We bow our knees before the Lord
by Fred Schaeffer, OFS

Many years ago, a friend of mine asked if I had ever really hugged Jesus, and somehow in that discussion was the seed that got me to think more and more about Jesus as He is among us. There are many ways of seeing Jesus, and when you are able to really see Him in any one of these ways, you will want to form a more intimate relationship with Him. You will want to love Him more. Devout people see Jesus with the eyes of the Soul.

It was on Memorial Day 1992, that I was commissioned to be a Special Eucharistic Minister, a wonderful gift from Jesus. That was an incredibly significant day for me, but as the day was playing out that wasn't immediately apparent. The year that followed that day, was a year of growth. We never stop to mature in our relationship with Jesus but in hindsight I feel I've grown more since 1992 than I had the previous 5 years before that. Many years ago, I had no conception what Christian love was all about. I thought I did, but I was only fooling myself. During those years, I had no 'staying power' - I began things, but I never finished them. When you get to stand in front of Jesus when your judgment day is at hand, He doesn't reward you for honoring Him once or twice nor for what you were planning to do, He wants to see an unbroken chain of events that lead to Him, to His heart; He wants to see a soul whose life story is that of continual intimacy, continual striving and unselfish love for His Father, for Him, and blessed by the Holy Spirit. Jesus wants enthusiastic followers who leave no stone unturned to please Him, rather than those who follow Him only so now and then.

As I review my actions of these past years, although I saw growth, I also saw some regression here and there. There is always room for improvement, and I am convinced I could never have matured in my faith without receiving the Body and Blood of Jesus, daily. How do I tell you that I yearn for God's closeness without giving the impression that I somehow want more than others do? The closer I come to Jesus, the more I feel the need for prayer, and the more I pray, this intimacy increases. I recall a story of a Protestant Minister, who visited a Catholic Church daily, and one day the parish priest could no longer restrain himself, and went up to the man to ask why he sought out the Catholic church for his noontime visits rather than his own church, the church where he preached and where he ministered. And the Protestant Minister answered quite simply... I believe that in the Catholic Church, the Lord Jesus is really present in Body and Blood, in the Tabernacle.

Think about that for a few seconds, my friends... that tells you something. It tells a story of the intimacy we frequently feel on this journey of faith but also an intimacy which we do not feel often enough. When have we really taken the time to hug Jesus? Are we so "used to" the Eucharist, that this mystery of the Eucharist has become commonplace? When you receive Communion do you do so because you truly seek this intimate union with Jesus, or has communion become an automatic act that no longer evokes any particular thought in you?

When the celebrant at Holy Mass, lifts the bread and the wine and they are transformed to the Body and Blood of Jesus, we may not understand the change because the bread still tastes as bread and the wine still tastes as wine, but the change is there, my sisters and brothers, and if you really think about that at that moment when you receive Jesus in your heart a little later in the Mass, you will see Jesus, you will see Jesus with the eyes of your soul. When you share Jesus with others when ministering, you see the love of Jesus in the eyes of those who are receiving Him, because when we receive Jesus we are burning with desire for Him.

Not only do we consume the Eucharist in its present form because we acknowledge the kingship of Jesus, and we pay homage to Him as our savior and redeemer, but Jesus (John 6:53-56) also told us: "I am telling you the truth; if you do not eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you will not have life in yourselves. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him to life on the last day. For my flesh is the real food; my blood is the real drink. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood lives in me, and I live in him. The most beautiful part of the scripture I've just read, the Word of the Lord, is the very last part of the last sentence... and I live in him... mark these words well, my friends, etch them into your memory, because quite simply put, if you receive Jesus in the Eucharist, he lives in us, and we will enjoy that intimacy that is so hard to describe because there is no language, no adjective to fully embrace the meaning of that word in regard to our relationship with Jesus in our soul.

Rather, it is something you feel when that condition exists, and once you have found Jesus in this way, treasuring this special relationship, He will not let us wander too far away from Him and we keep searching, wanting more and more. We keep growing and maturing in our spiritual life. And John also points out to us that it is the ascension which makes the sending of the Spirit possible and hence also our sacramental meal "For the element which really mediates life there is not the flesh as such but the accompanying Spirit, by which the Godhead in Jesus is meant¹."

Just as Christian love does not emerge from human emotion, the intimacy of our souls which defines our relationship with Jesus also has nothing to do with human emotion. In fact, as you mature in your life of the spirit, it will become apparent to you that this yearning for intimacy bears fruit when its stimulus is not one of self-satisfaction as much as one of giving. To put this concept another way, Jesus will undoubtedly be more pleased when you share your inner-most thoughts with Him because you love Him, then if you did so because it feels good. For years, when I didn't know Jesus so well, and I was feeling the pinch of loneliness, I wanted to feel that intimacy I had experienced in the Capuchin Order so many years ago, but the spiritual groundwork was no longer in place, and then it became a search for pleasure, and I can tell you that Satan lies in wait when we're given to searches for pleasure, for self-satisfaction, for self-indulgence. He leads us under the guise of feeling spiritual, further and further away from Jesus. That yearning for love is emotional and the yearning for a close intimacy with Jesus should not be based on human emotion but rather, it should have its basis on deep respect and true Christian love for One who loves us unconditionally and without reservations. He asks no less of us. Let us love Him because He is Lord!

Written on: March 23, 1996; Note: I do not have many unpublished manuscripts left, but this is one. 1996 was a year when I was preparing for religious life although that did not happen immediately. It was the year I moved to Cincinnati to join the OFM (June), where I had been admitted in a previous meeting in 1995. So 1996 was a very spiritual year for me. Even that was not the place where the Lord wanted me to be, but that's another story. /Fred S.

(1) Johannes Bets. "Eucharist" In Sacramentum Mundi (New York: Herder & Herder. 1968) in Essential Catholicism (Thomas Bokenkotter)

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