To begin, here are two common phrases you hear in religious circles to praise God:
God is Good all the time! All the time God is Good!
Praised be Jesus Christ! Now and Forever! Amen.
And there is a phrase circling the latest generation: what a time to be alive! And this most certainly encapsulates the excitement, joy, and fervor after the National Eucharistic Congress (NEC) in Indianapolis, IN from July 17-21, 2024.
My desire with this text is to share with fellow, practicing Catholics what I’ve received at the NEC, the first such event in 83 years. The Congress and other related movements were called into being in response to a poll from the Pew Research Center which revealed that a majority of Catholics do not believe that Jesus Christ is present in the Sacrament of the Eucharist. So, this event and other related events are aimed at providing deeper understanding of the Sacrament.
But the Congress absolutely blew everyone away; and this isn’t surprising, because the main organizers of the Congress, including Bishop Andrew Cozzens, as they revealed during the conference, didn’t want to just put a program together, but wanted to invite the Holy Spirit to help the US Church and mold the event – so God, and praised be the Most Holy Trinity for the event, responded in overwhelming fashion. For me, the event felt not just like drinking from a firehose – it was like drinking from God’s firehose!
Present at the conference was the official representative of Pope Francis: Cardinal Tagle, an official from the Vatican. The Cardinal presided over the closing mass, and he gracefully revealed a message to the entire US church from Pope Francis – His Holiness’ desire was that the entire US church “convert to the Eucharist.” This phrase is incredibly deep, but let’s break it down.
What he means to say is that the call of our lives is to be like Jesus – bread broken for the salvation and sanctification of the world. Scripture also helps to understand this: “Amen, amen, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains just a grain of wheat; but if it dies, it produces much fruit” (Gospel of John chapter 12). The death of the grain of wheat, and bread that is broken, bears much fruit for the world; we are able give life to the world by giving our life for God as a sacrifice, like Jesus Himself whose body is broken for us, and whose blood is poured out for us (Gospel of Luke chapter 22); this Jesus broken in body, and whose blood is poured out, is truly what…who…becomes present on our altars at every Mass. This Jesus is then offered as a sacrifice on the altar for the sanctification of the world!
This mandate to give our lives, like in the gospel of Matthew chapter 16, when Jesus mentions “losing” our lives for his sake, while being the principal mandate, is surrounded by many smaller mandates so beautifully encapsulated and explained at the NEC. We are also called to be missionaries. We are to share what we have received, even if it includes us suffering for it, being broken for it! And this is closely linked to what Jesus tells us, to go to the ends of the earth to share the Gospel (Gospel of Matthew chapter 28)! We were exhorted multiple times to understand the obligation that we have in sharing the Eternal life we have received from Jesus! Our efforts literally are life and death for others – if we don’t answer the call to share the Gospel with, first, our families and friends, and then wherever and with whomever God may call us, who will? What if we are God’s designated instruments for our families and friends? Actually, we are!
Of course, to be missionaries in this sense, requires a deep change of heart and life. We aren’t superficially called to implement these mandates, but first to live them, and then to share them. This idea is beautifully encapsulated on a huge healing event that we had – God doesn’t just put us to work endlessly, for him, and if we are employed, our employers, until our earthly lives end; this event showed me personally that God also wants to love us and heal any brokenness we might have – a foretaste of life eternal with Him, where all is resolved. This and other great gifts God gives us we can share with others! The Almighty One has come down from Heaven, yes, to save us from our sins and give us Eternal life, but also to show us His tender love and exhort us to have confidence in Him, the Divine physician – as they exhorted us in the event, it’s OK if we run to Him with our brokenness and wounded nature, as so often happened in the gospel (Examples: two blind men on the side of the road in Gospel of Matthew chapter 20; the woman who suffered from heavy bleeding in Gospel of Mark chapter 5). Let us approach the Lord, the King of the Universe with every concern and pain of ours, the One Who can give us all things, and is happy to do so, no matter the cost! In St. Faustina’s diary (#229), Jesus shares how He views us when we approach Him:
“’My daughter, imagine that you are the sovereign of all the world and have the power to dispose of all things according to your good pleasure. You have the power to do all the good you want, and suddenly a little child knocks on your door, all trembling and in tears and, trusting in your kindness, asks for a piece of bread lest he die of starvation. What would you do for this child? Answer Me, my daughter.‘ And [St. Faustina] said, ‘Jesus, I would give the child all it asked and a thousand times more.’ And the Lord said to [St. Faustina], ‘That is how I am treating your soul…’”
Similarly, the idea of the Eucharist being the “source” of our lives really struck home (Catechism of the Catholic… #1324). God calls us to be sure to take time every day to rest with Him and from there draw strength to go about the different works and tasks we are called. We must frequently recall that in biblical history, generations of Israelites yearned for the coming of the Messiah: in Matthew chapter 13, the Lord says, “many prophets and righteous people longed to see what you see but did not see it, and to hear what you hear but did not hear it.” Our lives should reflect, in a certain peace and calmness with which we undertake our everyday tasks, our knowledge that the Messiah has come and given us everything in our justification and salvation; the tasks and work He has given us is secondary to this great gift He has given us!
Furthermore, we had a very moving exhortation from Father Mike Schmitz, the famous organizer of the Bible in a Year and Catechism in a Year series. In order to receive God’s love fully, we are called to obey His mandate to repent. Of course, we are all at different levels of our faith, but our initial call to be Catholics, essentially to be followers of Jesus, is to do what He asks of us at a foundational, basic level – be it via a Catholic education, via Catechism as children, or RCIA/OCIA as adults, we are called to live in a state of grace, in a state of friendship with God – and of course, we have learned that this has a moral component, to follow God’s law! So, whether we are new to Catholicism, or have been part of the Church for decades, we are called always to follow God radically in a moral sense; our recourse is the Sacrament of Confession, to turn away from our sin by amending our lives, and ask for God’s forgiveness in Confession. So, part of spreading the good news of Eternal life to others, is first to accept this life for ourselves, and change our lives morally by obeying the 10 commandments. This includes many unpopular topics like Mass every Sunday and days of Obligation, obedience to parents when living with them, not engaging in abortion or helping others to do so, premarital sex, life after divorce, use of contraception, homosexuality, etc. Let us understand this moment of God being in our midst and the great call we have to follow Him fully!
In a practical sense, the NEC gave a great idea on how to live this Congress: “walk with one.” Not that we are to make a project of someone, but with prayer to Holy Spirit, we can see who God wants us to accompany, to walk with. What this means is someone who we can befriend and be the bridge to God – first as a friend, a confidant if they choose, someone we can pray for, and eventually invite to participate in Mass and the faith with us; basically, with the Holy Spirit’s inspiration, we can be the one to reveal God and His kingdom to them. Done just by those who participated in the conference, this would mean 50,000 souls brought closer to God (since at least 50,000 attended!).
Another wonderful takeaway from the conference is the idea of “presence.” As the saying goes, our presence is presents! Let us not underestimate the power of showing up – we may think that our presence as disciples of Christ is not valuable, especially if we are rejected or persecuted, but let us remember that through us, God’s light shines on an increasingly dark and increasingly hopeless world. We never know whose life we secretly touch with our witness and the goodness God gives us – so, like the Lord in the Eucharist, the Presence of God among us, let us be present!
And the last big idea I’ll share that I took away is the idea of community – we are called to live our faith in a community, no matter how imperfect the community or members are. The speaker who shared this idea mentions that it is in a community that we can live our faith, we can share God’s love, and if God so wills it, we can learn to be broken for others, to practice our charity, our love. A nun I spoke to at the event said this idea of being broken another way, as Pope St. John Paul II famously said: this is a “gift of self.” When we deal with others patiently and with mercy, we become broken for them, we give ourselves for them, because we are treated unjustly and often times are hurt, and like good Christians don’t seek revenge, but see these sufferings as God’s plan. And as I mentioned previously, the goal of our life is to give our life for God, to be broken, to make a self-gift of ourselves. So, let us not shy away from living in a community, and it can be the parish, or in a more specific group. But the hallmarks of the group are like those presented in Acts chapter 2: devoted to the teachings of the church, to Mass, to prayer, to life together, including material sharing. And through this fervent and beautiful community of faith, God will work wonders, and hopefully, many will be added our group!
What a great gift to have been able to participate in the NEC, and I’m infinitely grateful to those that supported me to be able to go. I’m also incredibly grateful to the varied Catholic media outlets, especially EWTN, and to God Himself, that there was comprehensive coverage of the event available for many.
This event was the great event of our generation – as I’ve described, through the Holy Spirit and the stewardship of the US church leaders and assigned people, God has answered our prayers, in that we now have the tools and graces to leave an impact on our country by leading others to the faith we so cherish.
God is Good all the time! All the time God is Good!
Praised be Jesus Christ! Now and forever! Amen.
Abundant blessings to you and yours,
Juan
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