By FR. KEVIN M. CUSICK
As is true of most human beings, I am uncomfortable with certain conversations and would much rather avoid them. After being in a parish for seven years I have come to know the people quite well. I easily observe who is not with us at Mass and who may therefore be totally missing in action at our or any other Mass that day.
When a parishioner absents himself from the Easter vigil because it’s too long and is also MIA on Easter morning, I know we may have a problem. When such person once again reappears at Mass I know what I need to say. Stepping out of my comfort zone, however, in order to tell someone that choosing to miss Mass on any Sunday, to include Easter, is a mortal sin is a conversation I would rather not have.
An age in which nearly everyone receives Communion every time he or she attends Mass, however, makes such communication necessary, and the sooner the better.
When such a person explains that the reason for his absence at Easter Mass is that the family had breakfast together that morning, then one adult has to tell another adult that this means you have to be late for breakfast. Breakfast is less important than keeping the Commandments — even if the breakfast is with the Pope, let alone one’s own family.
Sometimes the conversation goes well and results in sacramental Confession and amendment of life. At other times, however, the priest has peace in following his conscience but encounters resistance and must continue to pray for all those who resist Church teaching.
It is erroneous to claim that refusing to be with others in order to be at Mass is always unloving. Someone might commonly respond that it would be an unloving thing to arrive late to a family breakfast. This is an inversion of the truth. The most loving thing would be to serve as the instrument of witness to the truth for those whom one loves the most. Jesus is always loving us through those who undergo self-denial and flout human respect in order to share the truth with us.
Weathering the storms resulting from resistance to the truth and its teaching on the part of others is indeed a kind of suffering but we understand this is a sharing in that of our Lord, who transforms such pain into something redemptive and a sign of future joy.
The abuse of the Eucharist on the part of those who deny Christ by breaking the Commandments and then habitually receiving Him every time they attend Holy Mass is a widespread problem. Recapturing the true Presence of Christ through preaching and teaching can heal this gap between faith and life.
The Eucharist is indeed Food but the Church is not a grocery store. The Eucharist is indeed Medicine but the Church is not a pharmacy. The danger for us in acting as though the Eucharist is a pill that wards off death or Food that infuses an antidote against dying is that receiving this sacrament under those circumstances becomes an exercise in self-delusion. We must be honest with others about this fact.
The Eucharist is effective in functioning as grace only if it is received with the use of intellect and will as well as the physical faculties of the body involved in the act of reception and consumption. Our fast-paced society is quick to reduce everything to mere function or reciprocation. Everything we do to be valued must be boiled down to what I think or see I am getting out of it. Grace eludes the grasp of those who would live only on the material plane.
If the Divine Person of Jesus the Savior is present as Eucharist I must approach Him with such understanding in the intellect and respond with worship on the part of the will. This of course is necessary to receive Him entirely. Only the entire Christ can save us. Persons must be grasped in relation and not in utility. God could certainly handle not being loved in return, but He chooses not to do so. He can neither deceive nor be deceived.
The breakdown of worship also flows from disagreement within families and between spouses about the necessity of attending Mass on the Lord’s Day. It is a diabolical attack on the individual and the family when one parent “feels bad” when going to church or when receiving Communion. The Devil will pull the whole family away from Christ by any means. He is especially powerful at doing so through a parent.
We should gladly flee the world and take refuge in Christ as often as we can. This is what we are offered through Him eucharistically present. Especially in the Mass and in Christ’s Presence in the Eucharist we are with Him and find safety and security. Sunday Mass is a rock to which one should cling always, no matter what else may be going on in one’s Life.
Whether one is able to receive the Eucharist or not, one should move Heaven and Earth to get to Mass at least on Sunday every week or on the vigil if travel or work necessitates. Is there any lesson parents teach that is more important than this for the lives of their children? Those lives are not meant to end forever when they close their eyes on this world for the final time.
The love always greater than being with others is being with the Lord and witnessing to His love for them. When we attend Mass we love others by witness and by praying for them.
When our families experience our absence because we are worshipping God they are being loved: By our witness we share the hope of responding to God’s love for all of us. They too are called to conversion and to return to the Father’s house.
When I must confront others about their absence on Sunday, I am quick to share with them that I also do so for my own sake. I tell them that the Lord will ask me at judgment why I did not share the truth with certain souls. To do so would result in my being condemned for choosing my comfort now, in this world. And I could lose thereby the only true comfort of Heaven which once possessed no one can take from me.
The utter loneliness of Thomas More as he went to the chopping block is a pain in which we always share when we choose to love and obey God here apart from others who refuse to do so. This is contrasted with the utter and total lack of loneliness in Heaven which we will enjoy securely forever as a result with Thomas More and all the saints.
And we will rejoice with the Father and the heavenly choirs already now when those who need to repent and receive Confession do so before returning once again to meet and receive the Lord Jesus with sincere love in the Holy Eucharist.
Thank you for reading and praised be Jesus Christ Risen, now and forever. Alleluia!
@MCITLFrAphorism
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