The Eucharist is a “great grace”. We have become accustomed to it. As children we made our First Communion, and we continued to receive communion and, as with regular meals, it can become something routine and “tasteless” for us. Claret reminds us today that the Eucharist is something more. He recounts to us a lived experience now at an advanced age, perhaps when his apostolic activity began to decline and the persecutions intensify.
The Eucharist is much more than going to Mass, more than receiving Holy Communion. Claret tells us of a mystical experience that was only granted to him after a life of dedication, that he has been living the Eucharist profoundly throughout his life. An experience of “abundant grace” is granted by the Lord. It is not just anything; that’s why Claret remembered even the day and the time. But what is it? It is something deep, internal, that fills and involves everything.
The “great grace” is like the culmination of having long lived the meaning of the Eucharist. Jesus, at the conclusion of his surrender to the mission received from his Father, becomes Eucharist: “This is my body which is given” (Lk 22, 19). Claret, when he has already used all his energy and tried every means to evangelize, receives the “great grace” to become Eucharist, to be a tabernacle. There is no better way to pray and to deal with all evil.
The “great grace” is to live the Eucharist to the depths, to merge with it. So many martyrs teach us this. St. Ignatius of Antioch left us this in his writing, with his words and his testimony. Jesus is the bread broken and shared to give full life.
Whoever has “spent” his life for others is in tune with the Eucharist, because he has fulfilled the commission of the Lord: “Do this in memory of me”.
What is the Eucharist for me? How do I live it? What lessons does it teach me?
Grant me, Lord, to live the Eucharist as a “great grace”. Grant me to understand your dedication for love, and to follow you with a similar dedication: turn me into Eucharist.