A Marked Eucharistic Devotion
Because the specific end of our Religious Family is the evangelization of the culture, that is, to work to transfigure it into Christ[1] and for Christ,[2] and because we are convinced that “our feeble breath is only fertile and irresistible when it communes with the Wind of Pentecost,”[3] we members of the Institute of the Incarnate Word have the noble task “to love and serve Jesus Christ—His Body and His Spirit—and to help others love and serve Him. We want to love and serve the physical Body of Christ, the Eucharist, as well as His Mystical Body, the Church.”[4] For Christ in the Eucharist is the source and center, architect and fundamental expression of Christian culture.[5] Likewise, the Holy Eucharist is the source and creative force of communion between the members of the Church.[6]
Furthermore, since we know that we are called to be “other Christs”[7] and recognize that this is not attained without familiarity with the Word made flesh[8] hidden under the sacramental veil, we feel impelled to ceaseless prayer and adoration.[9] For this reason, in our communities, we adore the Blessed Sacrament for an hour daily, aware that it is not only the holiest and most just act that we can perform,[10] but also because we are persuaded that “a pause for true worship has a greater value and spiritual fruit than the most intense activity, were it apostolic activity itself.”[11]
Thus, this most beautiful Christocentric and Eucharistic spirituality that identifies us requires an authentic liturgical education conducive to a “full, conscious, and active”[12] participation in the Eucharist. This aspect is manifested explicitly in the formation that we receive and that we impart in our houses of formation since we consider that “the celebration of the Eucharist has [an] ‘essential importance’ in the spiritual formation of our seminarians, and it is the ‘essential moment of their day.’”[13] So convinced are we of this that we can say that “the seminary is the Mass.”
For us, “participation in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is the most important act of our day,”[14] and thus, “in all the houses of the Institute, the Holy Mass is the center of life, is the sun that enlightens the interior life, apostolate, work, and all activity.”[15] In this sense, it seems that we will never insist enough on the fact that it falls to our priests to “be masters of the ars celebrandi, and to our major seminarians, to our brothers, etc., to strive, on their part, to live in the most perfect way the ars participandi.”[16]
Moreover, as “in the work of evangelizing the culture, the efforts of one individual or one generation are not sufficient; rather, a great evangelical movement is necessary, one that will forever deepen and extend itself in this task,”[17] we consider that the Eucharist, in addition to being “the deepest foundation of our unity as a Religious Family,”[18] impels us to the mission and itself become the center of our pastoral work.
That is, the Eucharist is not only the source of charity, but, in a way, is the objective of all our apostolate. Therefore, all of our apostolic activities—camps, oratories, the educational apostolate, pilgrimages, youth groups, popular missions, etc.—have as an essential component a marked Eucharistic devotion or are at least conducive to it.
Thus, since the Holy Eucharist is the “consummation of the spiritual life, and the end of all the sacraments,”[19] all of the members of the Institute are “available to go to any part of the world where the preaching of the Gospel and the celebration of the Eucharist is needed,”[20] in order to propose and promote, in all environments—that of families, of lay associations, and of parishes, and, above all, of centers of education (especially in seminaries and universities) and of scientific research, and of the social communication media—an authentic pastoral work of holiness that emphasizes the primacy of grace and that has its center in the Sunday Eucharist.[21]
In those places where our missionaries have the pastoral care of a parish—whether in the middle of the jungle, whether in rural zones or in the great metropolises of the world—they work with courageous effort “so that the Most Holy Eucharist may be the center of the parochial community of the faithful”[22] and so that “they may be fed on the pious celebration of the sacraments, in a particular way on the frequent reception of the Most Holy Eucharist and of the sacrament of Penance.”[23] Additionally, they promote the worship of the Eucharist through Eucharistic exposition so that all may adore.
The solemn Eucharistic celebration on Sundays and holy days of obligation, Eucharistic processions with their corresponding “Eucharistic dialogue,” the care of liturgical furnishings, etc. are but manifestations of the marked Eucharistic devotion that characterizes us and according to which we wish to distinguish ourselves. For it will always be certain that “the Holy Eucharist contains substantially the whole common spiritual good of the Church,[24] ‘which is Christ.’[25]”[26]
He who participates in the Masses celebrated by the members of the Institute perceives “a style of liturgical celebrations in which the Word is incarnated and in which He appears—sacramentally—Incarnate, in which the principal presence and action of the principal Priest, Christ Himself, is always highlighted, in which it is perceived that the essential attitude of the secondary priest is the attitude of prayer—proper to him who knows that he is a mere instrument and a deficient instrument, subordinated to the principal cause and subject to His purposes—and in which all of the visible elements contribute to the radiant knowledge of the Invisible.”[27]
In summary: we know that “in the Eucharist, the logic of the Incarnation reaches its extreme consequences”[28] and that, in it, we will find the light, strength, and inspiration necessary to carry out the enormous task of the New Evangelization that awaits us.[29] Therefore, devotion to the Incarnate Word present in the Eucharist is, quite simply, a non-negotiable element adjoined to the charism of the Institute of the Incarnate Word and the “platform” from which we embark upon the marvelous adventure of inculturating the Gospel.
[1] Cf. Directory of Spirituality, 122.
[2] Cf. Constitutions, 13.
[3] Constitutions, 18.
[4] Constitutions, 7.
[5] Cf. Directorio de Evangelización de Cultura, 244.
[6] Directory of Spirituality, 294.
[7] Constitutions, 7.
[8] Constitutions, 231.
[9] Cf. Directorio de Vida Consagrada, 226.
[10] Constitutions, 139.
[11] Constitutions, 22, quoting Saint John Paul II, “Discourse to the Superiors Generals of Orders and Religious Congregations,” 4 (09/24/1978); OR (12/3/1978) Spanish Edition.
[12] Sacrosanctum Concilium, 14.
[13] Directorio de Seminarios Mayores, 224; our translation; quoting Saint John Paul II, Pastores dabo vobis, 48.
[14] Constitutions, 137.
[15] Directorio de Seminarios Menores, 14; our translation.
[16] Fr. C. Buela, IVE, Ars Participandi, chap. 1; our translation.
[17] Constitutions, 268.
[18] Directory of Spirituality, 300.
[19] Saint Thomas Aquinas, S. Th., III, q. 73, a. 3, quoted in the Directorio de Vida Litúrgica, 8.
[20] Fr. C. Buela, IVE, You Are Priests Forever, part III, chap. 3, 12, p. 225.
[21] Cf. Directorio de Evangelización de la Cultura, 243-244.
[22] Directorio de Parroquias, 59; cf. CIC, c. 528 § 2; our translation.
[23] Ibid.
[24] Saint Thomas Aquinas, S. Th., III, q. 65, a. 3, ad 1.
[25] Saint Thomas Aquinas, S. Th., III, q. 79, a. 1, c.
[26] Directory de Vida Litúrgica, 6; our translation.
[27] Ibid., 2.
[28] Saint John Paul II, “Sunday Angelus Address” (7/19/1981), 2; our translation.
[29] Directory of Spirituality, footnote 389, Saint John Paul II, “Mensaje en el V Centenario de la Primer Misa en América” (12/12/1993); OR (14/01/1994), 9.
