Window to Heaven - 3

 A Window to Heaven - 3

“Our Lord Jesus Christ is as much present in our tabernacle, and our Adoration Chapel, as He is at the Vatican, or Jerusalem, at Lourdes or Fatima or any other holy place to which people travel.  In fact, no place on earth is more holy than our Adoration Chapel.  Every Mass, every consecration, is a miracle, greater by far than any other, really: for God to come into matter and transform it into Himself is far greater than His creating that matter in the first place.

That is why, Catholics have always shown a special reverence in their churches by genuflecting when entering the presence of the sovereign King who is really and truly there; by assuming stances of adoration, kneeling, or keeping silent in His presence, for it is in fact, God who is present, and by keeping silent we have a better chance of hearing what He has to say to us.

His presence is called “real”, for in the end, it is not we who are real, the piece of consecrated bread a mere symbol; no, our reality in this earthly form is padding away.  Right now we have this human form, but what we shall be is up to God, and none of us has seen it, this side of death (1 Jn 3:2).  We, who seem so real, are really mere phantoms of a day, our flesh grass that will pass away as we fall into the inscrutable mercy of God.  But now He comes to us as nourishment, as the food of life.  And as we change, we shall come to see the face of Him who has chosen to be among us as one who serves, and who serves by giving us His Body to eat, His Blood to drink, His presence to adore.”

      (Father Raymond T. Gawronski, S.J.)