Living the Eucharist as a Family

Living the Eucharist as a Family

The Eucharistic Revival is coming to a close with the National Eucharistic Congress in Indianapolis, IN this July. How can we live the Eucharist as family? As a Catholic husband and father, I find myself reflecting on the phrase: Taken, Blessed, Broken, and Shared. This takes me back to the passage from Luke 24: 30-31:

“And it happened that, while he was with them at table, he took bread, said the blessing, broke it, and gave it to them. With that their eyes were opened and they recognized him, but he vanished from their sight.”

Taken. Blessed. Broken. Shared.

These gestures are poignant, found in the Gospel narratives like the Feeding of the Five Thousand (Matthew 14:19) and the Last Supper (Luke 22: 19).

I invite you to meditate on these four gestures. How can the Eucharist be lived as a family?

Taken

Living the Eucharist as a family takes intentionality. We need to take time away to be together. Time with one another, especially with Christ is transformative. The Eucharist teaches us the virtue of presence and taking time to be together is a ripe opportunity to practice it. 

The passage from Luke is a special moment where the disciples are at the table with Christ. Only when Christ opened the Scriptures and broke bread, did their eyes open and hearts go aflame.  As a family, take time to be together to look over the Sunday readings, pray the rosary, or share a table conversation during a meal. 

Blessed

Time spent together and with Christ is sacred. To bless something is to set it apart for holy things. The hour that we keep to attend Mass or to be at Eucharistic Adoration, is blessed. How often are we tempted to fill time with something or seek to accomplish something?

One of the best pieces of advice I received growing up was: let Christ take delight in your presence. I had to let it sink in, but slowly came to understand what the advice meant. This time with each other and with Christ is to simply be. There is no agenda or objective to complete.

Broken

Something has to be broken in order for it to be shared. St. Teresa of Calcutta once said, “For love to be real, it must cost, it must hurt, it must empty us of self.” Family life is not perfect and there is no perfect family. All families have some form of brokenness. The Eucharist teaches us that brokenness is a sacrifice that is necessary to love.

Christ sees beauty in brokenness. In his Resurrection, his body still bears the wounds from his Passion and Death. What areas of our lives are broken that can be filled with the presence of Christ and others? Preoccupations with social media? Anger over a dispute with a friend or coworker? Whatever it may be, Christ yearns to enter those spaces of our lives to help us find deeper meaning.

Shared

Sharing is not simply sharing something of material value. Sharing, in a deeper sense, is an offering of ourselves. Family life, the life in common, is a process of constant sharing. It’s not easy, especially living under one roof. Sometimes we want moments to ourselves, to be in our office or room. However, family life is not lived in isolation, rather with one another. We are not a family alone. We are a family together.

A Lifelong Pilgrimage

As the Eucharist Revival comes to a close, how is your family reconnecting with the Eucharist? I invite you to continue pondering on the four gestures, “Taken, Blessed, Broken, and Shared.” As we speak, pilgrims from the four corners of the country make their way to Indianapolis. The journey doesn’t end at the Congress – it continues through Pentecost and onward. Living the Eucharist as a family is a lifelong pilgrimage.