"Lord I am not worthy..."

     I have the great privileged to go to Mass every single day.  I get to encounter our Lord really present in the Eucharist under the appearance of bread and wine day in and day out.  As thankful as I am for this great gift, sometimes I forget how wonderful of a gift this is.  As with many things that we do frequently, I start to take Mass for granted and I don't pay attention as much as I should.

     This past week I had one of those great experiences where I was completely focused during Mass.  I listened to the prayers.  I responded and thought about what I was saying as I did so.  I tried my best to unite myself to Christ and to offer prayers for Pope Benedict as I know he needs them now along with the Cardinals and the entire Church.  It was a great experience and I was thankful the rest of the day that God had allowed me to truly enter into the Mass that day.

     The one part of the Mass that really struck me that day was the words that we say right before communion, "Lord, I am not worthy that you should enter under my roof, but only say the words and my soul shall be healed" (I got that right the first time...bye bye old translation!).  When I said those words that day, they shook me like they never had before.  We take these words directly from the Gospel when the soldier wanted Jesus to heal his slave was at home near death.  Jesus agreed, but the soldier replied with these words because he did not feel worthy to have Jesus come into his home.  The soldier said these words out of true humility and his profound realization that we do not deserve any of the wonderful things that God gives us.

     The Church does not have us pray these words in the Mass simply because they sound nice.  We are not to say them as if we are appeasing God by saying what we think He wants to hear.  No!  WE ARE NOT WORTHY.  Receiving the Eucharist is a gift, it is the greatest gift and it comes to us because of the gift from God to man in His Son Jesus Christ.  We only have the Eucharist because of Jesus' complete gift of self on the Cross, through which He won for us salvation.

     This realization should not be depressing and make us think that we are miserable little nothings.  Rather, realizing that we are not worthy on our own merits to receive Jesus, for God to come to us, we should thank Him that much more for giving us this beautiful gift.  Let us never take God's love for granted.  Let us constantly thank Him for all that He has given us, especially the gift of His Son, present Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity in the humble host on the altar.  For we are not worthy that He should enter under our roof, but He says the Word and we are healed!

In Christ,

Patrick