CHAPTER 5: A VISIT TO THE BLESSED SACRAMENT
In his encyclical Mysterium Fidei, Pope Paul VI commented on Eucharistic worship: The faithful should not neglect each day to make a visit to the Blessed Sacrament, which ought to be reserved in churches in a
most worthy place with maximum honor according to the liturgical laws, since this visit is proof of gratitude, a sign of love, and a duty of adoration to our Lord Jesus Christ who is present there.
If we are striving to live the reality present in the tabernacle, and our hearts are not asleep, we will not be able to pass a tabernacle where Jesus awaits us without stopping. Perhaps we do not have the time to enter the church and remain there for a moment, but we can always enter it in spirit, making acts of love and reparation, with our thoughts fixed on the tabernacle. Church steeples do more than hold up the bells and the clock; they draw our attention to the Blessed Sacrament itself. St. Josemaria has remarked: “As you make your usual way through the city streets, aren’t you happy when you discover another tabernacle?”
In Mysterium Fidei Paul VI also wrote: While the Eucharist is reserved in a church or oratory, Christ is truly Emmanuel, that is, God with us. “No other nation has a God as close to us as our God.” This closeness gives us an incomparable dignity; it orders moral actions, nourishes virtue, consoles the afflicted, and strengthens the weak.
All of this certainly merits a thank you. Christ need not have remained in our tabernacles; he chose to do so out of no need of his own, but because of our need. He knew that we would need him, and in this we see the ingenuity of his love. A PLAN OF LIFE 13 HELPING YOU FIND GOD WHEREVER YOU ARE
If there were only one tabernacle in the world, how happy we would be if we could adore him there but a few times in our lives? God has made it easier for us, however, and we should make use of this great gift. St. Josemaria has advised: “After saying your usual prayer, tell Jesus, really present in the tabernacle, about the cares and worries of your day. And he will give you light and courage for your life as a Christian.”
By visiting our Lord we learn something not found in books, for love is born and grows through personal association. We can begin to understand something of the reason for the Eucharist only by identifying with people who love each other. Present together, their eyes say everything, almost without a need for words. “He looks at me and I look at him,” an old man told the Cure of Ars, speaking about his visits to the tabernacle. There, without realizing it, we are contemplatives: I know he is there; I really am in the presence of the Most High. One might suppose that the natural thing would be to feel small. But here the natural thing is to know that he loves you and to say to him with the confidence of St. Peter: “Lord, you know all things, you know that I love you!” (John 21:17)