The Human Element in the Eucharistic Miracle

Often I find myself contemplating the miracle of human life. In the ebb and flow of modern day existence often such miracles are sadly thrown away, disregarded, aborted, euthanized. When we come back to the Holy Word of God, both the written and the Incarnate, we are given the chance to once again see life through the eyes of children, where awe and mystical inspiration comes in the most natural sense.

Reflecting on the creation of humankind we can put together for a modern Christian audience the centrality of the bio-spiritual structure of human identity (yes the ancients were much better at theology, and these ideas were not lost on them as they are in today’s Christian community). In other words, humans are not creatures of pure physical body, we are not creatures of pure light and spirit.

Following the completion of the human person in Genesis 2:7, the most accurate translation describes the final product as a “living soul.” There is a contrast between ruah (Hebrew for spirit, wind, breath) and nephesh (Hebrew for soul). Unfortunately we do not have the time to go into greater detail. Simply knowing what you are (a biological-soul life) is sufficient for our purposes here.

There is never human body alone. Where there is a human soul in our presence there is, absolutely, also body. The miracle is the Fruit of the Holy Spirit. I do not try to answer the question of how. I embrace the miracle before me. As stated above what is central to human identity is the bio-spiritual structure created in the image of Divine life and goodness. Let us never forget that Christ is the eternal and Incarnate Son of God. Christ is both fully Human and fully God. Christ is still fully Human and Fully God while in Heaven.

Therefore, it is the humanity of Christ, the Incarnation of God, which plays a crucial role in the miracle of the Eucharist. When the Soul of Jesus comes among us, the Host (fruit of the land provided by the people) is placed at the hands of the Ordained Priest (In Persona Christi), and because we can say that soul demands body, the Host instantaneously and yes miraculously has, becomes, and is Body.

Finally, the Body of Christ is also known and experienced as the collective body of people prostrated before God to share in the Holy Flesh. We experience one another in that little Host, the experience of one another is facilitated through the Risen Christ. Our bodies are transubstantiated just as much as that little Host, so that now we too take on that biological demand of the Soul of Christ, becoming the Body of Christ. So that now we may do for the world what Christ has done for us. We come together to experience One Divine reality of awesome and divine power for the purpose of sharing in Christ’s Resurrection.