Benedict XVI closed Italy's 25th National Eucharistic Congress on Sunday. The occasion offered a chance to reflect on the power of the Eucharist, and the practice of 24-hour Eucharistic adoration. ZENIT spoke with Father Alberto Pacini, the rector of Rome's Church of St. Anastasia al Palatino. He spoke of the results of daring to open his church at unlikely hours and expose Christ on the altar, even if he was the only one to adore him.
ZENIT: What is the meaning of the Eucharist for the Catholic faith?
Father Pacini: In this sacrament Jesus gives us his body and blood, with the words and gestures, which he commanded his own to perpetuate to be present with us always: "Lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age" (Matthew 28:20). In this sacrament the Lord makes himself present in an altogether particular way -- in a substantial way, that is, not only a spiritual presence, but also with his body, blood, soul and divinity -- to be food and medicine of immortality. "He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day" (John 6:54). Hence, this sacrament is God present in our midst today and always, so that every time we eat him we live through him; every person who approaches this sacrament comes into contact with God the Creator and Savior, with all his divine power of love, with his supreme and infinite mercy. He experiences the Father's embrace of love, who has prepared his wedding table, and all his "prodigal children" who, having accepted the invitation, return home (Luke 15:11-32).
ZENIT: Why is it so important for the Catholic faith?
Father Pacini: The Eucharist is not only important for the Catholic faith, as Blessed John Paul II wrote in No. 8 of Ecclesia de Eucharistia: "Because even when it is celebrated on the humble altar of a country church, the Eucharist is always in some way celebrated on the altar of the world. It unites heaven and earth. It embraces and permeates all creation. The Son of God became man in order to restore all creation, in one supreme act of praise, to the One who made it from nothing. He, the Eternal High Priest who by the blood of his Cross entered the eternal sanctuary, thus gives back to the Creator and Father all creation redeemed."
Whether or not the men and women of this world know it, they are involved in the salvific action of the Son of God made Son of Man, present now in a definitive way in this world. The Catholic Church guards this mystery, in perfect and uninterrupted communion among the bishops of the whole world and with the Apostles, through the apostolic transmission. The Catholic Church guards this treasure, the most precious that exists, not only in her faith, indefectible through the action of the Holy Spirit, but also in her celebration and her adoration and in all the tabernacles of the world. Radiating from the Eucharist in an inexhaustible way is the Holy Spirit, as from the side of Christ pierced out of love, and he fills the whole world with his salvific power, so that in the words of Benedict XVI to the 23rd WYD, we can say: "Source and summit" of the ecclesial life, the Eucharist is a "perpetual Pentecost." In this perpetual Pentecost the Spirit acts not only in the Church, but also for the benefit of the whole of humanity.
