May 15, 2009
Speaker focuses on Christ’s presence in the Eucharist
Benedictine Sister Leta Zeller reads a Gospel passage during a presentation May 7 at the Catholic Center in Evansville. She is the pastoral associate and DRE at St. Wendel Church, St. Wendel, and St. Francis Xavier Church, Poseyville. The presentation, “Christ’s Presence in the Eucharist,” was given in locations throughout the Diocese of Evansville by Father Abraham Orapankal of RENEW International. (Message photo by Mary Ann Hughes) Click for a larger version.
By MARY ANN HUGHES (Message staff writer)
“The message was good,” said Cathy Burns, “but the messenger was absolutely fantastic!”
She’s a parishioner at St. Peter Church in Linton, and she recently attended a presentation by Father Abraham Orapankal about “Christ’s Presence in the Eucharist.” He’s is a national presenter for RENEW International who spent last week talking in parishes in Vincennes, Linton, Evansville, Ferdinand and Jasper.
“It really hit home,” Cathy said. “It was a powerful presentation for me.”
Father Abraham was ordained in 1983 for the Diocese of Kohima, in northeast India, and has served as pastor of a parish, high school principal, rector of a minor seminary, professor of theology at the Regional Theological College in Shillong, India, and as a spiritual director for seminarians. He has also done pastoral ministry in the Archdiocese of New York.
At the beginning of his presentations, he reminded everyone, “We are called to celebrate, believe and to remember because the Lord says so. The Eucharist is the source and summit of our faith. It is the greatest gift God has given us.”
That’s hard to reconcile with the declining numbers at Mass on Sunday, Father Abraham said. He offered five elements of a good liturgy which if incorporated into parishes “will fill our churches.”
• The first is a climate of hospitality. A parish needs to ask, “Is my parish church hospitable?” “How does it compare to other churches?” “Do parishioners recognize one another?” “Is there a sense of fellowship?”
• Is there an experience of mystery? People come to church for a God experience,” he said. Parishes need to ask, “Do they feel touched by God in my church?”
• He suggests “opening up of symbols. Young people often say Mass is boring. They are right. The Catholic Liturgy is filled with symbols and rituals. If we don’t understand those symbols, Mass is boring.”
He talked about doing a “dialogue Mass” with a group of elementary school children. When he asked the students why water is added to the wine during Mass, a student said it probably was because the wine is too strong. Father Abraham explained that the wine “represents the divinity of Jesus. The water is our humanity. When the water is added to the wine, we are reminded we have a part in it, that we are active participants. We are in it.”
• Participants must have both a personal and communal experience during the Liturgy. “To attend Mass and pray to my God and ask for graces that I need is incomplete. We are created for community. We come from God who is community — in three persons. We are called to be community.
“There is so much brokenness today. People are searching for a sense of belonging. We need to be a part of a people of faith.”
• Awareness of the sacred. “When we enter a church, it is holy ground. There is the experience of treading on holy ground.”
Father Abraham believes that if parishes offer all five components “we will have excellent liturgies.” And “all of us are responsible for making that happen.” The presider must be prayerful before Mass and spend time preparing his homily until “it is meaningful and relevant to people.”
What about the rest of us? “We need to arrive before the entrance procession. We need to read the readings ahead of time. When we all do our part, these elements will fall into place.”
He noted that the Catholic Church is “losing thousands of Catholics to smaller denominations. Why? Because they don’t feel those five elements.
“They feel our Liturgy is boring. In other churches, they find a sense of hospitality. They are prayed over, and they feel good about that.”
Father Abraham noted that in the Catholic Liturgy “Jesus is present in four ways.
• In the assembly. “We have gathered in his name. Jesus is there. When we see the face of Christ on those there, then everyone is included.”
• In the presider. “Christ is present in the presider. The presider is acting in the person of Christ. The Mass is not his Mass. It is the Mass of Jesus Christ.”
• In the proclaimed word. “Jesus is present in the proclaimed word. We need to hear God’s word when it is proclaimed. That’s why we stand and make the triple sign of the cross on our head, lips and heart.” He added, “We do it so fast even the angels cannot comprehend it.”
• In the Eucharist. “He is present because He said so. We believe it because Jesus said so,” he said, quoting John 6:51: I am the living bread that came down from heaven; whoever eats this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the world.
Father Abraham stressed, “It is our Mass. That’s why it important for us to be attentive, not be distracted. We need to be fully awake and attentive to the Eucharist. When the priest is offering the bread and wine, all of us are offering all of ourselves and God transforms them into his graces. We become men and women of hope.”
On Holy Thursday, the First Eucharist, Jesus washed the feet of the apostles. It’s a reminder, Father Abraham said, that “Eucharist is meaningless unless it leads to service. We need to grasp the meaning of service in the Eucharist.”
When he asked the groups to participate in visualization with him, he had them close their eyes, and imagine the Upper Room with Jesus and the apostles. He invited them to picture Jesus washing the feet of the apostles, then washing their feet.
“It’s a call to service,” he said. When he asked people to comment, they responded, “It was humbling.” “I feel totally unworthy of what He is doing to us.” “If He is doing that for us, how can we not do that for others?”
He agreed, quoting Jesus, “So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you must wash one another’s feet.”
Becoming the Body of Christ in the Eucharist means “you come as you are but you don’t leave as you came,” he said. “At the end of the Mass, we can either look at our watches or be commissioned to go out as ambassadors to live the Mass.”
As Cathy Burns reflected on Father Abraham’s presentation, she said, “It’s crucial that the Mass be personal, but that’s not enough to grow our Church. We have to do more. We have to evangelize the cause of our church.”
She said the presentation reinforced what she already knew. “It really made it personal to me. The Eucharist is not just something we do on Sunday. We take it with us, and we need to live it in our communities.”
Benedictine Sister Geraldine Hedinger is the diocesan director of the Office for Adult Formation. She said that “throughout the diocese, the feedback given after Father Abraham’s presentation is very affirming and positive.
“Participants appreciated the solid theological content and his delivery. Examples he used were concrete. He was able to energize those present. He stretched their understanding of church as striving for unity in diversity.
“Father Abraham awakened, in many, a desire to share their enthusiasm with those not present. To paraphrase a quote from Father Abraham, the participants ‘came as they were, but did not leave as they came.’”