He Will Be With Us Until The End of Time
By Fr. Peter Patros
Jesus makes us many promises and we know Christ is someone who always keeps his promises.
One specific promise he gives us and his disciples is that he will be with us until the end of time.
How does Jesus fulfill this promise if he ended up leaving this world at the time of his Ascension?
Jesus fulfills this promise by becoming present to us: body, blood, soul and divinity in the Eucharist every time we celebrate the mass.
We read in the Epistle of Saint Paul to the Corinthians as he reminds all of us that when we receive the Eucharist we are not just receiving holy bread, we are participating in the actual body and blood of Christ
The Eucharist is the heart of the Church because Christ is the heart of the Church.
When we were in the middle of the pandemic, a lot of us were frustrated because we had to participate via live stream and at home.
We as the church knew that this was not a good solution, but it was the best we could do at the time.
Praying at home is not an alternative to replace what we have here in this Church.
Some say they pray better at home.
Some like the convenience.
Some like the lack of distraction
Some even say that I don’t need to come to Church to be holy.
Stepping inside the Church does not make you holy the same way stepping into a hospital makes you healthy.
However, it is the one that is ill, comes to the hospital, draws near to the doctor and follows the treatment given to him is healed.
The same way, we come to Church not as a reason to boast in our holiness, but we boast of our weakness as St Paul says.
We come to Church to be healed and to be made holy by Christ.
To our great advantage, we have a great gift here in the Church that is present in a special way here unlike anywhere else, not our homes, not our work.
We have the gift of Christ’s real presence, body, blood, soul and divinity, in the Eucharist.
It not a mere symbol. We believe Christ truly present and we honor and revere him as such.
For that reason, we draw near brother’s and sister’s, after such a long journey being away. Remember our purpose of why we enter this Church. We come here to meet Jesus. We enter here to receive Christ, our Doctor and Medicine of Immortality. Remember that he is the Source and Summit of Our Lives as Christians.
Amen.
