What’s in a name? The word “Eucharist” means thanksgiving. We all remember at least once a year to give thanks as we eat turkey, watch football, and take a day off. At least, I hope, we are thankful. But that word needs to be unloaded. We should be thankful to God. This thankfulness is not just a mood or disposition but a prayerfulness and fulfillment of a relationship with God. To alter a word in the operatic song, “every day is thanksgiving day for me.” The Scriptures tell us to dedicate ourselves to thankfulness. Does that mean we neglect prayers of asking, sorrow and adoration? No. But we may be neglecting thanksgiving at other times of the year. When we go to Mass, we must realize that Christ is still giving thanks (Eucharist) to God. Christ gives thanks to the Father. Christ can do this because he is also one of us, human. Listen to the words at Consecration: “… he himself took bread, and, giving thanks, he said the blessing…” Then “… he took the chalice, and, giving you thanks, he said the blessing…” When the bread is first offered, the celebrant says, “Blessed are you, Lord God of all creation…” That word, “blessed,” really means “thanks.” Notice the gesture of holding aloft the bread and wine. It is done in thanksgiving for all that God has given us. This bread will be changed into the living, substantial presence of Christ, still giving thanks in the Eucharist. We join our gratitude to his as between consecration and communion; Christ is giving thanks until we join him in a special way in thanksgiving. We thank him, and with him, thank the Father who is so good to us. It may be that on Sundays and weekdays, the faithful say to themselves, “I am going to church,” or “I am going to hear Mass,” or “I am going to celebrate the Liturgy.” All these phrases are good. But, maybe once in awhile, we could say to ourselves, “I am going to give thanks to and with Christ in the Eucharist”? There is no better way to give thanks to God than in this action, which gives us the word, “Eucharist” or “thanksgiving.” As the old prayer used to say, “What shall I give to the Lord for all he has given us? I will take the chalice of salvation and call on the name of the Lord.”
Filed under: Awalt Papers |
Blogger Priest 
FatherJoe just happened to find this blog and am busy trying to read all the Awalt Papers. How I miss my Uncle and his straight talk. Email me when you have a chance Hope you are well. Mary Pat
Dear Fr Joe,
Yes, it is true I do still have my head and the link you gave is only one of a huge, no not huge but absolutely colossal exhibition of man’s inhumanity to his fellows. Is that what you mean by ‘our fallen nature?’
Some scientists argue that when the left side of the brain dominates the right it makes it difficult for the emotions and our creative aspects to manifest themselves. Currently I’m right in the middle of a serious depressive phase; I’ve suffered from them for much of my adult life, and am taking 45mg Mirtazepine daily. The trouble with depression is that it’s not necessarily a presence of anything bad even though there are times of overwhelming foreboding or of immanent catastrophy, even though these periods can be very creative in a bizarre way. It is much more a lack or total absence of anything good and that, of course includes God.
The brain functions in a way that is only partially understood but we do know that there are electro-chemical processes and reactions and the interconnections between neurons and dendrites is really beyond contemplation, billions and billions of pathways and all under some sort of control.
And somewhere in there, between the head and the heart, on that meta-physical journey, lies the soul. Now I’m not being deliberately obtuse nor culpable of despair as these emotions that I have very little control over just swamp me, but the left side of my brain wants to understand and know for certain all the facts of the case. I am an engineer and by nature have a need to understand.
My right hemisphere is sort of paralysed or not allowed freedom of expression…or possibly satan has taken charge.
My old AA sponsor, now long dead, was always a practising Catholic and a daily communicant for very many years. He suffered from severe depression and had very many sessions of ECT before it finally remitted, and in his case for good. He was serving Mass one day, and as he was about to pour the wine into the chalice for the offering he was struck by a terrible thought of just how bizarre it all was and his ‘faith’ just evaporated in that instant, never to return.
I would take him to a Latin Mass once in a while and he tried to claw some sort of belief back, but it just eluded him forever. But with all that I know that he was a good man, he was a ‘good samaritan’, and if not with faith, then with good works alone I trust in the Love of God and his ultimate place with The Lord.
The turmoil inside my head, and possibly inside the head of anyone suffering from serious mental illness, is very difficult to describe, and we are virtually powerless to do anything about it. You talk of your experiences, and I can only talk of mine. Mine seem to indicate that prayer is not answered, that God is a vengeful and jealous God, and apparently not interested in me personally until I will be judged just after death. But then that was how my head master at boarding school was, and perhaps that’s where it came from.
The nuns also told me that it was not so much that Jesus died for my sins, but that it was my sins that crucified Him. It was I who drove those thorns into His head, it was me who nailed His hands to the wood of the cross, and it was me and my wayward and sinful nature that drove the lance into His side. I am responsible for His death, they told me that over and over again from the age of 4 till I was 11.
And it’s not true, just as Adam and Eve are not true, but there is truth in it, and truth in it all…and it’s truly awful.
With Love, Paul
Dear Fr Joe,
It’s difficult to give thanks when life seems a crock of poo!
I’m reminded of Job and how God allowed the devil to test him almost beyond endurance, and perhaps it’s down to my mental illness or perhaps it’s just the nature of reality, but some days there really is nothing to give thanks for.
You say that we can give thanks for ‘God’s saving grace’ etc., but we are only needing salvation because of a terrible trick enacted by an idiot and his temptress in the garden of Eden; but if like me you don’t believe in that fable then:
1) Why is it that we need to be saved?
2) How did Jesus becoming one of us only to be Killed for equating Himself to God possibly open the door for our salvation?
3) What have I got to be thankful for? (I didn’t ask to be born.)
4) Some days I fail to even believe in a God as the Church teaches, but have to believe in something to explain everything around me.
5) This God seems much more a detached entity, uninterested in me personally, but much more like an aloof omnipotent experimenter.
5) When EVERYTHING seems to go bad, how can I bring myself to be thankful as the Church and my warped conscience tells me I should?
And if you had to pay $10 for a gallon of gas I bet you too would be more than a little miffed.
Still with love, Paul