This document discusses the challenges of the Eucharist for Filipino Catholics. It explores the Eucharist as presence, memorial, meal, and sacrifice. While Filipinos are very spiritual, there is sometimes a disconnect between spiritual life and daily life. The Eucharist calls Catholics to integrate worship with their struggles and not keep God separate from their worldly lives. It challenges contemporary culture's focus on individualism, hatred, hopelessness, and putting a price on things. The Eucharist offers mystery, love, hope, thanksgiving, and real presence. It reminds Catholics to offer their whole lives as worship and live the example of Christ's sacrifice.

2. TheThe
ChallengesChallenges
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3. We Filipinos are
spiritual
We easily believe in God.
Belief in “Gaba” is very prevalent in
most
We believe in spiritual beings that
are not seen – mga hindi tulad
natin.

4. But…….
• We tend to separate our spiritual life
from our day-to-day life.
• Our life of worship is not very much
connected with our daily struggles.
• We tend to keep God in his place
while we here below live by our own
rules.

5. We can view the Eucharist
in four aspects:
• As presence
• As memorial
• As meal
• As sacrifice

6. Eucharist as Presence
1. We are comfortable with the Sacred
Host.
2. We take comfort in the presence of
the Sacred Host but we are
disturbed by people.
3. We are indifferent to the continuous
presence of Jesus in the Eucharist,
and more so to the presence of Jesus
in the poor and suffering.

7. Eucharist as
Presence
St. Alphonsus:
“Of all the
devotions, that of adoring
Jesus in the Blessed
Sacrament is the greatest
after the sacraments, the
one dearest to God and the
one most helpful to us.”

8. Eucharist as Presence
4. Challenge for us priests:
John Paul II:
“The celebrant must let the
mystery being celebrated shine out in
such a way that the community can
perceive that he is neither an actor in
the stage nor an official doing a
function but a believer in God with the
ineffable presence of the one who
cannot be seen with the eyes of the
flesh but is more than real than all
that belongs to the world of the
senses.”
***We be present to our people.

9. Eucharist as Meal
1. We are comfortable with
the idea of food and drink.
2. We are indifferent to being
in the state of grace.

10. Eucharist as Meal
3. We do not easily accept sharing
and communion.
4. Challenge for us priests: Do we
feed the people with spiritual
food also work to feed them
material food?

11. Eucharis
t as
sacrificE
1. We are comfortable with the ritual of the
mass, the unbloody sacrifice.
2.People now are indifferent to the concept of
sacrifice and victimhood. So the idea of self-
oblation is now foreign to many.

12. Eucharist as Sacrifice
3. We are disturbed by
people who live and
die with conviction –
we call them bigots or
fundamentalists with a
scorn.
4. For us priests who
offer this sacrifice of
worship, do we allow
ourselves to be
broken, to be shed?

13. One contribution in the Synod of
Bishops on the Eucharist in
October 2005
“I urge you, then brothers, remembering the
mercies of God, to offer your bodies as a living
sacrifice, dedicated and acceptable to God, that is the
kind of worship for you, as sensible people.” (Rom
12,1.) This Pauline version of the new worship - as a
total offering of one’s person - has definitely overcome
any separation between the sacred and the profane
horizon.

14. One contribution in the synod of
Bishops on the Eucharist in
October 2005
Neither is it purely a sacrificial and reparatory
act for offenses or distancing from the eyes of
God. New Christian worship becomes the
expression of renewed existence: ‘Whatever you
eat or drink, and whatever else you do, you do it
all for the glory of God.’ (1 Cor 10,31) Every act
of freedom by the Christian is thus a call to be
an act of worship.”

15. The Eucharist as
Memorial
1. It is comfortable to
think of memorial as
historical recovery,
as thinking back on
the past, a simple
recall of what
happened then.
2. Many today are
indifferent about the
past.

16. The
Eucharist as
Memorial
3. What is disturbing is
the re-membering,
becoming a member again.
4. The challenge for us
priests who celebrate the
memorial of Christ: Do we
strive to insert ourselves
all the more into the
mystery of Christ?

17. The Eucharist as Memorial
In the biblical concept of
memorial, we enter another
dimension of time that is not
subject to our measurement, in
which the future, illumined by the
past, is offered to us as the
unchanging present. In this way the
mystery of Christ, Alpha and
Omega, become contemporaneous
to each person in every age and

18. The Eucharist as an
open challenge to
our contemporary
culture.
1. In our present time when there is an atmosphere of
individual and social selfishness, the Eucharist
reaffirms total self giving.
2. Where there is hatred and terrorism, the Eucharist
emphasizes love.
3. Ours is a time of scientific positivism. The Eucharist
offers mystery.
4. There is an air of hopelessness in many. The
Eucharist offers the pledge of glory.

19. The Eucharist as an open
challenge to our contemporary
culture.
5. In a time that stresses efficiency and puts a price on
everything – even persons are tagged with a price –
the Eucharist is thanksgiving: seeing the giftedness
of grace and of everything.
6. Our mode of communication connects us with each
other in real time. But the person we are in touch
with is not present – an absent presence. The
Eucharist offers us Real Presence.
7. The world of WTO, of Free Trade is the world of
competition and selfishness. The Eucharist is an
offer of selfless love that others may live.

20. The Eucharist as an open challenge to
contemporary culture.
8. The world is ruled by those in power. The
Eucharist is lowly service – “wash each other’s
feet”
9. In the world of greater sophistication and
complexity – there is greater sophistication in
our relationships – in masteral and doctoral
studies any small thing is blown up to great
proportions to be worthy of study! The
Eucharist offers us great simplicity – mere
bread and wine.

21. Quote from Rev. Barry Fischer during the Synod of
Bishops on the Eucharist of October 2005:
“The communion achieved in the reconciling
blood of Christ empowers us to be bridge-
builders, truth-tellers and healers of wounds.
Our “Amen” when receiving communion affirms
not only the Real Presence of Christ in the
Eucharist; it invites us to be bread broken and
blood poured out, life given, for the life of the
world. We become, as it were, ‘living chalices’
carrying the Precious Blood of Christ, that
sacred balm,..

22. Quote from Rev. Barry Fischer
during the Synod of Bishops
on the Eucharist of October
2005:
Participation in the
Eucharist strengthens and
emboldens us to dream a
different history, to build a
new world , a world that
conforms to God’s plan for
humanity, as revealed in the
life, death and resurrection of
Jesus Christ.”

23. Romans 12, 1
I urge you brethren, by the
mercies of God, to offer your
bodies as a living sacrifice,
holy and pleasing to God,
your spiritual worship.

24. Romans 12,2
Do not conform yourselves to
this age but be transformeD
by the renewal of your minD,
that you may Discern what is
the will of goD, what is gooD
anD pleasing anD perfect.

25. Maraming
Salamat
Po!