Communion

I can't wait to get to Mass in the morning. I prepare with lectio, using the readings of the day, communicating with a spiritual communion, praying the rosary.

I love to get to the church early, to pray before the Blessed Sacrament, usually discussing my sins and infidelities with Our Lord, and remembering all of those I need to pray for. Especially "my kids".

I have a lot of "kids". I immediately can adopt a perfect stranger if I see a hint of sadness, or a limp, or some sort of mental challenge, even just a stutter. I try to pick them up as a spiritual good Samaritan I guess. But it's not that I think I am a good Samaritan - these "kids" of mine are the good Samaritans. You see, they touched something in me that identifies with them. They awaken in me the awareness that I am lame and crippled and blind too. And I love them because they gave me this gift to recognize my own sometimes crippling defects. I can't hug them, so I kind of adopt them and bring them to prayer with me.

Sometimes, like this morning, I can almost feel our Lord's embrace of us as soon as I kneel down in the pew...and I don't even have to mention my kids, because He already knows about them.

Every time I approach for Communion I feel a thrill, mixed with a kind of fear that I am so not worthy - I know that sounds pious and fake, but I also understand that He wants to come under my roof...He can't wait either.

And I don't want Him to leave, once I have Him. It is the only moment when I know happiness, and joy - albeit oftentimes not felt, or experienced in any emotional way. I can't describe it. I don't want to leave the church because I know the world will invade and distract me from this recollection. So I stay as long as possible to make my thanksgiving, grasping Him who grasped me. It is nice, because the church empties out quickly after Mass, and we are nearly alone.

Teresa of Avila wrote that the practice of mental prayer is easiest after communion, and prescribed for her nuns to remain a long time in thanksgiving. It is so like the married couple, united in the embrace of love, not wanting to separate from one another. Every communion is like that.

It's so good to make a long thanksgiving - it's all about love. I think it is better to spend 15 or 20 minutes in thanksgiving after communion than it is to spend an hour in adoration...yet both are invaluable, aren't they.

This is why I am Roman Catholic - Jesus present in the Blessed Sacrament.