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The Spiritual Exercises of Saint Ignatius of Loyola, presented by Fr. Ed Broom, OMV, in a 10-Week Program with weekly one hour Presentations and assigned Daily Meditations drawn from Holy Scripture. The following are six key graces and fruits of the program.
1. Deeper prayer life leading to intimate friendship with Jesus the Lord.
2. Greater love for Holy Scripture.
3. Ability to examine one’s conscience better due to a greater understanding and appreciation of the Sacrament of Confession.
4. Greater love for Jesus truly present in the Holy Eucharist;
5. Deeper filial relationship with Mary, our Mother.
6. Discernment of Spirits. Learning to discern: who is talking to me right now – the good spirit or the bad spirit?
One of the key chapters in the Dogmatic Constitution Lumen Gentium, Chapter V, is the Universal Call to Holiness. In concrete, this chapter lays out the goal and the purpose of every human person, created in the image and likeness of God: the call to become a saint! Jesus expressed this command unequivocally and with utmost clarity and transparency: “Be holy as your Heavenly Father is holy.” (Mt. 5:48) In the most famous block of teaching and preaching of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, the Sermon on the Mount, in the initial phase of this teaching called the Beatitudes Jesus teaches: “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for holiness; they will be satisfied.” (Mt. 5:6) Saint Paul in his letter to the Thessalonians reiterates the same truth: “This is the will of your heavenly Father: your sanctification.” (1Thess 4: 3) The modern saint, Mother Teresa of Calcutta, exhorts us in these words: “Holiness is not the privilege of the few, but the duty of all.”
Therefore, let us offer the Express-way to holiness. Instead of choosing and pursuing a circuitous, labyrinthine, laborious and sometimes frustrating path towards holiness, why not choose the quickest, most secure and efficacious path to arrive at the heights of holiness in our short life here on earth!
What is this short-cut, this smooth path to Jesus, the Way, the Truth and the Life? It is Jesus Himself through Mass and Holy Communion. However, the means by which we connect with this electric current of grace and holiness is through living out the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass to the fullest extent possible. The Dogmatic Constitution on the Liturgy, Sacrosanctum Concilium, expresses it in the following words: “The faithful must participate fully, actively and consciously in the Mass… the source and summit of holiness.”
As a motivation to all people of good will who take sincerely this Universal Call to Holiness, we will accentuate the remarkable sanctifying effects that Holy Communion can produce in the recipient of such a sublime Sacrament. Indeed, the most Holy Eucharist, which is truly and substantially the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of Jesus, the Son of the living God, is the key to all holiness.
Before entering into the effects that Holy Communion produces in the individual, a key theological concept must be explained with clarity and precision: The concept of Dispositive-grace. This means that the Sacrament of the Eucharist is truly Jesus, the Son of the Eternal Father, the Holy of Holies. However, the graces received in the reception of Holy Communion are commensurate or in direct proportion to the disposition of the individual heart that receives Jesus. If one receives Jesus in mortal sin then he eats and drinks to his own condemnation. (I Corinthians 11: 17-22). If the preparation and reception is mediocre, the graces will correspond to the attitude of mediocrity. If the disposition is good, the graces will flow more freely. If the disposition is fervent then graces will redound all the more. Finally, if the preparation is excellent and the reception a heart on fire with love then the effect can be compared to a spiritual atomic-bomb: an explosion of graces. The latter should be our aim and our goal!
Now we will enumerate and explain exactly what can take place in the well-disposed heart that receives the Eucharistic Lord Jesus in Mass in the context of the most Holy Eucharist—the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of Jesus.
1. PURIFICATION OF THE HEART AND SOUL. Holy Communion received with the ardent fire of charity can serve to burn away the residue of smaller sins that we call venial sins. Saint John of the Cross, the Mystical Doctor of the Church, offers us this analogy. Put a rusty piece of iron in a scathing and intense fire, the fire will consume the rust and the iron assumes the same property as the fire. So it is with Holy Communion. The Council of Trent says it is the antidote to our daily infirmities. On a Pastoral note, nobody should refrain from the reception of Holy Communion if they have venal sin(s) on their soul.
2. SPIRITUAL HEART-TRANSPLANT. Saint Margaret Mary AIacoque had the unique and incredible privilege of contemplating the most Sacred Heart of Jesus at Paray Le Monial in France. What a blessing and unique privilege indeed! However, it must be stated with gratitude and great humility that we have a more frequent and greater privilege. We can receive Holy Communion on a daily basis. In the Our Father, Jesus taught us to pray: “Give us this day our daily-bread…” We truly receive the total Lord Jesus—His Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity, and that includes the Sacred Heart of Jesus. So in a real sense, every Holy Communion received worthily is truly a SPIRITUAL-HEART-TRANSPLANT. After receiving Holy Communion, we have the Sacred Heart of Jesus beating in our heart! Our heart becomes consumed in His Sacred Heart!
3. THE MOST SUBLIME VIRTUES IN THE SACRED HEART OF JESUS. Following up on the reality of the Sacred Heart of Jesus that we receive in every Holy Communion is the fact that with Jesus’ Heart, we also receive His most sublime virtues. Faith, Hope, Charity, Humility, Patience, Obedience, Purity, Fortitude, Meekness, Gentleness, Wisdom and Knowledge—all of these and all of the virtues imaginable are truly present in every Holy Communion. Still more, these virtues in Jesus are the most refined, the most holy, the most sublime that the human mind can comprehend.
4. CONVERSION OF VICE TO VIRTUE. For this reason, the great Educator of youth of the 19th Century, Saint John Bosco, was a precursor of the practice of frequent Holy Communion in that he would encourage his young people in the Oratory in Turin to receive Holy Communion frequently and fervently so as to eradicate vices—especially that of impurity—and supplant them with holiness. There is no more efficacious means to conquer our vices and sinfulness then frequent, fervent and faith-filled Holy Communions! “Lord, strengthen my faith!”
5. MIND-TRANSPLANT. The great Apostle to the Gentiles, Saint Paul, exhorts us in these words: “Put on the mind of Christ!” Then he insists: “You have the mind of Christ.” And finally: “Do not conform your mind to this world, but have a fresh way of thinking.” Indeed, if Holy Communion is the Total Christ then that includes the mind of Jesus. If you want to burn away the dross of bad and ugly thoughts, then meditate upon the Word of God and receive Holy Communion. What chlorine is to a swimming-pool, so is the Word of God and Holy Communion to our mind!
6. SPIRITUAL NOURISHMENT. The Prophet Elijah ate the bread that the angel gave him two times and from the energy and strength derived from that bread, the great Prophet walked forty days and forty nights. (The same length of time Jesus was in the desert!) In an analogous sense, Holy Communion endows and inundates us with spiritual energy so that we can travel with great alacrity and strength on the Highway to Heaven!
7. SPIRITUAL REMEDY AND PREVENTIVE MEDICINE. If we are well-nourished bodily when the flu-season arrives, we have a much better chance to avoid those common colds, coughs, flu and runny-noses. On one occasion, I was about to come down with a cold and some person of good will gave me Airborne—a potent dose of Vitamin C. Guess what? I avoided the cold that was about to grab hold of me! In a parallel sense, the frequent reception of Holy Communion can serve to bundle us up and fortify us against the onslaught of our imperious and disordered passions that constantly strive to inundate and overwhelm us, inciting us to sin!
8. JOY, PEACE, AND INNER CONSOLATION. As an appetizing and enjoyable meal shared with friends culminates in joy, peace, happiness and consolation, so it is with nourishing our souls on Jesus in Holy Communion, the Bread of Life. This analogy is expressed very clearly by the Angelic Doctor, Saint Thomas Aquinas. Just as good food nourishes and uplifts the body, so does Holy Communion enrich and uplift the soul!
9. REMARKABLE SOURCE AND STRENGTH TO CARRY OUR DAILY CROSS. Jesus addresses the tired, the weary, the burdened, the overwhelmed, those experiencing heavy trials and tribulations with these words—related to Holy Mass and Holy Communion: “Come to me all you who are weary and find life burdensome and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” (Mt, 11:28-30). So many people have given witness to the fact that in the midst of the trials of life, the sufferings and sorrows, the heart-aches and heart-breaks, running to Jesus in Mass and receiving Him in the Sacrament of Holy Communion serves as an inexpressible relief and strength, a source of solace, hope, and support! Do not try to carry your cross alone. Rather, invite Jesus to help you shoulder the burden by receiving Him into your inner-most being in Holy Communion. “Come, Lord Jesus, Come!”
10. PROMISE OF ETERNAL LIFE: HEAVEN WILL BE OURS FOREVER! What thought can be more consoling than the fact and truth that one day we will be united with Jesus in Heaven! He will be Our God, Savior, Friend, Companion, Support, Teacher, Master, and our Greatest Lover in Heaven. This incredible promise was made by Jesus in His “Bread of Life Discourse” in the Synagogue of Capernaum. (Jn. 6:22-71) These words are most consoling: “Amen, amen, I say to you, whoever believes has eternal life. I am the bread of life. Your ancestors ate the manna in the desert and died; this is the bread that comes down from heaven so that one might eat it and not die. 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.” (Jn. 6: 47-51) As clear as the sun at midday are these words of Jesus! If we have established the habit of receiving Jesus in Holy Communion—the Bread of Life that gives life to the world—with hearts filled with deep faith, hearts full of fiery love and passion, and we receive frequently as we pray in the Our Father, “give us this day our daily bread“, then the promise of Jesus is clear! Heaven will be ours forever and ever and ever!
Let us conclude with what the great friends of God, the saints themselves have preached and written on the great importance of frequent and fervent reception of Holy Communion in our lives!
Saint Ignatius of Loyola:
“One of the most admirable effects of Holy Communion is to preserve the soul from sin, and to help those who fall through weakness to rise again. It is much more profitable, then, to approach the Divine Sacrament with love, respect and confidence, than to remain away through excess fear and scrupulosity.”
Saint Josemaria Escriva:
“When you approach the tabernacle remember that He has been waiting for you for twenty centuries.”
Saint John Vianney:
“All the good works in the world are not equal to the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass because they are the works of man; but the Mass is the work of God. Martyrdom is nothing in comparison for it is but the sacrifice of man to God; but the Mass is the sacrifice of God to man.”
Saint Maximilian Kolbe:
“If the angels could be jealous of men, they would be so for one reason: Holy Communion.”
Saint Frances De Sales:
“When you have received Him, stir up your heart to do Him homage, speak to Him about your spiritual life, gaze upon Him in your soul where He is present for your happiness, welcome Him as warmly as possible, and behave outwardly in such a way that your actions may give proof to all of His Presence.”
In conclusion, the key to holiness in life on your Highway to Heaven is faith-filled, frequent, and fervent reception of Jesus, the Holy of Holies and your Best Friend, in Holy Communion. May Our Lady of the Eucharist intercede for us now and at the hour of our death! Amen.
Copyright 2021 Oblates of the Virgin Mary
St. Peter Chanel Church, Hawaiian Gardens, CA
