IF we truly want to be consistent with our Christian identity, then we should feel the urge to respond positively and eagerly to what Christ once told his disciples, “The harvest is rich but the laborers are few, so ask the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers to his harvest.” (Mt 9, 37)
That was why, Christ immediately summoned his 12 disciples and gave them authority over unclean spirits with power to drive them out and to cure all kinds of disease and all kinds of illness. (cfr. Mt 10,1) Then he told them, “cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse those suffering from virulent skin-diseases, drive out devils. You received without charge, give without charge.” (Mt 10,8)
It is important to note that these words are also meant for all of us who wish to follow Christ as we should. We should not forget that since we are meant to be “another Christ,” we also share in his continuing mission of saving mankind, which is what apostolate is all about.
For this, we need to develop a keen sense of vocation. It should be clear to all that everyone has a vocation. Everyone is called by God to carry out a mission that ultimately is a matter of our salvation.
To be sure, no one comes to existence by mere accident nor by pure chance and divine caprice. God does not create us at random. Even a person who is considered unwanted by his parents or is conceived through rape is already a person planned and loved by God from all eternity. This is a fundamental truth about ourselves that we should never take for granted.
Thus, we should try to develop this sense of vocation as early as possible. And this can mean as early as when one is still a child, already beginning to be aware of what and who he or she is. This normally should start in the family, with the parents playing a major role in this affair since they are our first teachers here on earth.
The parents should be quick in sowing the seeds of this sense of vocation by making the child aware that he or she just did not come from them but from God. And that he or she also belongs to God. This basic truth should always be reinforced all throughout the process of bringing up and educating the child.
The parents should therefore plant the rudiments of piety in their children, mainly through their example and with them doing the appropriate catechesis. Their children should see them praying and having a special and pious regard to God. When the children see the love between them and feel their parents’ love for them, then the children will find it easy to relate themselves with God in faith and love.
With a sense of vocation firmly established, we should be keenly aware of the mission inherent to that vocation. This mission will definitely require everything from us. But neither should we forget that everything has also been given to us. To be sure, Christ does not ask of us something that he himself would not enable us to do.
It’s a truth of our faith that we should vividly remember always, especially when we feel we are already at our limits in our self-giving to fulfill God’s will. God cannot be outdone in generosity. If we are generous with him and with others, the more generous will God be with us!
Body and blood
We celebrated last Sunday a mystery of faith on the body and blood of Jesus Christ. The celebration is one teaching that could hardly be accepted by those who are indoctrinated in the teachings of non-Catholic sects. Many of those self-proclaimed preachers espouse the idea of cannibalism based on the literal interpretation of the sacred scriptures. Although we take the bible as a good source of divine revelation, we still need to heed the teaching authority of the Catholic Church in terms of understanding the word of God.
The bible itself is very explicit in admonishing us from making private interpretation of it. In our desire to know the will of God, we would better seek counsel from the Church that had been given the authority to teach on matters of faith. Going into individual interpretation is akin to every person imposing his own understanding about the laws of our land without regard to the authority of the Supreme Court. That is a sure prescription to chaos and conflict.
It was Jesus Christ himself who taught us about eating his body and drinking his blood in order to have eternal life. Unless we do so, we cannot share in the grace of salvation and the life everlasting. But many of us would wonder, as the people in Jesus’ times were troubled, how would we be able to partake of that body and blood. It is indeed mind-boggling so we need the explanation and teaching of the Catholic Church on the matter. Surely, the revelation and commandment is not literal. We are taught that the body and blood Jesus Christ was referring to was the very bread and wine that he and his apostles partook during the Last Supper that we commemorate every time we celebrate the holy mass. The bread and wine offered in the Holy Eucharist are transubstantiated into the body and blood of our Lord.
Here is where another distortion is made by false teachers and self-proclaimed non-Catholic preachers. There is no supper in the morning according to the twisted and misguided interpretation of these preachers. Verily, they willfully ignore the fact that the celebration is a commemoration of the event and not of the time. There is simply fixation of time before the Lord. What is morning here is evening elsewhere on earth. Our time of reference is a conventional one for man’s convenience. It does not bind God who is the Lord of mankind for all eternity. It only is incidental that that Last Supper took place during supper time. What is more important is the event where Jesus established the sacrament of the Holy Eucharist as His covenant with mankind, wherein he partook with his disciples the bread and wine which He proclaimed as his very body and blood.
It is the greatest gift to us all who believe in Jesus Christ and accept with great faith the mystery of his body and blood. It really requires so much faith for one to believe that the bread and wine offered at Holy Mass are transubstantiated into the body and blood of Christ upon consecration by the priest. What we see is still bread and wine in its physical form and appearance but it is in substance the true body and blood of Jesus Christ. We are blessed with this divine gift that allows us to share in the body and blood that gives us eternal life. We only need to have a strong faith and live in the belief on the mystery so that we may deserve to share in this great gift of life that is the body and blood of Christ.
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