Do this in memory of me.” These words we hear and pray at every consecration are important for us to better appreciate and understand the core of the Mass. This reminds us that the Mass is a special and graced act of remembering.
It is special because it places us in the context of our Judeo-Christian tradition.
In the Old Testament, the Passover Meal was the special act, the special annual ritual of remembering God’s saving act in the Exodus.
In the New Testament, Christ establishes the Mass as the special moment of remembering the New Exodus in the Paschal Mystery, in the Cross and the Resurrection.
The act of remembering in our Judeo-Christian tradition is a graced act because our tradition holds that the grace we remember comes to life. This is the special and graced moment of remembering at each Mass. “Do this in memory of me.”
Forum
Last week, I was in a Youth Leadership Forum in the Calabarzon area—the first forum of its kind sponsored by the mayor, the municipal council, the congressman and private-sector partners. There were around 400 participants, from student leaders to young professionals.
My topic was ethical leadership. One of the main points I discussed was how leadership was highly inspired by one’s sense of mission and how ethical leadership is rooted in the ethics of care or love and service.
A young lady asked in the open forum how one discovers one’s mission and how one can be sure this is one’s mission. My response was one had to remember one’s life story; one had to remember the story of one’s journey. It is in the story that one will see and understand one’s mission. It is in the remembering that the grace of the story and the grace of mission come to life.
I am always in awe when in the formation sessions I run—mostly for public school teachers—the process of remembering is always a healing and liberating experience. While it is framed in the Ignatian process of gaining self-awareness and moving to self-acceptance, it is really a form of remembering; remembering God’s graciousness in our blessings and giftedness, as well as His mercy and compassion in our shortcomings and sinfulness that He forgives.
Remembering the story of our journey gives us new perspective. It makes us see the wholeness of our life again and discover new meaning—and in this new meaning rediscover our mission.
Privileged moment
This Sunday, Feast of the Body and Blood of Christ, let us renew our devotion and love for the Mass by reflecting on it as a privileged moment to remember and to bring to life the graces we remember.
Allow me to share an excerpt from an article one of my mentors, Fr. Catalino G. Arevalo, S.J., wrote in 1996. It was the first time we celebrated Teachers’ Day at the Ateneo de Manila High School, calling it Delaney Day, after the late, great Fr. John P. Delaney, S.J. In it he talked about Father Delaney’s love for the Mass and how he infused people with this love.
“The central school activity was THE MASS. Second year religion classes were centered on the Mass, understand the Mass, live the Mass. He taught us teachers how to teach it in class, how to get into not only the minds, but the hearts of our students. Years later, when my own high school students were over 35, 40…not a few of them told me, ‘It was the one thing we learned that has stayed with us.’ ‘For me, my life still somehow centers around the Mass. Not that I have always been faithful, but its meaning and power remain, somehow, with me still.’
“Tied to this love of the Mass was the love of the Heart of Christ, in those years so much was symbolized by the Sacred Heart of Jesus. One day, before he was brought to the States where he died, Ricardo “Baby” Lopa told me: ‘From Father Delaney I learned to love the Mass and the Heart of Jesus. It has been an anchor for me, no matter what happened in my life. Even now, as I face death, it is my strength and my courage, and my hope.’
“When his body lay in state a couple of weeks later, an image of the Sacred Heart stood beside his coffin, witness that Baby found his strength and his ultimate peace in the Sacred Heart of Christ, whom he had learned to love at the Ateneo, largely through Father Delaney.
‘CMC’
“Father Delaney tried to put effectively the ideal of ‘CMC’: no complete Mass without communion. We should think of the Mass as basically incomplete without communion. And the ideal for each student was ‘three CMC’s each week’: there was one weekly Mass for each year, (Monday, fourth year; Tuesday, third year; Wednesday, second year; Thursday, first year). Then he urged each one to participate in one more weekday Mass, Friday (class day, before lunch) or Saturday (holiday). Then, of course, Sunday with one’s family in one’s family in one’s parish. ‘Three CMC’s each week.’
“The America magazine editorial after his death spoke of him as ‘Heart of Fire and Steel.’ There was a side to John P. Delaney that was that. He wanted our HS students to be men of ‘steel’ in their characters. He kept inspiring them not to be ‘soft’: in the matter of purity of life, of imagination, of friendships, of deeds… He wanted the students to grow up as men of backbone, of character, of ‘toughness’ in their Christian life…not giving in to the ‘easy ways,’ ready for sacrifice… (This theme of sacrifice was, of course, linked with the Mass.) ‘Sacrifice’ was the key to happy living: in marriage, in work, in relationships with others… Without sacrifice, self-denial in things that matter, we could not grow into men with ‘hearts of fire and steel.’” (Fr. C. G. Arevalo, S.J.)
Today, please, spend time reflecting, remembering the beauty and the grace of the Mass in your day-to-day life. Reflect and remember how in remembering the story of God’s love for us, this love comes to life—in the people we love and the people we are willing to sacrifice for.
Today, remember that in our mission—no matter what it is; no matter how simple or how sublime and lofty—all of us share one mission: to let others know and feel love, God’s love.