Happy Easter, Brothers and Sisters.
Jesus, the Crucified one has risen! The Church proclaims to the ends of the world the Good News that He has truly risen. The words of the liturgy, “Yes, Christ my hope is arisen; Christ indeed from death is risen, our new life obtaining” (Easter Sequence), proclaim that we should not despair, for Christ is risen to give us hope.
As we celebrate Easter, people often wonder where the resurrected Christ is today, and oftentimes the answer is heaven. But where is heaven? Yes, Jesus has returned to his heavenly Father, yet He is so much present in our lives today, especially in the Sacrament of the Eucharist. The Eucharist is the perfection of God in Jesus becoming like us in all things. Jesus is the Emmanuel, the God with us, in the form of bread and wine we partake. Jesus becomes like us in all things, except sin, and He tells us that He is with us yesterday, today, and forever. When He celebrated the first Eucharist with His disciples on the night before He died, He tells them: “Take and eat, this is my body, then He took the cup, and says, drink from it, all of you, for this is my blood.” (Matthew 26:26–28). Jesus, our Savior, “instituted the Eucharistic Sacrifice of his Body and Blood… in order to perpetuate the sacrifice of the Cross throughout the ages, until He should come again.” (Sacrosanctum Concilium #47). The Eucharist is a memorial of our redemption through His passion, death, and resurrection.
Jesus has kept his promise. He is truly substantially, soul, and divinity, present in the Eucharist, and we adore Him, consume Him, and partake of His life, so that we become like Him. Yes, He suffered, He died, and He rose, but continues to be with us in the Eucharist now until the end of time.
Respectfully,
Fr. Glenn Jaron, MSP & Fr. Jose Estaniel, MSP
