Grounded 2

Author: Andrew Comiskey
March 26, 2020
‘Hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what he already has…?’

Hard to identify each little loss—they blur into a haze. Maybe familiar Lenten sacrifices like rich food and wine, or the absence of family and friends with whom to share the leanest of fare? (You can’t ‘zoom’ a meal).

Or is it the now familiar infusion of fear in those around you which challenges your peace? You know, that vow to stay calm, to not let ‘it’ get you. Unless you have no nerve-endings, ‘it’ (covid-19) bangs on your door each time you witness people better than you losing breath. Agitation in the outer courts, clamoring for your core…

Jesus in the Eucharist centers me like nothing else. Partaking of the Body and Blood daily has become for this Catholic convert the centerpiece of my worship. Yep, that is what I miss most in the lockdown—no Holy Meal.

Don’t get me wrong: I love singing simple songs of love to Jesus, hearing Scriptural exhortations to armor oneself in faith, and receiving inspired prophetic prayers. But nothing will do like Christ-in-me, the reception of Jesus in the inner courts, fortifying this warrior in the most profound way.

It took time to get there. I was raised Episcopalian where a slightly diluted Catholic take on communion prevailed; I valued the meal but did not know its Subject. Later charismatic versions were super casual, tough to interpret in their myriad forms. Leanne Payne tutored me in an Orthodox version which opened my heart to more. Then a two-year prep at a local parish before becoming confirmed.

I could hardly wait, for I embraced the Catholic view, as you may well know, that insists on priestly prayers (in the line of Peter) to transform the elements into a re-presentation of Jesus—His real body and blood–every Mass.

Quite a claim. I aspired to this edible Jesus and lived with increasing hunger until that Easter Vigil 9-years-ago. Jesus ‘satisfied my desires with good things’ and I’ve not looked back but knelt forward in daily Mass ever since. Until now.

A virus got in the way. Church doors are locked, no opening in view. I hunger for Him. I can remember Him and many healing meals, can meditate on the Word, and prayerfully agree with Annette about His goodness over our family, but I cannot consume Him. Big loss. I ache for Him, not unlike the wait ten-years-ago.

Only now I’ve ‘tasted and seen His goodness’, passed into Him, consumed and been composed by Him. I hunger and thirst for the One.

If there is a purpose in this ‘ache’, Pope Benedict said it first and best: ‘Do we not often take the reception of the Blessed Sacrament too lightly? Might not this kind of spiritual fasting be of service, or even necessary, to deepen and renew our relationship to the Body of Christ?’

I guess he means that it’s ok to hunger a little, to not take for granted what one now expects. Perhaps many of us do not savor enough the Gift of the Holy Meal.

So I wait again. Help me, help us, O God, to hunger patiently.

‘…If we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently.’ (Rom. 8: 24b, 25)

Please take time to watch our video and become ‘Chaste Together.’


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