THE WORD AND THE SAINTS
September 16, 2024 - Remembering Sts. Cornellius and Cyprian1 Corinthians 11: 17-26,33; Luke 7: 1-10
The Body of Christ is the key to understand these levels and and these dimensions. Christ comes alive and encounters us at the immediate level during the celebration and we are called to grow in that communion at the tranformational or transcendental level, that is in continuity of our daily life. The second is the Body of Christ which is he people of God - who encounter each other at the immediate level within the eucharistic celebration and are challenged to grow and transform themselves into that communion at the transcendental, or transformational level of their faith life.
When these two dimensions are not experienced in and through a Eucharist, that celebration remains merely a ritual and the Lord shall certainly not approve of it. We do ourselves more harm through it, warns St. Paul. While these two dimensions blend in and bear fruit at the immediate and the transcendental levels, creating a community of love and peace, the Lord shall expressedly congratulate us, as he does to the centurion!
The saintly martyrs we celebrate today, one a Pope and the other a Bishop, were great models in this teaching and practice. They recognised the real challenge of making the Eucharistic gathering truly a moment of communion of hearts rather than merely a ritual of ceremonies. For us today, that needs a bit of homework prior to the celebration itself: communion has to be built on a daily basis and celebrated at the Eucharist. If it has not been built already, what do we celebrate at all?
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