OUR SENTIMENTS AFTER COMMUNION
On this Sunday we celebrate the solemnity of the Body and Blood of Our Lord Jesus Christ, also known as Corpus Christi. With this celebration the Church professes and renews her Eucharistic faith. The faith of the Church, our faith that, Christ the Lord is “present in the Eucharist in a unique and incomparable way. He is present in a true, real and substantial way, with his Body and his Blood, with his Soul and his Divinity. In the Eucharistic Species of bread and wine, Christ is present whole and entire, God and Man” (cf. Catechism of the Catholic Church 1373-1375).
Unmated by this unshakable fundamental faith in the Eucharistic Jesus, let us recall what should be our deserving sentiments after communion. To remember those sentiments, we will be helped by the Adoro Te Devote hymn found in our hymnal 405 in Latin and 561in English. The following should be our interior disposition after receiving the Body and Blood of Christ:
1. Gratitude and thanksgiving to Him whom we possess in our heart. Now with glad thanksgiving, praise Christ glorified; He in us is present; we in him abide. Members of his body, we in him are one; Hail this sacred union, heaven on earth begun.
2. Adoration from the depth of our being, the God who humbled Himself as to give Himself to us. Humble we adore Thee, hidden Deity, which beneath these symbols are concealed from me. Wholly in submission Thee my spirit hails, for in contemplating Thee it wholly fails.
3. Renewing our sentiments of faith in Jesus, who is present in this divine mystery. Seeing, touching, testing, all are here deceived, but by hearing only safely its believed. I believe whatever God’s own Son told; nothing can be truer Truth’s very word.
4. Marvel at the excess of Jesus’ love for us and excite ourselves to love Him more and more. I do not like Thomas, see Thy wounds appear, but with him confess my Lord and God is here. Grant this faith in me may ever more increase, and my hope in Thee, and love, may never cease.
5. Begging Him to fix His abode in us forever, that hereafter we may live only by Him, in Him, and for Him. O thrice-blest Memorial of my dying Lord! this Bread of Life doth life to man afford. Grant O Lord, my soul may ever feed on Thee, and Thy taste of all things sweetest to it be.
6. Lay our needs before Him. Victim for Thy people, Jesus Lord and God, cleanse me, wretched sinner in Thy precious Blood. Blood whereof one drop for humankind outpoured, might from all transgression have the world restored.
7. Ask Him for fidelity and perseverance. Jesus, whom in this life veiled I behold, Grant what my soul thirsts for with desire untold. O may I, beholding Thine unveiled grace, rest in blissful vision of Thine open face.
May this solemnity bring to the Whole Church and to all of us a renewed faith and love of the Jesus Christ in the Eucharist.
As you may have heard, on July 1st, 2025, I will transfer to my new place of assignment in Northfield. Today, I want to thank each and every one of you who have been part of my pastoral ministry in your amidst at Holy Cross Church. Thank you for your patient love to me. I am grateful to Archbishop Hebda and his immediate collaborators for giving me a chance to serve at Holy Cross as my landing mission all the way from Africa. Thank you, Fr. Howe, staff and parishioners of Holy Cross. All of you have been, are and you will remain a gift of faith to me.
God bless you all and abundantly.
~Fr. Justus