence,
Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity in that Most Blessed Sacrament. Enjoy!
Office of Readings – Wednesday 4th week of Easter
(Breviary #2)
From the treatise On the Trinity by Saint Hilary, bishop
The unity of the faithful in God through the incarnation of the Word and the
sacrament of the Eucharist
We believe that the Word became flesh and that we receive
his flesh in the Lord’s Supper.
How then can we fail to believe that he really
dwells within us? When he became man, he actually clothed himself in our flesh,
uniting it to himself for ever. In the sacrament of his body he actually gives
us his own flesh, which he has united to his divinity. This is why we are all
one, because the Father is in Christ, and Christ is in us. He is in us through
his flesh and we are in him. With him we form a unity which is in God.
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| Artwork by Fr. Kevin Drew |
The manner of our indwelling in him through the sacrament of
his body and blood is evident from the Lord’s own words: This world
will see me no longer but you shall see me. Because I live you shall live also,
for I am in my Father, you are in me, and I am in you. If it had been
a question of mere unity of will, why should he have given us this explanation
of the steps by which it is achieved? He is in the Father by reason of his
divine nature, we are in him by reason of his human birth, and he is in us
through the mystery of the sacraments. This, surely, is what he wished us to
believe; this is how he wanted us to understand the perfect unity that is
achieved through our Mediator, who lives in the Father while we live in him,
and who, while living in the Father, lives also in us. This is how we attain to
unity with the Father. Christ is in very truth in the Father by his eternal
generation; we are in very truth in Christ, and he likewise is in us.
Christ himself bore witness to the reality of his unity when
he said: He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood lives in me and I in
him. No one will be in Christ unless Christ himself has been in him;
Christ will take to himself only the flesh of those who have received his
flesh.
He had already explained the mystery of this perfect unity
when he said:As the living Father sent me and I draw life from the Father,
so he who eats my flesh will draw life from me. We draw life from his
flesh just as he draws life from the Father. Such comparisons aid our
understanding, since we can grasp a point more easily when we have an analogy.
And the point is that Christ is the wellspring of our life. Since we who are in
the flesh have Christ dwelling in us through his flesh, we shall draw life from
him in the same way he draws life from the Father.
RESPONSORY John 6:56; see Deuteronomy 4:7
Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood,
– He lives in me and I in him, says the Lord, alleluia.
There is no great nation which has gods as near to it as our
God is to us.
– He lives in me and I in him, says the Lord, alleluia.
CONCLUDING PRAYER
O God,
life of the faithful,
glory of the humble,
blessedness of the just,
listen kindly to the prayers of those who call on you,
that they who thirst for what you generously promise
may always have their fill on your plenty.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,
who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever.
– Amen.
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