“Shared Host, Shared Life,” A Look at the Catholic Eucharist

I came across an essay in Gerhard Lohfink’s most recent, and sadly his last book, All My Springs Are in You, which I would like to use as a basis for this blog. If you are a consistent reader of the blog, you know that I often use Lohfink’s expressed spirituality and theological thinking to get a point across. He died this past April, and the world of scholarly and pastoral writing is bereft of the insights he might have shared had he overcome the cancer that took him.

One of the many fine essays in the book is titled, Shared Host, Shared Life, in which Lohfink connects the power of Eucharist with the reality of the Christian’s living like Christ Himself. When we bring our faith to the reception of Eucharist or Communion, we will experience an enlarged presence of Christ within, and we will carry that presence to others. The result is our life in Christ is shared – even with those who do not believe as we do. According to Lohfink, “(the) reception of the Eucharist (receiving Holy Communion) only becomes a genuine encounter with Christ when believers themselves, in their common discipleship of Jesus, become one ‘body.’ “Those who share the host with others must therefore also join their lives together.” (p. 193)

Hold that thought for a minute. Sister Mary Barbara Philippart is a retired member of my congregation who served as a missionary in Peru for many years. She has been involved in several ministries wrapping up an active life serving the poor in Appalachia. One evening in Peru, while locking her little house up for the night, a gang of guerillas called the Shining Path, burst into her home. The Shining Path was a major insurgent group determined to turn Peru into a Marxist/Maoist country because the legitimate government was failing the country. The Shining Path became violent in the 1980s targeting the rural poor for converts. Sister Barbara worked with the rural poor. She was immediately terrorized anticipating a murderous death. The men tied her hands and feet and pushed her face down on to the floor. They ravaged her house and found nothing but the religious materials she used for teaching. In one of her narrations of the story which I heard personally, she said she was sure the guns would go off, but she spoke kindly to her captors. She thinks she shared empathy for their cause but insisted that violence was not the method to use. I do not recall how she untied her hands and feet, but the men left the house, and she was alive! Was it the grace of Eucharist that brought them together, the nun and the terrorists? Did that grace, reflected in her kindness and fearless courage force the men to abdicate any nefarious design they may have had on her? I think so.

Sister Mary Dugan is dedicated to the hearing- impaired and spent her life teaching hearing-impaired children. In a rural town in Ohio, she was confronted with a young girl who was both blind and deaf. The girl was receiving a good education in Braille but was not being taught to learn through education for the deaf. Mary spent years with her student who was blossoming into a teenager as she excitedly learned how ‘to hear.’ The girl had taught Mary how to use Braille so she could use it to teach the girl how to hear. At the end of their journey, the young woman baked a loaf of bread for Mary as a gift. Mary saw it as Eucharist and so do I. A connection was made; the Body of Christ was shared. And it came visibly in this loaf of bread. 

The Bread of Life, our Eucharist, is not a magical item. It is not a talisman to make you feel good about your faith as you partake of it. The Eucharist does not perform miracles, but it can enable a believer to use grace and goodness to survive threatening moments or achieve challenging goals. Barbara and Mary are testimonies to that. It is, rather, a source of grace to enable you to bring the Lord into your very being so that you will be changed and share that growth with others who desperately need it.

Reflection

Lohfink suggests a reflective reading of John’s Gospel, 6:22-59, and says we might ask ourselves: what does bread mean? Such a meditation can lead to all kinds of insights. Is my daily bread the news, social media, anything that feeds some part of me that craves secular assurance? Am I always hungry for more – more money, more possessions, more acknowledgement? Is my daily bread truly Jesus Christ in the Eucharist? 

Maybe we could read John 6:22-59 this week and reflect on it. Think of Lohfink’s words as well: “(The Eucharist) is a call and promise meant to change one’s whole life. It means coming to Jesus and believing him, living with him, joining with him in gathering the scattered children of God, building community, making space for God’s will.”

I love his line as stated above: “Those who share the host with others, must therefore also join their lives together.” (p. 193)