Communion

Having offered you myself, Almighty Father, through Christ and with him and in him, now He offers me Himself, His very Body and Blood. “Unless you eat my body and drink my blood you will not have life.” Will I ever understand the immensity of this gift, its generosity, its gratuitousness?
I break the bread, his body. Lord, break my self-centredness, all that gets in the way of the total gift of myself to you, even as you give me the gift of Yourself.
I receive his Body and Blood. I remember St Paul: As we share in the loaf and the cup, we come into communion with Christ; and we though many come into communion with one another for we share the one loaf (1Cor 10:15-16).
I am one with Christ, like the branch and the vine; I am also one with all who receive-how can there be division among us? ‘… grant that we who share in the Body and Blood of Christ … may become one body, one spirit in Christ.’
I drink from the cup of the blood of the new covenant which has been poured out for the forgiveness of sin. As I drink of the cup, I say ‘yes’ again to the covenant sealed in the Blood of the Lamb: You are my God; I am one of your people. The Blood of the Lamb, Jesus Christ, which fulfils the sign of the blood of the sacrificial animal whose blood sealed the old covenant and the blood of the lamb put over the doors of the Israelites in Egypt protecting them from the destructive plague.
Blood of Jesus, seal me in your love, protect me, wash away my sins.
I turn to my brothers and sisters who come to the table of the Lord. ‘The Body of Christ …. The Blood of Christ.’ Amen. Amen.
Msgr Michael de Verteuil is the chairman of the Archdiocesan Liturgical Commission, and moderator of the Sangre Grande/Coryal/Toco/Matelot cluster.