The Solemnity of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ (Corpus Christi Sunday)

Dear parish family and friends of St. Julia,
  
The Mass is the “source and summit” of our faith.  It is what makes us who we are as Catholics and to receive the Eucharist.  The Eucharist – the Body and Blood of Christ.  No where else can we find this.  We gather as a parish family, a community of believers, not to be seen, but to be fed by the Word of God and the Body and Blood of Christ.  This is what our sisters and brothers, children, grandchildren, nieces and nephews, students and teachers, neighbours, colleagues, friends – everyone needs to hear.
 
In 2009, Pope Benedict XVI remarked at Mass for the Feast of the Body and Blood of Christ that “the Eucharist has the power to unite people, strengthen them and remind them that only God is worthy of worship.”  He would go on to say "to adore the body of Christ means to believe that there, in that piece of bread, there really is Christ who gives meaning to our lives, to the immense universe as well as to the smallest creature and to all of human history as well as to the briefest existence."
 
The power to unite and strengthen. 
 
What is it that brings us together?  That is what this Sunday is all about.  The Eucharist.  It is what unites us.  It is the spiritual food that we need.  With all that is going on around us, and what appears to be pulling us apart, what we need is that which unites and strengthens us all the more.  And that is the Eucharist.  To be present and still in a sacred place.  To come together, and know from the very depths of our soul that we are all loved by our creator and God.
 
I encourage you to invite someone to join us for mass this weekend at St. Julia.  That personal invitation or welcome back just might be what they need to hear and what they have been waiting for.
 
May God bless each of you and those that you love.
 
Fr. Greg