Twentieth Sunday of Year - B
Archbishop Hughes

Fr. Carl Peter, a classmate, a friend of mine…and a superb theologian had just re-read the sixth chapter of John's gospel for his personal prayer. He looked up and said: 'I don't know how anyone can read this chapter and not believe Christ gives us his own flesh and blood in the Eucharist.'

Today's passages from Sacred Scripture really bring this truth home to us. God revealed himself in Old Testament times as the Creator of the world and the Redeemer of the Jewish people from oppression. But God also revealed himself in the Wisdom literature as offering himself in communion under the image of food and drink. This self-gift was presented in the form of wisdom as we hear in the first reading: 'Let whoever is simple turn in here; to the one who lacks understanding, she says, 'Come, eat of my food and drink of the wine I have mixed! Forsake foolishness that you may live; advance in the way of understanding'.'

Then in the Gospel passage we hear the Lord Jesus making it unmistakably clear, despite the quarreling and grumbling among those listening: 'Amen, amen I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life within you. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. For my flesh is true food and my blood is true drink…' Can anyone mistake the meaning of his words? Certainly those with him got the message. For some walked away and Jesus had to test his apostles: 'Will you also go away?' Simon Peter came through: 'Master, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and are convinced that you are the Son of God.' These words speak unmistakable truth.

Each time we celebrate Mass, God offers himself anew: first in words of wisdom in the Liturgy of the Word; then in his Body and Blood in the Liturgy of the Eucharist. This is at the heart of our Catholic faith and life. We are called to full, conscious and active participation in the Eucharistic Liturgy. This may involve for some assuming liturgical roles or for the whole congregation reciting or singing responses during the Mass. But full, conscious and active participation goes much deeper. It engages the deepest recesses of the human person. We are invited to open our minds to hear, our hearts to accept and our wills to act on God's own word of life. We are to offer our very lives and all that is going on in them to the Father in union with the Lord through the power of the Holy Spirit as we move from the Liturgy of the Word to the Liturgy of the Eucharist.

I do not know whether you are familiar with St. Catherine of Siena who did more to reform the troubled Church of her day by her wholehearted immersion in the Eucharist. She was a laywoman who laid hold of the mystery of the Eucharist and it enkindled in her the sacrificial love to give her life for the renewal of the Church. She lamented those who came to the Eucharist only wanting to feel good or be entertained. She insisted that the only way truly to enter into the Eucharist was to become unafraid of total self-gift even in the face of suffering. It is then that we are truly united with the Lord Jesus who is made present in his total self-gift on Calvary in sacramental form.

It is the desire we bring to hear God's word, to meet him in sacrament and to be changed in the way in which we continue to live our lives that makes the difference. St. Paul urges us today in the second reading: 'Brothers and sisters: Watch carefully how you live, not as foolish persons but as wise…try to understand what is the will of God.'

This will be the last Sunday Eucharist that I will celebrate here at St. Louis Cathedral as your shepherd. On Thursday, I will hand on the responsibility of this ministry to my good successor, Archbishop Aymond. Although the Lord has asked of me some rather daunting challenges during the years in which I have served, there is nowhere I would have preferred to serve in these times. I love the Lord. I love his Church. I love you who are the Catholic faith community of New Orleans. I love the wider community. Let us not be blind to the forces of evil that pose a constant threat. But let us always focus on the Lord and draw our strength from the Holy Eucharist.

I do not retire as a priest. I will remain in New Orleans offering to do for Archbishop Aymond anything he may want and engaging in a spiritual direction and retreat ministry. I now renew my self-offering at this Eucharist. I offer all the diminishment that life in this world will inevitably bring for the salvation and sanctification of those whom God has entrusted to my care ever since I was first ordained. May God forgive me my sins. I ask forgiveness of those I may have hurt. I gladly offer forgiveness to any who have hurt me. My episcopal motto is a paraphrase of the last verse of first Corinthians in which Paul expresses his desire to love them as Christ has loved him. So, I say with all my heart: 'For you, God's own love.'