WASHINGTON, DC, June 9 — In the homily during the June 9 Mass for the National Eucharistic Pilgrimage at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, Cardinal Wilton Gregory, Archbishop of Washington, described the Eucharist as God's ultimate response to the "havoc" the devil seeks to bring to all God's works.
"In the Eucharist," he stated, "God gives himself to us so completely that we are far better off than even Adam and Eve might have been before they disobeyed the one who gave them life."
He called the National Eucharistic Pilgrimage a "national spiritual journey project to strengthen our belief that the Eucharist is truly the most perfect gesture of God's intense desire to be with us" and a manifestation of God's "hounding us and never ceasing to follow us and to precede us on the journey of love."
Here is a transcript of Cardinal Gregory's homily for the Tenth Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year B).
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“I was afraid.”
That was the sure indication that sin had entered the garden before Adam and Eve had disobeyed God. They had not been afraid of God. They were not embarrassed because of their nakedness. They did not have to hide in the garden. Sin destroys the harmony that God had designed for our first parents.
And so, for us as well, the devil makes an early appearance in our first reading and a reference in today's Gospel. He always comes to destroy the intimacy that God has intended to exist between his creatures and himself. Then as well as now, the evil one always seeks to bring havoc to God's creation of genius. He seeks to divide us from God and from one another.
As soon as Adam and Eve had disobeyed God, however, the Lord was already planning to restore the friendship that had originally existed between him and his creation. Jesus becomes the reconciliation and the restoration of the relationship that God still intends for all of us.
There are two specific sacraments that work to undo the destruction that Adam and Eve had initiated.
The Sacrament of Reconciliation is the spiritual moment when we can admit our faults acknowledge our failings, confess our sinfulness and be reconciled with God and with our church. Unfortunately, too many Catholics have strayed away from frequenting that moment of mercy and grace.
The other Sacrament that seeks to undo what Adam and Eve and each one of us has been guilty of at times is the Eucharist itself.
In this Sacrament God himself comes close to each one who receives this gift. The Eucharist is God's offering of his hand in a sacramental way in order to draw us close to him. Christ makes himself present in ways far more intimate than even the Lord's walking in the garden calling after Adam and Eve might have been.
Jesus is truly present in a magnificent way that he invites us to dine with and on him. He offers us not merely food but eternal life in this Sacrament. He is so absolutely present that even Adam and Eve would have been thrilled to have been so close to the one who continues to call out, “Where are you?”
The evil one, however, still tries to deceive too many people into distancing themselves from the Bread of Life. Some refuse to believe that this gift is truly the Living Lord. Some may propose that is it is merely a symbolic manifestation. Others might suggest that it has lost its meaning, relevance or importance in our highly technologically-sophisticated age.
But in the Eucharist God gives himself to us so completely that we are far better off than even Adam and Eve might have been before they disobeyed the one who gave them life. “O happy fault that has merited such a Redeemer!,” the Church happily sings this phrase while awaiting Easter glory.
The Genesis account of human failure has been replaced by the God who will never settle for the destruction of his friendship with the people he has fashioned to be his own.
We are engaged in a national spiritual journey project to strengthen our belief that the Eucharist is truly the most perfect gesture of God's intense desire to be with us under the forms of bread and wine. Christ is truly present in such a manner that defies our ability to fully grasp the Wonder of this gift.
If truth be told, it is once again God hounding us and never ceasing to follow us and to precede us on the journey of love. Amen.
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