Eucharist Quotes

“Out of the darkness of my life, so much frustrated, I put before you the one great thing to love on earth: the Blessed Sacrament … There you will find romance, glory, honour, fidelity, and the true way of all your loves upon earth.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien

“The liturgy of the Eucharist is best understood as a journey or procession. It is the journey of the Church into the dimension of the Kingdom. We use the word 'dimension' because it seems the best way to indicate the manner of our sacramental entrance into the risen life of Christ. Color transparencies 'come alive' when viewed in three dimensions instead of two. The presence of the added dimension allows us to see much better the actual reality of what has been photographed. In very much the same way, though of course any analogy is condemned to fail, our entrance into the presence of Christ is an entrance into a fourth dimension which allows us to see the ultimate reality of life. It is not an escape from the world, rather it is the arrival at a vantage point from which we can see more deeply into the reality of the world.”
― Alexander Schmemann, For the Life of the World: Sacraments and Orthodoxy

“Beauty, then, is not mere decoration, but rather an essential element of the liturgical action, since it is an attribute of God himself and his revelation. These considerations should make us realize the care which is needed, if the liturgical action is to reflect its innate splendour.”
― Pope Benedict XVI

“It became obvious why Catholics had built such beautiful cathedrals and churches throughout the world. Not as gathering or meeting places for Christians. But as a home for Jesus Himself in the Blessed Sacrament. Cathedrals house Jesus. Christians merely come and visit Him. The cathedrals and churches architecturally prepare our souls for the beauty of the Eucharist.”
― Allen R. Hunt, Confessions of a Mega Church Pastor: How I Discovered the Hidden Treasures of the Catholic Church

“the very last thing I want to do is to unsettle in the mind of any Christian, whatever his denomination, the concepts -- for him traditional -- by which he finds it profitable to represent to himself what is happening when he receives the bread and wine. I could wish that no definitions had ever been felt to be necessary; and, still more, that none had been allowed to make divisions between churches.”
― C.S. Lewis, Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer

“The proper formation and consecration of the Eucharist requires careful attention. The Objects of the Working must be chosen systematically. My own Record has all the faults of pioneer work: it contains much to avoid. There must be proper tabulation of the Experiments, and strictly scientific observation. Sentimentality, sexual or spiritual, must be sternly suppressed. Compliance with these conventions should assure a success far greater than I have myself attained.”
― Aleister Crowley, Jane Wolfe: The Cefalu Diaries 1920-1923

“The Pope would have an easier job than the President of the United States in adopting a change of course. He has no Congress alongside him as a legislative body nor a Supreme Court as a judiciary. He is absolute head of government, legislator and supreme judge in the church. If he wanted to, he could authorize contraception over night, permit the marriage of priests, make possible the ordination of women and allow eucharistic fellowship with this Protestant churches. What would a Pope do who acted in the spirit of Obama?”
― Hans Küng

“I would celebrate the Holy Communion service in my pajamas if I thought it would help someone to find faith.”
― Nicholas Stacey

“The human mother can suckle the child with her milk. But our beloved Mother Jesus can feed us with himself. This is what he does when he tenderly and graciously offers us the blessed sacrament, which is the precious food of true life. In mercy and grace he sustains us with all the sweet sacraments. This is what he meant when he said that he was the one that holy church preaches and teaches us. In other words, Christ the Mother is entwined with the wholeness of life which includes all the sacraments, all the virtues, all the virtues of the word-made-flesh, all the goodness that holy church ordains for our benefit. The human mother can tenderly lay the child on her breast, but our tender Mother Jesus can lead us directly into his own tender breast through his sweet broken-open side. Here, he reveals a glimpse of the godhead and some of the joys of paradise with the implicit promise of eternal bliss.”
― Julian of Norwich

“When we receive the bread and blood, we, also, are touching God...I know you recognize that wonderous fact, dear brother, but sometimes it's good to be reminded.”
― Jan Karon, In This Mountain

“Heaven's eucharistic irruption into earthly space and time prompted classical Lutheranism not to join the Reformed and Anabaptists in their campaign of iconoclasm which rendered Christian churches little different in external appearance from Islamic mosques. While conceding the adiaphorous quality of images representing various aspects of the Incarnate Life, as early as his conflict with Karlstadt the Reformer defended the appropriateness of the crucifix and sculptures of Mary with the Christ Child. Orthodox Lutheran architecture and church decor attested the confession of our Lord's presence among His own in the means of grace, forging a style which goes hand in hand with precious doctrinal substance. Increasing accommodation to the North American Puritan milieu over the past century has led to a loss of the genuinely Lutheran understanding of the altar as a monument to the atonement, which is Christ's throne in our midst. ... If our chancels' decoration (or stark lack thereof) bespeaks the absence of our Lord and His celestial companions, can we be surprised at waning faith in the real presence and at waxing conviction of the rightfulness of an open communion practice? A deliberate opting for Puritanism's aesthetic barrenness can only make the reclaiming of Lutheran substance an even harder struggle.”
― John R. Stephenson, The Lord's Supper

“In modern church life, we often leave the nave to have "fellowship" with one another at social functions in the basement, and we are sometimes invited to "fun and fellowship" at games nights or congregational picnics. These are inappropriate usages of the word "fellowship" (which translates the New Testament κοινωνία), for the human interaction that takes place in church basements and public parks can be shared without a qualm with Christians of other confession and even with the irreligious and pagans. True κοινωνία begins with baptismal admission into the church (δι' οὗ ἐκλήθητε εἰς κοινωνίαν τοῦ υἱοῦ αὐτοῦ 'Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν, 1 Cor 1:9) and culminates in the fellowship granted through common partaking of the holy things; as such, it is entirely distinct from all Adamic-earthly gatherings, being the supernatural product of divine monergism.”
― John R. Stephenson, The Lord's Supper

“Learning to listen with one's whole body. Learning to hear with the eye and see with the ear and speak with the hearing. Knowing the Spirit in movement and not in stasis.

Such a process makes us aware of the way some of our bodily and work-role functions were usurped for the rituals of the church over which women were forbidden to officiate as celebrants. New birth, symbolized by the uterine waters of baptism, was separated from physical birth. The Eucharist took the serving role in which women were cast all the time and adapted it as a seminal experience that only men could perform.”
― Nelle Morton, The journey is home

“If this most holy Sacrament were celebrated in only one place and consecrated by only one priest in the whole world, with what great desire, do you think, would men be attracted to that place, to that priest of God, in order to witness the celebration of the divine Mysteries! But now there are many priests and Mass is offered in many places, that God's grace and love for men may appear the more clearly as the Sacred Communion is spread more widely through the world.”
― Thomas à Kempis, The Imitation of Christ

“You cannot see God. But He sees you, and He knows how much you suffer. He protects you, and He will always be beside you to protect you. And He will give you signs to let you know that He is there. God is there for everyone. If you open your heart to Him, He will show you the way.”
― Carlo Acutis

“Since the initial bestowal of the forgiveness of sins coincides with the fallen creature's passage from spiritual death to eternal life, both it and its renewal in absolution and Holy communion are inseparable from God's consequent action to preserve the life restored in Christ. And because bodily death stems from the sin whose seat is in the soul, apprehending the forgiveness of sins necessarily flowers in the resurrection of the body which suffers death for the soul's offense.”
― John R. Stephenson, The Lord's Supper

“[The Eucharist] is neither simply intellectual, addressing itself to disincarnated reason, nor moralistic, exhorting men to do better, though it contains both these elements, but deriving as it does from Christ, who is both divine and human and who is the invisible priest of the visible Church, the liturgy addresses itself to the whole man and seeks to draw him into union with God by means that are consonant with human nature.”
― J.D. Crichton

“Through [the Eucharist's] celebration Christ makes himself present and that presence, it is interesting to note, is largely made through words which may be those of holy scripture or those of the poets who, together with the music that their words have evoked, have enriched our worship throughout the centuries. These patterns of words, music, gesture, and movement, sometimes of great beauty, have formed the setting of the eucharistic action on whose content in one way and another they have thrown light. Together they have manifested the Christ who makes himself present. Likewise, the prayer of the Church, whether it is called the Divine Office or Mattins and Evensong, which are so largely scriptural, recalls the past, speaks through Christ who is present, and constantly looks on to the end.”
― J.D. Crichton

“Never fail to try again”
― Marcia Mandisi Mabaso, The Adventurous Nun: Stories My Family Told Me: Biography of Sister Mildred Lungile Madlala

“Do we Catholics adore bread when we pay adoration to the Blessed Sacrament?

No; we do not adore bread, for no bread is there, but the most sacred Body and Blood of Christ, and wherever Christ is, adoration is due Him by man and angels. St. Augustine says: "No one partakes of the Body until he has first adored and we not only do not sin when we adore It, but would sin if we did not adore It." The Council of Trent excommunicates those who assert that it is not allowable to adore Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, in the Blessed Sacrament. How unjust are those unbelievers who sneer at this adoration, when it has never entered into the mind of any Catholic to adore the external appearance of this Sacrament, but the Savior hidden under the appearances; and how grievously do those indifferent Catholics sin who show Christ so little veneration in this Sacrament, and seldom adore Him if at all!”
― Leonard Goffiné, The Church's Year

“My child, I wish to confide to you the secrets of My Heart burning with love for men in this Sacrament. How forgetful men are becoming of their Creator! Ambition, sensual pleasures, vain and worldly amusements, seem to estrange so many hearts from Me, even among those who were once devoted to Me in this sweet Sacrament of My Love, where I continually swell, and where they spent so many happy hours in the past secure from worldly seductions.”
― Refuge of Sinners Publishing, Inc., A Voice from the Tabernacle: or Reflections and Prayer in Honor of the Blessed Sacrament

“The Eucharist awakens in us the voice of God, which has been silenced by the busyness of this world.”
― Allene vanOirschot, Daddy's Little Girl: A Father's Prayer

“Anyone who has a special devotion to the sacred Eucharist and who tries to repay Christ's infinite love for us with an eager and unselfish love of his own will experience and fully understand how worthwhile it is to carry on a conversation with Christ, for there is nothing more consoling here on earth, nothing more efficacious for progress along the path of holiness.”
― Pope Paul VI, Mysterium Fidei: Encyclical on the Holy Eucharist

“For if the sacred liturgy holds first place in the life of the Church, then the Eucharistic Mystery stands at the heart and center of the liturgy, since it is the font of life that cleanses us and strengthens us to live not for ourselves but for God, and to be united to each other by the closest ties of love.”
― Pope Paul VI, Mysterium Fidei: Encyclical on the Holy Eucharist

“We can never show enough reverence, nor ever worship the Eucharist with adequately heartfelt veneration. That is why throughout the ages it has been the custom in the Church to receive the Holy Eucharist kneeling. We should receive the Holy Eucharist prostrate and not standing. Are we the equals of Our Lord Jesus Christ? Is it not He who will come upon the clouds of heaven to be our Judge? When we see Our Lord Jesus Christ, shall we not do as did the Apostles on Thabor when they prostrated themselves on the ground in terror and wonder at the greatness and splendor of Our Lord Jesus Christ? Let us keep in our hearts and souls that spirit of worship, that spirit of profound reverence for Him who created us, for Him who redeemed us, for Him who died on the Cross for our sins.”
― Marcel Lefebvre, The Mass of All Time

“Most of us have probably read these chapters [1 Cor. 11--15] as if they were stand-alone works almost independent from one another. This is a by-product of the Western church's tendency to teach Bible verses as lonely snippets and chapters, as if they were self-contained silos, when we should be searching for Scripture's overarching truths. (pp. 1-2)”
― Stephen P. West, Something Happens Here: Reclaiming the Distinctiveness of Wesley's Communion Spirituality in Times of Divisiveness

“Eucharistic participation in Christ is the foundation of a freely willed movement towards God, and is the present realization of the personal choice (“in accordance with nature”)
of that dialogical reciprocity that saves and perfects nature, whereas its denial is the kindling of a (“contrary to nature”) self-loving necrosis within the abundance of life itself. In each case freedom according to the image of God remains: we have, then, either freedom as a dialogical love that liberates nature in a eucharistic relationship, or freedom without love – or rather, without dialogue – which imprisons nature in a malicious self-will and self-activity. The question about the eternity of hell thus does not affect God and his love, because hell will end when the devil wants to end it, when he ceases from his malice against God – because if hell is the absolute narcissistic enclosure within oneself, in an imaginary superiority that denies the reality of corruption and the need for the transformation of the created, then this situation becomes in the end the soul’s ultimate blindness, its self-condemnation to hell.

Hell, then, is the denial of the Eucharist, the tragic freedom of absolute narcissism, that is, the supreme self-torture of a freely chosen enmity against love. As the boundary of heaven, it is lit dimly by its light, and this minimal gleam of rationality that is shed on it besieges the abyss of its irrationality with the compassion of the saints of God; but the battle against this hardened self-deification is indescribably frightening and also inauspicious.
The rest is known to God alone....”
― Nikolaos Loudovikos

“I want all of the holiness of Eucharist to spill out beyond the church walls, out of the hands of priests and into the regular streets and sidewalks, into the hands of regular, grubby people like you and me, onto our tables, in our kitchens and dining rooms and backyards.”
― Shauna Niequist, Bread and Wine: A Love Letter to Life Around the Table with Recipes

“The Eucharist—our gathered meal of thanksgiving for the life, death, and resurrection of Christ—transforms each humble meal into a moment to recall that we receive all of life, from soup to salvation, by grace. As such, these small, daily moments are sacramental—not that they are sacraments themselves, but that God meets us in and through the earthy, material world in which we dwell.”
― Tish Harrison Warren, Liturgy of the Ordinary: Sacred Practices in Everyday Life

“Catholics take their Church for granted,” he explained. “We even take our Lord in the tabernacle for granted. But you mustn’t be too hard on us. All children take their home and their father for granted. We are spoiled children.”
― Myles Connolly, Dan England and the Noonday Devil