Fr. Roger J. Landry
St. Paul’s Chapel, Columbia University
Eucharistic Procession Fervorino
Solemnity of Christ the King
November 20, 2022
To listen to an audio recording of this fervorino, please click below:
This is the text that guided the reflection:
- We are here in this beautiful chapel dedicated to St. Paul in the heart of our Columbia campus. The famous stained glass windows of John La Farge behind us feature St. Paul’s preaching in Athens in the Areopagus, right next to the Acropolis. Above is the inscription taken from St. Paul’s words there, “What you unknowingly worship, I proclaim to you.”
- We remember from Acts 17 that the Athenians had a statue dedicated to an unknown God. Underneath St. Paul’s feet, we see an inscription in Greek that says “To the unknown God.” St. Paul used that statue and inscription as a starting point to try to bring them to the God who had come that they did not yet know, to reveal to them the one in whom the live, move and have their being. Many didn’t give him the time of day, especially once he started talking about Jesus’ bodily resurrection.
- We see this drama played out out. In the center, St. Paul is preaching and the listeners are showing various degrees of attention, some are listening, some are totally indifferent. On the left, we see those who heard and became believers, like Dionysius, Damaris and others. On the right, we see skeptics, including a Greek judge.
- Today in the modern areopagus of a famous and elite secular campus, we proclaim with St. Paul Christ as the King and Lord even though many still don’t know and acknowledge him, especially in his risen body and blood in the Holy Eucharist. And we pray that some, even many, may become believers, too.
- To the Greeks, especially those in Corinth, St. Paul proclaimed the reality of Christ the King in the reality of the Eucharist.
- He asked, “The cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a participation in the blood of Christ? The bread that we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ?” Christ in the Eucharist, in other words, allows us to participate in his life, his passion, his death and resurrection. Through receiving Holy Communion worthily, we become partakers of his Body, his Blood, his Soul and His Divinity. This is an awesome reality that surpasses all other earthly gifts.
- Paul also testified to the Christians in Corinth, “For I received from the Lord what I also handed on to you, that the Lord Jesus, on the night he was handed over, took bread, and, after he had given thanks, broke it and said, ‘This is my body that is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.’ In the same way also the cup, after supper, saying, ‘This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.’ For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the death of the Lord until he comes.” He recalled for them the Masses he celebrated among them and the words of institution he would say. The Mass is a living memorial, what the Jews called a zikkaron, a means by which an event of the past would become live in the present. And St. Paul was saying that not only is this the greatest of human gifts, to become part of Christ’s body given for us and blood poured out for us, but that as often as we celebrate Mass we proclaim the Lord’s death and resurrection until his second coming. This is the greatest way we share our faith, by proclaiming this mystery. This is what we do every Mass we celebrate. This is also what we do when we take Jesus out of the Church on procession.
- I’d like to finish with some words St. Paul similarly gave the Christians in Corinth about processions that he might have preached today were he physically with us. He wrote to them, “For as I see it, God has exhibited us apostles as the last of all, like people sentenced to death, since we have become a spectacle to the world, to angels and human beings alike. We are fools on Christ’s account. … We are weak. … We [are held] in disrepute. To this very hour we go hungry and thirsty, we are poorly clad and roughly treated, we wander about homeless and we toil, working with our own hands. When ridiculed, we bless; when persecuted, we endure; when slandered, we respond gently. We have become like the world’s rubbish, the scum of all, to this very moment. … Therefore I urge you, be imitators of me.”
- He was describing the procession of the Roman army returning from battle. The slaves were always the caboose where they suffered insults and were pelted with various objects and even blows.
- He said that those of us who spread the faith are like the last in the procession, like slaves sentenced to death, who have become a spectacle, accounted as fools. There are some who treat us as fools, who hold us in disrepute, but when people look at us this way, as they did Paul, he urges us to bless them, to respond gently, to imitate Paul in imitating Christ in praying for them, forgiving them and asking God to bless them.
- As we continue our journey with Christ and St. Paul, even if some might account us as fools, we nevertheless know that the last shall be first, that Christ the King is himself with us reigning humbly, that we are the disciples of the one who has conquered the world by his love, and that as often as we celebrate the Eucharist and take Jesus out, we proclaim his death and resurrection and make it possible for others, in this Areopagus, to become believers and beloved brothers and sisters.
The reading on which the fervorino was based was:
A Reading from the First Letter of St. Paul to the Corinthians
Brothers and Sisters,
For I received from the Lord what I also handed on to you,
that the Lord Jesus, on the night he was handed over,
took bread, and, after he had given thanks, broke it and said,
“This is my body that is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.”
In the same way also the cup, after supper, saying,
“This cup is the new covenant in my blood.
Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.”
For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup,
you proclaim the death of the Lord until he comes.
The Word of the Lord.
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