Today I post from personal experience rather than my usual habit of linking to an interesting site or news story. I was at a parish away from home this morning, and a priest known in the Atlanta Archdiocese as being ultra-conservative was the celebrant. This morning’s Gospel reading was, of course, Christ’s Bread of Life Discourse from John 6.

For those outside the Catholic bubble, John 6 starts out with the feeding of the 5000 (men, not counting women and children) and then Christ moves into a discourse on how He is Himself the bread that came down from heaven, and how those who eat this bread will never be hungry again, but will have eternal life. He repeats Himself several times, on this point. In a future reading, we will read that “many departed from him” as a result of these statements – these were disturbing statements, and Christ didn’t “clarify,” and say, “you’re misunderstanding me, I mean that I am symbolic of bread that comes from heaven” or anything like that. A good Bible-believing protestant, one would think, would get that Jesus was being literal since He says this over and over without ever saying anything about something that is symbolic. But I digress.

The good priest’s homily was a very strong statement about the Eucharist. Father knows that there are survey results indicating that about half of Catholics don’t believe in the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist. They believe that it’s symbolic. As Father pointed out through this and other Scriptures, Catholics have closed communion because it’s something different to us…yet surprisingly few of us know that it’s something different! He went on to state the conditions under which someone should receive the Body and Blood – one must not have mortal sin, one must assent to all Church teaching 100%, one must recognize the Eucharist for what it is, and so on.

What strikes me here is that it’s really kind of sad that we are at a point where for so many years the catechesis has been so week that a priest must do a 20 minute homily during Mass, which we’re supposed to be at every week, which is the unifying practice of the entire worldwide faith, about what the Eucharist is, when it’s something we’re supposed to be intimately familiar with.

I was with my wife, who agreed that the homily was indeed powerful and it was good to hear “straight talk” from a priest, but also feared that Father came on so strong as to perhaps be alienating and/or condescending. I noted comments from people who grew up in the Church in the 70’s, and they were really turned off by the homily, saying it came off “holier-than-thou” and the idea was the no one is holy enough or worthy enough to receive communion ever.

I think it’s possible that for so many years Church teaching was watered down with homilies about unity, grace, love, ecumenism, etc., that when someone steps up and gives more of a “straight-talk” homily, one that’s dead-on, perhaps it is offensive to those who have received the happy-touchy-feely catechesis. That said, I think straight-talk is necessary…the only gripe I have with it was the statement that in order to receive Communion one must agree and accept 100% the teachings of the Church. I was taught when I joined the Church that we should pray that we would be allowed to understand and helped to agree with all the teachings of the Church, and but that we must accept them in order to receive Communion (while working on developing our own agreement with them.)