On this Corpus Christi Sunday, the Catholic Church celebrates the Lord’s True Presence among us in the Eucharist. In the mystery of the Eucharist, the Lord walks with us, accompanies us and offers us the help of his grace so that we might work out our salvation in him.

The reality of the Lord “pitching his tent” with us and dwelling among us is a mystery so great and so intimate that it should fill us with the highest sense of awe and the most profound sense of amazement (John 1:14), so that we cry out constantly with the apostle John:

“And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, ‘See, the home of God is among mortals. He will dwell with them; they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them” (Revelation 21:3).

The fanning into flame of this sense of wonder over the Lord’s Real Presence is one of the great hopes of our current National Eucharistic Revival. The bishops of the United States are calling on all believers to deepen their Eucharistic faith and fervor.

This is a lofty goal, and it requires the highest and most serious of efforts to accomplish it. Such a goal begs the question: What can help the People of God to most realize and rejoice over the Lord’s Eucharistic Presence?

Among many possible answers, there is one that stands above the rest, namely, the example of adoration and love of the Blessed Mother for her Son and Eucharistic Lord.

Sadly, the Marian dimension of the Eucharist is oftentimes overlooked in some sectors of the Church. It has been mocked in others and viewed as pious exaggeration that should be ignored or dismissed in still other sectors of the Church. Such disdain and negligence, however, occur at the peril of our ability to restore and enrich any authentic amazement over the Lord’s True Presence.

No human being has ever loved, worshipped or served the Lord Jesus as perfectly as Our Lady loves, worships and serves her Son. And so, why would we not turn to her, ask for her help, be inspired by her example, and receive encouragement through her maternal guidance?

In his 14th and final encyclical, Ecclesia de Eucharistia, Pope St. John Paul II directed the attention of the Church back to the Eucharist. The encyclical was issued in 2003 as his health was failing. He died about two years later. 

In the encyclical, John Paul II followed and modeled the Marian dimension of the Eucharist for us. He tells us: “Mary can guide us towards this most holy sacrament, because she herself has a profound relationship with it” (53). 

The saintly Pope devoted the entire sixth chapter of the encyclical to “the school of Mary, Woman of the Eucharist.” 

The chapter is packed full of heartfelt reflections on Our Lady and the Eucharist. Here are just a few examples.

“Yet we know that she was present among the Apostles who prayed ‘with one accord’ (Acts 1:14) in the first community which gathered after the Ascension in expectation of Pentecost. Certainly Mary must have been present at the Eucharistic celebrations of the first generation of Christians, who were devoted to the breaking of bread’ (Acts 2:42)” (53).

The awareness of Our Lady being present at the New Passover, the Eucharistic Sacrifice of the early Church, is itself enough to compel all of us to a deeper faith and gratitude in the Eucharist. If she, Mother of the Lord, bows down before the Eucharistic Sacrifice and the Lord’s True Presence, then certainly who are we, adopted into the divine family, not to do the same?

John Paul II continues:

“In her daily preparation for Calvary, Mary experienced a kind of ‘anticipated Eucharist’ — one might say a ‘spiritual communion’ — of desire and of oblation, which would culminate in her union with her Son in his passion, and then find expression after Easter by her partaking in the Eucharist which the Apostles celebrated as the memorial of that passion.”

“What must Mary have felt as she heard from the mouth of Peter, John, James and the other Apostles the words spoken at the Last Supper: ‘This is my body which is given for you’ (Luke 22:19)?” (56).

The thought of Our Lady hearing the words of consecration from the mouth of the apostles and participating in the remembrance — the making present — of the Lord’s one sacrifice in the Eucharist is something that will compel even the most lukewarm soul to drop to his knees in prayer and adoration before the Eucharistic Lord.

We are led to spiritually see the Mother of the Lord — who gave him a body and nurtured him as a child, who alone could physically say with the Lord, “This is my Body” and “This is my Blood,” and who alone was with him as a source of strength at the cross — kneeling in prayer and submitting to the Eucharistic Sacrifice, the sacramental re-presentation of the Lord’s sacrifice, offered before her through the priestly ministry of the apostles.

Such a thought allows for the Mass to take on for us a further human realization and awareness of what the Lord is doing and what he is accomplishing among us. Mary shows us this perspective. She points to her Son, she gives us a warmth and connection to the sacrifice, and shows us how to worship and adore the Lord. 

As John Paul II gave us the image of the Blessed Mother at the early Masses of the Church, so he gave us the further image of Our Lady receiving Holy Communion:

“The body given up for us and made present under sacramental signs was the same body which she had conceived in her womb! For Mary, receiving the Eucharist must have somehow meant welcoming once more into her womb that heart which had beat in unison with hers and reliving what she had experienced at the foot of the Cross” (56).

The mere thought of the Blessed Mother receiving the Eucharist, and somehow mystically the Lord returning to her own body, is a cause of serious reflection on what it means for us — who are we? — to receive the Lord’s Body and Blood. Such a reflection serves as the source of an ever-deeper and overflowing sense of unworthiness and gratitude toward the gift of Holy Communion, the invitation we’ve been given to receive the very Body and Blood of Jesus Christ into our own souls. 

The saintly Pope is not done. He makes a connection between Our Lady’s Fiat and our Amen at the reception of Holy Communion. As she believed in the Presence of God within her womb, so we are called to believe in the Presence of God under the appearance of bread and wine.

“As a result, there is a profound analogy between the Fiat which Mary said in reply to the angel, and the Amen which every believer says when receiving the body of the Lord. Mary was asked to believe that the One whom she conceived ‘through the Holy Spirit’ was ‘the Son of God’ (Luke 1:30-35)” (55).

John Paul II, however, gives us even more. He turns to the question of Eucharistic adoration. We can see the flow: from the Mass to Holy Communion and from Holy Communion to adoration. He writes:

“When, at the Visitation, [Mary] bore in her womb the Word made flesh, she became in some way a ‘tabernacle’ — the first ‘tabernacle’ in history — in which the Son of God, still invisible to our human gaze, allowed himself to be adored by Elizabeth, radiating his light as it were through the eyes and the voice of Mary. And is not the enraptured gaze of Mary as she contemplated the face of the newborn Christ and cradled him in her arms that unparalleled model of love which should inspire us every time we receive Eucharistic communion?” (55).

The realization of the Blessed Mother as the first tabernacle in history, in which both she and later Elizabeth would adore the Lord, is a compelling springboard for each of us in our own lives to turn to the Lord in the tabernacles of our parishes and — imitating Our Lady and her kinswoman — to adore and rejoice in the Lord’s Presence among us.

In each of these ways — the Eucharistic Sacrifice, the reception of Holy Communion and Eucharistic adoration — Pope St. Paul II wants us to see Our Lady’s presence. He concludes by writing:

“Mary is present, with the Church and as the Mother of the Church, at each of our celebrations of the Eucharist. If the Church and the Eucharist are inseparably united, the same ought to be said of Mary and the Eucharist” (57).

John Paul II knew how much the Blessed Mother can help each of us love the Lord Jesus. In his final encyclical, he shares a spiritual vulnerability with us and, opening up his own heart, he shows us the Marian reflections that have obviously shaped and molded his own love and adoration of the Lord Jesus, his sacrifice for us and his True Presence among us. 

The saintly Pope unveils these Marian thoughts of his heart as a gift and encouragement to us. He simply tells us: If we’re going to love the Eucharistic Lord, then we need his Blessed Mother to guide us.

And so, John Paul II implores us to enter the school of Mary, follow her example, trust her as the Woman of the Eucharist and as our spiritual mother, surrender with her to the amazing mystery of the Lord’s Eucharistic Presence, and then rejoice with her in amazement and gratitude over the God who loves us and dwells among us.

Join Father of Mercy Wade Menezes for the free “Eucharistic Devotion” EWTN Online Learning Series at EWTN.com/devotion.