Behind the altar stands a white-robed priest. In one hand he holds aloft a round white wafer of unleavened bread, ceremonially pure and untainted by salt or any preservative. In the other, below the wafer, he holds a brass chalice of white wine. "All we have to do," he tells his parishioners, "is live the Eucharist. Pray the Eucharist. Be the Eucharist ourselves."Every day, millions of Catholics come to Mass to worship and receive the tangible blessing of God in the Eucharist. The Eucharist, says Hillsdale College sophomore Margaret Ball, "is the source and summit of our faith."
But for many professing American Catholics, that source of faith seems to have run dry. According to a study by the Pew Research Center, 41 percent of Catholics polled are unaware that their church teaches that Christ is miraculously present in the Eucharist. Lack of knowledge is not the only problem, says Hillsdale junior Anne Morath.
Morath believes many Catholics are walking through the motions of a comfortable religion rather than living a vibrant faith. It's like an antidote, she says. They are injected with a dead bit of God and become immune to actually experiencing God.
That includes an enthusiasm for the miracles that don't happen every day, accounts of which are passed by word of mouth with awe and excitement and form a rich part of the Catholic Church's tradition. Such miracles, Morath says, include visions of Jesus in the Eucharist, visitations from the Virgin Mary, statues that weep real tears, and even the elements of the Eucharist occasionally being transformed into scientifically testable human blood and human flesh.
Then you go inside the cathedral, she says, and you see all the people, "brothers and sisters in Christ," and pictures and images on the walls and windows depicting the story of Jesus. And in the center is the tabernacle. "[It's] the home of Christ," she says. "And he's in there and he's present to us."
