UNION WITH JESUS IN THE HOLY EUCHARIST I (part 1 of 2) like two pieces of melted wax...

UNION WITH JESUS IN THE HOLY EUCHARIST (Part I)
(...like two pieces of melted wax...)

AS we approach the great Solemnity of Corpus Christi we once again meditate on Jesus’ gift of Himself to us in the Holy Eucharist. In this Sacrament He gives us His Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity, to be our spiritual food.

{First we must realize how much more blessed we are to be in touch with Jesus any time in various places– in the tabernacles of our churches– to bask in His Real Presence and receive His love and peace. There can be no greater consolation and solace in this world than to be with God IN PERSON (bodily), and even to be united to Him most intimately in Holy Communion.

We might wish we saw him like the Jews did, in His bodily form. But the Jews encountered Him only in one place at a time and at certain times; and without benefit to many of them without faith.They saw him only outwardly and in a natural state. In the Eucharist we behold him with the eyes of faith, with all its merits, in a state of pure grace, available to operate within us all the effects of His grace. We can pour out to Him all our cares, joys, sorrows and concerns, confident that He listens and cares. He unites himself to us, Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity, which union may be likened to two pieces of melted wax blended and commingled together. Now let us reflect more deeply on the effects of ingesting Jesus under the species of bread and wine in holy communion. For this is certainly much more intimate than being able to touch, hug, or embrace Him, as His disciples had the opportunity to during His earthly life.

In Holy Communion the Body and Blood of Jesus are blended with our body and blood. His Soul and divinity, with all Its powers, are joined to our soul. “Thus his imagination stays and regulates our imagination; His understanding enlightens our understanding; His will invigorates and fortifies our will; His appetite moderates our appetite, and extinguishes therein the fire of concupiscence; His senses purify our senses; He roots up our evil dispositions; He destroys the seeds of sin; He mortifies our humours, and disposes everything in such wise that the practice of virtue becomes easy to us. This it is that was represented to a certain devout person, who as Plato relates, once beheld at one of his communions the Body of our Lord IN THE ACT of uniting Itself to his; Its eyes, Its arms, and each of Its sacred members mingling with his own, as one piece of melted wax mixes with another.”

To be sure, in Holy Communion “our Lord enters into the powers of our soul according as we are DISPOSED to receive Him; He really unites His Flesh to our flesh, and His Spirit to our spirit, albeit we know not how this union is brought about.”

“When we are united to Jesus Christ in communion, what union of His Heart with our heart, His power, His senses, His sacred members with ours!” Such union surely has the power to purify and elevate our very being, including our affections; with even the possibility of physical (or mental) healing, if He so wills. Most of all such union has the power to make us grow more and more in the virtue of charity –to love as He loves.

This ought to produce in us the miracle of “the separation of our evil inclinations and vicious habits from our soul”. “This miraculous effect has been wrought in many Saints, who by means of communion have wonderfully divested themselves of their defects and the corruption of the old man. Our falls and our miseries ought not to prevent us from hoping that it will be wrought also in us.”
Indeed “souls are wonderfully changed and perfected in Holy Communion, our Lord removing all their weaknesses, clearing away their stains, tearing away their evil habits, rooting up their passions, and quenching in them the fire of concupiscence, in proportion to the dispositions they bring to the holy table”.} { }*Gleaned from “The Spiritual Doctrine of Fr. Louis Lallemant, SJ, with direct quotes.