Solemnity of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ
By creating man with a need for food, God established nutrition as the sustenance of natural life. This reality is an image of the life of grace, which is sustained by a heavenly food: the Eucharist.
See also:
Mass Readings
First Reading – Dt 8:2-3, 14b-16a
Moses said to the people: “Remember how for forty years now the LORD, your God, has directed all your journeying in the desert, so as to test you by affliction and find out whether or not it was your intention to keep His commandments. He therefore let you be afflicted with hunger, and then fed you with manna, a food unknown to you and your fathers, in order to show you that not by bread alone does one live, but by every word that comes forth from the mouth of the LORD. “Do not forget the LORD, your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, that place of slavery; who guided you through the vast and terrible desert with its saraph serpents and scorpions, its parched and waterless ground; who brought forth water for you from the flinty rock and fed you in the desert with manna, a food unknown to your fathers.”
Responsorial Psalm – Ps 147:12-13, 14-15, 19-20 (R. 12)
R. Praise the Lord, Jerusalem.
or:
R. Alleluia.
Glorify the LORD, O Jerusalem;
praise your God, O Zion.
For He has strengthened the bars of your gates;
He has blessed your children within you. R.
He has granted peace in your borders;
with the best of wheat He fills you.
He sends forth His command to the earth;
swiftly runs His word! R.
He has proclaimed His word to Jacob,
His statutes and His ordinances to Israel.
He has not done thus for any other nation;
His ordinances he has not made known to them. Alleluia. R.
Second Reading – 1 Cor 10:16-17
Brothers and sisters: 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? Because the loaf of bread is one, we, though many, are one body, for we all partake of the one loaf.
Gospel – Jn 6:51-58
Jesus said to the Jewish crowds: “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.” The Jews quarreled among themselves, saying, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?” Jesus said to them, “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 on the last day. For My flesh is true food, and My blood is true drink. Whoever eats My flesh and drinks My blood remains in Me and I in him. Just as the living Father sent Me and I have life because of the Father, so also the one who feeds on Me will have life because of Me. This is the bread that came down from Heaven. Unlike your ancestors who ate and still died, whoever eats this bread will live forever.”
Featured Saints
This yeas, Sunday takes precedence over the memorial of St. Barnabas the Apostle. A missionary companion of St. Paul and later of St. Mark. According to tradition, he was stoned to death at Salamis, on the Island of Cyprus.
St. John Gonzales de Castrillo, priest (†1479). Religious from the Order of the Hermits of St. Augustine; he negotiated peace among the citizens of Salamanca, Spain, who were divided into warring factions.
St. Aleydis, virgin (†1250). A Cistercian laysister from the Camera Sanctae Mariae Abbey, close to Brussels (Belgium). At age 22 she contracted leprosy, which eventually left her paralyzed and blind. She was known for her mystical gifts, and she offered her sufferings for the souls in Purgatory.
St. Rosa Francisca Maria Dolores, virgin (†1876). She transformed an association of pious women into the Congregation of the Sisters of Our Lady of Consolation, in Tortosa, Spain, dedicated to serving the needy and educating children.
St. Paula Frassinetti, virgin (†1882). Foundress of the Congregation of the Sisters of St. Dorothy in Genoa, Italy.
St. Parisius, priest (†1267). Camoldolese priest who died age 108 in Treviso, Italy. By order of the Prior General, he provided spiritual direction for the nuns of St. Christina Monastery for 77 years.
Blessed Ignatius Maloyan, bishop and martyr (†1915). He was shot to death with other Christians in Mardin, Turkey.
Blessed Stephen Bandelli (†1450). Priest of the Order of Preachers who died in Saluzzo, Italy. He was an outstanding preacher and diligent confessor.
Blessed Maria Schininà, virgin (†1910). Of noble birth, she renounced worldly goods to dedicate herself to the sick, abandoned and the poor. To this end she founded the Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus in Ragusa, Italy.
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