THE REAL PRESENCE

CHRIST IN THE EUCHARIST

Eucharistic Love - Eucharistic Handbook

St. Peter Julian Eymard

Chapter I, page 3

EUCHARISTIC LOVE

Man is love like his divine Model. As he loves so he lives.

Self-love makes him selfish; love of the world, vicious.

Only the love of God can make a man good and happy. Love is his only end: "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole strength."1 Deut. VI, 3

Such is the law. "Fear God, and keep his commandments," says the Wise Man, "for this is all man."2 Ecclesiastes XII, 13 Therefore, concludes Saint Augustine, "he who does not love God is not a man."

But every love has a first principle, a center, a life purpose.

Love is the bond that makes us perfect.

Jesus, and Jesus in the Most Blessed Sacrament, must be the first principle, the center and the end of an adorer.

Page 5, last Paragraph

…Love must be a rallying and gathering point of all the faculties of man; a school where one learns to know Jesus Christ; an academy where the mind studies and copies its divine Model, where even the imagination learns to picture Him in all the goodness and beauty of His love and of His works.

It is especially in mental prayer that the soul gets to know Jesus Christ and that Christ reveals Himself to it.

Our Lord has said: And he who loves me will win my Father's love, and I too will love him, and will reveal myself to him."1 John XIV, 21

Love then becomes the first principle of true conversion, of a perfect service of Jesus Christ, of the apostolate and of zeal for His glory.

1. Love is the starting point of true conversion.

Inordinate love of creatures or of pleasure is what has perverted the heart of man and driven him away from God; it is therefore by returning to the sovereign love of God that man will return to duty and virtue

A conversion inspired by fear is often as short-lived as fear itself; and it is the same with a conversion born of misfortune. So many who were converted in time of illness became worse after their cure.

But a conversion out of divine love is generous and persevering. Magdalen gives us the first proof of that.

Magdalen heard about Jesus, of His tender goodness for publicans and sinners. On listening to Him, she felt her heart sweetly and irresistibly drawn to this heavenly Physician. But what struggles to sustain to even dare approach Jesus! She, a public sinner, weighted with crimes! She, the scandal of her people! …Penitent love was to work this prodigy of grace. And behold Magdalen, who, without further ado, rose suddenly up from her life of sin, …went straight to this good Master. Without being announced, or welcomed, or received, she entered boldly though humbly the house of Simon the Pharisee. She threw herself at the feet of Jesus, kissed them, bathed them with tears of contrition, dried them with her hair, and remained there speechless, exposed to the scorn and sneers of Simon and his guests. Her love was stronger than their scorn. And so Jesus honored her above all others. He defended her, praised her action, and exalted her love. "If great sins are forgiven her," said the Savior, "she has also greatly loved."1 Luke VII, 47 That was her divine absolution.

But how did she love much? She did not say a word! She did more than that: she confessed, she published the goodness of Jesus by her humility and her tears. And from a sinner, she arose purified, sanctified, ennobled by the love of Jesus. One moment was enough for this perfect transformation. For love is like a fire: it purifies a soul in an instant and restores to virtue its former vigor.

1. Love is the starting point of the service of Jesus Christ and of evangelical perfection.

The service of Jesus Christ is hard on human nature, because it is founded on self-abnegation and on Christian mortification….

Saint Paul who all by himself worked more, suffered more, and won more nations to Jesus Christ than all the other Apostles together. But whence did so much strength and power come to him? What sustained him in the midst of so many sacrifices, in this life of death? Love.

Listen to Him: "Jesus Christ 'loved me', when I did not love Him, when I hated Him, when I persecuted the Church of God. He loved me first. 'He gave Himself to the death of the Cross 'for me'."1 Cf. Gal. II,20

…The starting point of every true disciple of Jesus Christ when facing a duty that is hard to perform, a sacrifice that immolates him, a sinful pleasure lures and tries to seduce him, an impious world that persecutes him.

Jesus has loved me unto death; I will love Him at least unto this sacrifice.

Jesus died for me; I will at least live for Him.

Jesus has loved me unto the gift of Himself to me; it is but right that I give myself to Him.

Everything for the love of Jesus; such is the watchword of the adorer.

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SAINT PETER JULIAN EYMARD - EUCHARISTIC HANDBOOK VI

Article I Adoration Page 156

I. To adore Jesus Christ in the Most Blessed Sacrament is first of all to acknowledge him truly, really and substantially present therein by the humble sentiment of a lively and spontaneous faith: humbly surrendering our feeble reason to the divinity of this sublime Mystery; asking neither to see or touch, like the unbelieving Apostle, before accepting the truth of Jesus Hostia; merely waiting, to prostrate ourselves at His feet, for the infallible and gentle word of the Church telling us like Saint John the Baptist: "Look, this is the Lamb of God; look, this is he who takes away the sin of the world."

II. To adore Jesus Christ in the Most Blessed Sacrament is to offer Him the sovereign homage of our entire being: of our body by the profoundest respect, of our mind by faith, of our heart by love, or our will by obedience, of all our senses by a worship of the deepest reverence. And that in union with the praise of all the true adorers of Jesus Christ, in union with the adorations of the Church, of the Most Blessed Virgin during her sojourn on earth, and of all the heavenly court which, prostrate before the throne of the Lamb, offers Him its crowns as a homage, saying: "Thou wast slain ...thou hast ransomed us with thy blood and given us to God ...Power and Godhead, wisdom and strength, honour and glory and blessing are his by right." 1

III. To adore Jesus Christ in the Most Blessed Sacrament is to adore the greatness and tenderness of His love for man as He prepared, instituted and perpetuated the Divine Eucharist in order to be the undying Victim of salvation, the Heavenly Bread and the consolation of journeying man on earth.

IV. Lastly to adore Jesus Christ in His Sacrament is to make the Divine Eucharist the goal of our life, the final object of our piety, the loving purpose of our virtues and sacrifices. Everything for the greater glory of Jesus in the Most Blessed Sacrament! Such should be the watchword of the entire life of an adorer.