ENGLISH TRANSLATION

(For simultaneous translation)

Text of Video 0153M (2014 Edition)

Rocca di Papa, 8 October 1976

Meeting of the Zone Delegates of the Work of Mary

Chiara Lubich: “Unity with Christ and with our Neighbours”

(Third Talk on Jesus in the Eucharist)

...Today we are going to talk about what the Eucharist brings about in the soul
of each individual person and in a group of people. For this reason, it is entitled:
Unity with Christ and with our Neighbours.
Once again, we are back at the beginning, because in order to be able to
understand this, we need to know about the last talk, which explains the
conditions necessary for producing these effects. I don't know why I use this
method: I always begin with the effect and then give the conditions. It’s because
I always start from being "one"....
So we need a bit of intuition, but the Holy Spirit will give us a hand. I
wanted to tell you that the conditions for being able to experience these effects
are quite demanding, and you will hear about them tomorrow. After I’ve told you
about these conditions, perhaps then we can begin to hope that our Holy
Communion will have these effects because we’ll know the conditions.
So let's get started.

Having read and explained the Scripture passages concerning the

institution of the Eucharist, and having meditated on the liturgical and dogmatic
development of the Eucharist might give us the impression of having said
everything. But what depths are hidden in the words of God! They contain God
Himself.
So let’s look first of all at the difference between the union with God
which the Eucharist brings about and that which is the effect of other
sacraments. (It's interesting!)
Through the other sacraments we are linked to Jesus by the particular
virtue of each sacrament, which means through the specific grace that each
sacrament imparts. For example, the sacrament of matrimony gives people the
grace needed to live the married life in unity with Christ.
In the Eucharist, however, we are united to Jesus Himself substantially
present, (this word substantially is important; remember the transubstantiation -
this word has never been changed because it means the being of Jesus), by
eating His flesh and drinking His blood, as John states in the Gospel (cf. Jn.
6:53-56).
Baptism, in which water is used to signify the washing away of original
sin and other sins, is the sacrament of new birth. It is something personal, and it
is received only once in a lifetime.
The Eucharist is food. And food is usually eaten every day in order to
maintain and increase life. Thomas Aquinas says: "This sacrament is given
under the form of food and drink. Therefore every effect which is produced for
our physical life by material food and drink – that is sustenance, growth,
regeneration and pleasure – all of these effects are produced by this sacrament
for our spiritual life."1 (We can already see some of the effects here.)
And again, "Just as physical food is necessary for life, so much so that
one cannot live without it... so also spiritual food is necessary for the spiritual
life, so much so that without it, spiritual life cannot be maintained."2
Thomas Aquinas also says – and this is beautiful - the one generates,
(God), in Baptism makes those whom he generates, (human beings), in His
image, but he does not assimilate them into His own substance.3
The Eucharist, however, brings about a union of the faithful with God
which goes far beyond that produced by Baptism; it achieves a substantial
assimilation. There is no physical fusion between the communicant and Christ;
But wait! There is a mystical assimilation, spiritual but real, which allows the use
of the term “body”.
All of this, of course, has to be understood in such a way as to respect
the distance between creator and creature.4
In the documents of Vatican II (Lumen gentium) we read that communion
with the body and blood of Christ does nothing less than change us into what
we received.5 This phrase would be enough!
This has been demonstrated by the great heights of mystical experience,
by the transforming union that some saints have reached through Holy
Communion: it is the nuptial characteristic of the sacrifice of the alliance made
between Christ and his Church, which also comes into action between Christ
and the soul – they become one.
Having said this, we can understand the amazing statement of
Thomas Aquinas: "The proper effect of the Eucharist is the transformation of
human beings into God"6.
When we read the works of the Fathers and the saints, the doctrine of
the Eucharist and the effects it has on people receiving it with the proper
disposition, seem very new.

1 THOMAS AQUINAS, S.t. p. III, q. 79, a. 1-2.

2 Idem, In Jo 6, 54, 1. VII, 968.
3 Cf. idem, C. In 1 Cor., c. II, 1. 5.
4 Cf. idem, IV Sent. 10, I, I; 45,2,3, sol. I; S.t. III, q. 62, a. 5; q. 64, a. 3; q. 66, a. 3, ad I; q. 73, a.
3, ad. 3.
5 Cf. L.G. 26.
6 THOMAS AQUINAS, Sent. IV, dist. 12, q. 2, a. I.
 We had an intuition of this in 1961 in a talk I gave to the first international
school for focolarini. Among other things, I said then: "God became a man in
order to save us. When He became a man, however, He desired to become
food so that, feeding ourselves on Him, each of us might become another
Jesus.
Now, it is one thing to see Jesus as if we had lived in His times; it is
another thing to be Jesus again, to be able to be another Jesus on earth today.
The Eucharist has precisely this purpose: to nourish us with Jesus so as to
transform us into another Jesus because (as I say) He has loved us as
Himself."
We Christians have spoken and heard too many words but there has
been too little understanding of the love of Christ for us: "As the Father has
loved me, so I have loved you" (Jn 15:9). That word "as" is really true.
That’s how we are loved. We can be other Christs, by means of the
Eucharist.
Have we realised this? The world would have changed by now if we had.
Jesus in the Eucharist, give me the grace, as I read the Fathers of your
Church and your saints, to make you a little better known. This is the longing I
feel at the moment, I am almost distressed at my inadequacy, at my inability to
express what you have allowed me to experience beside you. It is too great.
May the Holy Spirit make up for it. No, may He take over completely. He has so
much to do with the Eucharist.
The Holy Spirit can shed light upon the words of the Fathers and of the
saints. He can move our hearts and open our eyes so that we can see our
destiny and the fathomless love Jesus has for us, which has no words to
describe it.
Here is what we discovered in Cyril of Jerusalem: “His body is given to
us under the symbol of bread, and his blood is given to us under the symbol of
wine, in order to make us by receiving them one body and blood with him ."7
We can speak of one body and blood because what comes about is not a
physical union in the human sense of the word, but a union of our persons with
the glorified body of Christ, which is present in the Eucharist, vivified by the Holy
Spirit. He enters within us. So we really are one body, but in a new and mystical
way, a mystical way.
Cyril continues – this is something else -: “Having his body and blood in
our members, we become bearers of Christ ” – I’ve said this many times – “and
sharers, as Saint Peter says, in the divine nature.”8
And Leo the Great: "For naught else is brought about by the partaking of
the Body and Blood of Christ than that we pass into that which we then take ,
and both in spirit and in body carry everywhere Him, in and with Whom we were
dead, buried, and rose again...”9 - through Baptism

7 CIRILLO DI GERUSALEMME, Cat, myst. 4,3 (PG 33, 1100).

8 Ibid.
9 LEONE MAGNO, Sermo 63,7 (PL 54, 357).
 Augustine writes that it was as if he had heard a voice from on high: “I
am the food of grown men; grow and you shall feed upon Me; nor shall you
convert Me, like the food of your flesh, into you, but you shall be converted into
Me"10
And Doctor of the Church Albert the Great writes in several different
works: "This sacrament changes us into the body of Christ, in order that we may
be bone of His bones, flesh of His flesh, and members of His members."11
"Every time two things are united in such a way that one has to be
changed into all of the other, then the stronger transforms into itself that which
is weaker. Therefore, since this food possesses greater power than those who
eat of it, this food transforms into itself those who eat it."12
"Those who have received Him (Jn. 1:12) in the sacrament, eating Him
spiritually, become of one body with His Son, and so they are and they are
called sons of God."13
"The Lord's Body in this generating - making us become another Christ -
is like a seed which uses its power to attract people to itself and transform them
into itself."14 And we are like the earth.
"How much we must thank Christ (continues Albert the Great) who with
His life-giving Body (I say life-giving because it's important. Jesus said that the
body isn't worth anything, that it is the spirit that gives life, and His Body was
given life and is life-giving) how much we must thank Christ who with His life-
giving Body changes us into Himself in order that we may become His holy
body, pure and divine."15

Now we’ll look at the writings of some saints. Taken in isolation, they
could seem exaggerated, sentimental, even a bit mad. But the Fathers confirm
their words and the fact that they are saints.
St. Therese of Lisieux writes about a meeting with Jesus: "That day it
was no longer a glance but a fusion. There were no longer two of us. Therese
had vanished like a drop of water in the ocean. Only Jesus remained. He was
the master, He the king."16
According to me, this experience shouldn’t just be an isolated case
reserved for exceptional souls. It should be or become a common experience
for all Christians if they receive communion with all the necessary conditions
that we’ll talk about later.
There are people in the Movement who bear witness to this, who have
lived intensely all that was required for the Eucharist to produce its full effect.
God allowed them to understand that they had become one with Christ. As a

10 AGOSTINO, Confess. VII, 10, 16 (PL 32, 742).

11 ALBERTO MAGNO, De Euch., d. 3, tr. 1, c. 5 in A. PIOLANTI, "Il Corpo Mistico e le sue
relazioni con l'Eucaristia in S. Alberto Magno", Roma 1969, p. 193-197.
12 Idem, IV Sent., d. 9, a. 2 in op, cit., p. 172-178.
13 Idem, De Euch., d. 3, tr. 1, c. 8, n. 2 in op. cit., p. 172-178.
14 Ibid.
15 Ibid.
16 TERESA DI LISIEUX, "Gli scritti", Roma 1970, p. 118.
consequence of this, they were urged by the Holy Spirit to utter the word:
"Abba!" ("Father!"), and they felt immersed in the bosom of the Father (cf. Gal.
4:6).
In his book on mystical theology, A. Stolz says this: “In the Eucharist, the
most intimate union possible with Christ, in the sense of a total transformation of
our being into the transfigured Christ, becomes a sacramental reality.”
In the Eucharist.
“Then, in a sacramental way, Christ lifts those who have become similar to him
out of the misery of earthly existence and leads them before the Father.
By participating in the Eucharist, the faithful is thus “captured” out of this world
and led by the Son into the sphere of the angels and up to Father, and in union
with the Son he can approach him with the word “Abba” – Father – on his
lips."17
St. Therese of Lisieux writes: "'My heaven is hidden in the particle where
Jesus my spouse hides Himself out of love.... What a divine moment it is when,
my dearly beloved, in your tender affection you come to transform me into you.
This union of love and of unutterable bliss, 'this is my heaven'."18
And again Therese says: "Jesus... transforms a white particle into
Himself every morning in order to communicate His life to you. What's more,
with a love that is greater still, He wants to transform you into Himself."19
And St. Peter Julian Eymard: "This is an inexpressible union which
comes immediately after the hypostatic union....
“Why did Jesus Christ want to establish such a union with us?” he
continues.
“To console us with His friend ship, to enrich us with His graces and His
merits.
“Above all, with his union of life, He wanted to deify us in Himself and
thus fulfill the desire of the heavenly Father to crown Him (to crown Jesus) in
us, too, members of His mystical body."20
We are other Christs.
And so what we said before is true. If Jesus could say to a loaf of bread:
This is my body, all the more can He say to Christians: You are my body.
Now we’ll pass on to another effect which the Eucharist produces in each
individual person who receives it under the proper conditions - later we’ll talk
about the collectivity.
We’ve already referred to this: the Eucharist is the cause of the
resurrection of the flesh.
The times we live in are so poor in faith and so bizarre in their surrogates
for genuine faith, that we need to return to the Fathers of the Church, to the
great figures of all times, and to the Pope, in order to see how they interpreted
or interpret now those words of Jesus which are so clear.

17 D.A. STOLZ, "Teologia della mistica", Brescia 1947, p. 206-207.

18 TERESA DI LISIEUX, op. cit., p. 856.
19 Ibid., p. 848.
20 PIER GIULIANO EYMARD, "Messa e Comunione", Torino 1966, p. 247-248.
 Let’s listen to Irenaeus: “When, therefore, the mingled cup and the
manufactured bread receives the Word of God, and the Eucharist of the blood
and the body of Christ is made, from which things the substance of our flesh is
increased and supported, how can they affirm (the Gnostics) that the flesh is
incapable of receiving the gift of God, which is life eternal, which [flesh] is
nourished from the body and blood of the Lord, and is a member of Him? -even
as the blessed Paul declares in his Epistle to the Ephesians, that "we are
members of His body, of His flesh, and of His bones."
He does not speak these words of some spiritual and invisible man, for a
spirit has not bones nor flesh; but [he refers to] that dispensation [by which the
Lord became] an actual man, consisting of flesh, and nerves, and bones,-that
[flesh] which is nourished by the cup (the wine) which is His blood, and receives
increase from the bread which is His body.”
(It's really Christ penetrating into our being, also our body).
Irenaeus continues: (It’s very beautiful) “And just as a cutting from the
vine planted in the ground fructifies in its season, or as a grain of wheat falling
into the earth and becoming decomposed, rises... so also our bodies, being
nourished by the Eucharist, and deposited in the earth, and suffering
decomposition there, shall rise at their appointed time, the Word of God
granting them resurrection to the glory of God, even the Father, who freely
gives to this mortal: immortality, and to this corruptible: incorruption, because
God’s strength is made perfect in weakness (1 Corinthians 15) "21 (in us, who
are dying, decomposing).
Justin, who agrees with Irenaeus of Lyons and Ignatius of Antioch on the
idea that the Eucharist is a pledge of immortality and resurrection, according to
some commentators, talks “as if the Eucharist rendered our bodies immortal
already in this life and had actually initiated us into the resurrection." 22 (I am
convinced of this too, but it has to be explained.)
Origen too affirms: "It communicates its own immortality (for the Word of
God is immortal) to the one who eats thereof."23
Thomas Aquinas writes: "It is proper to attribute this effect to the
sacrament of the Eucharist because, as Augustine says, the word resuscitates
souls but the Word made flesh enlivens bodies. It is not just the Word and His
Divinity that is present in this sacrament, but the Word united to His flesh as
well, and therefore it is the cause of resurrection not only for souls but also for
bodies."24
In his 1976 Easter message Paul VI said: "Christ the Lord is truly risen....
We too brethren and sons and daughters, we too will rise... if with a pure and
sincere heart we have fulfilled our Easter duty... for, of the one that is fed with
this vital food, Christ has said: 'I will raise him up on the last day'(Jn. 6:54)."25

21 IRENEO, Adv. haer. V 2,3 (PG 7, 1124).

22 "Eucaristia" a cura di A. PIOLANTI, Roma 1957, p. 120.
23 ORIGENE, de orat. 27, 9 (GCS II, 365, 22-24).
24 TOMMASO D'AQUINO, In Jo 6, 55, 1. VII, 973.
25 "L'Osservatore Romano", 20-21/4/'76.
 But the effect of the Eucharist in human beings goes beyond this. A
modern theologian says: "All creation is present, in a certain way, in the bread
and wine of the Eucharist (including human work). Well, then, if this totality is
changed into the glorious body and blood, it means that in it” -in the totality-
“there is a radical openness and call to glory in all things."26 And this means that
creation too is called somehow to glory.
Jesus who dies and rises again is certainly the real cause of the
transformation of the cosmos. But since Paul has revealed that through our
sufferings we complete "what is lacking in the sufferings of Christ" (cf. Col. 1:24)
and that nature "awaits the revelation of the sons of God" (Rom. 8:19) - two
enormous truths - Jesus also expects the collaboration of people "Christified" by
His Eucharist in accomplishing the renewal of the cosmos.
We could say, therefore, that by means of the Eucharistic bread, human
beings become "Eucharist" for the universe, in the sense that with Christ they
are the seed of the transfiguration of the universe.
If the Eucharist is the cause of the resurrection of the human person, is it
not possible that the body of the human person divinized by the Eucharist may
be destined to decay underground in order to contribute to the renewal of the
cosmos? So couldn’t we say that after we have died, we are, with Jesus
“Eucharist” for the earth? The earth eats us, just as we eat the Eucharist, not in
order to transform us into earth but to transform the earth into "new heavens
and a new earth" (Rev 21:1).
It is a fascinating thought that the bodies of our Christian deceased have
the task of collaborating with God in the transformation of the cosmos. This
generates in our hearts deep affection and veneration for those who have
preceded us. It gives us a better understanding of the age-old custom
(especially of Christians) of venerating those whom we call the dead (especially
the bodies of the saints) but who in fact are really being born to a new life in the
cosmos.
The Eucharist redeems us and makes us God. We, with our death,
transform nature. So nature is an extension of the body of Jesus. In fact Jesus,
through the incarnation, took on human nature, in which the whole of nature
converges.
Let’s take a look now at a second wonderful effect of the Eucharist: those
extraordinary divine fruits we’ve been talking about are not produced only in
individuals. The Eucharist, as a true "sacrament of unity," also brings about
unity among people. And this is logical: If two people are similar to a third, then
they are similar to each other; if we are Christ we are similar to each other.
The Eucharist produces communion among people, and this is
something splendid. If the whole human family took it seriously, it would have
incredible, heavenly consequences. Because if the Eucharist makes us one
with each other, then it’s logical that we should treat all people as brothers and
sisters. The Eucharist forms the family of the children of God, all brothers and
sisters of Jesus and of each other.

26 B. FORTE, "La Chiesa nell'Eucaristia", Napoli 1975, p. 306.

 The natural family has its laws. If these were extended to a supernatural
level and applied on a vast scale, they would change the world. In a family
everything is shared: life itself, the home, the furniture.... A family has its own
intimacy: its members know one another's joys and sorrows because they’ve
shared them. They go out into the world bearing the warmth of their home, and
they can contribute to society if they are whole people, from a healthy family.
A family is happy when its members come together for a meal or when they
sing or pray together.
If the family is one of the Creator's most beautiful works, what must the
family of God's children be like?
In the Middle East, the common meal was given great importance. Not
only did Jesus want to have His closest disciples around Him at the Last
Supper, but even more, when he passed round His cup and broke His bread to
share it with them, it seemed he wanted to draw them even closer to Himself,
almost to unite them with His own person. These actions of Jesus are the
exterior signs of the Eucharist as the sacrament of unity.
Another stupendous thing about Jesus’ banquet is that He elevated it to
an infinitely superior reality.
By means of the Eucharist He united Christians to Himself and to each
other in one single body, which is His own body. As a result, He gave life to the
Church in its most intimate essence: the body of Christ, fraternity, unity, life and
communion with God.

The Eucharist, therefore, brings about the Church where people gather to
partake in the Eucharistic banquet. It brings about not just (this is stupendous)
not just part of the Church, but the entire Church. It is the complete body of
Christ present in a given place, as the letter of Paul makes clear: "to the Church
of God which is in Corinth" (1 Cor 1:2), but it's the Church of God.
The Eucharist makes present all members of the mystical body, beyond
distance and death, because space and time are abolished in the glorious
Christ there present.
Lumen Gentium states: "Celebrating the Eucharistic sacrifice we are
most closely united to the worshiping Church in heaven."27 (Because we’re
together.)
We can see how the Eucharist immediately helped Christians to become
aware of being a single body in the Acts of the Apostles: "The community of
believers were of one heart and one mind. None of them ever claimed anything
of his own; rather, everything was held in common" (Acts 4:32).
And John of Damascus writes that the Eucharist "is called communion,
and truly is so, because of our being in communion through it with Christ... and
because through it we are in communion and united to one another.... We all
become one body and blood of Christ and members of one another."28

27 L.G. 50.
28 GIOVANNI DAMASCENO, De fide orthodoxa IV, 13 (PG 94,1154).
 Origen also says that whoever partakes of the Eucharist must become
aware of what "communion with the Church" means. One of his commentators
observes: "Communion with the body of Christ is communion with His bread but
also with His Church (because it produces the two effects). The truth of the
Eucharistic assembly and of each participant is no less important than the
reality of the Eucharistic bread."29
Albert the Great emphasizes this reality in several passages: "As the
bread, the matter of this sacrament, is made into one loaf out of many grains
which share their entire makeup, co-penetrating each other, so the true body of
Christ is put together from many drops of blood of our own nature... mixed
together; and thus many believers... united in sentiment and communicating
mystically with Christ their head, constitute the body of Christ.... That is why this
sacrament leads us to practice a communion of all our temporal and spiritual
goods."30
He continues: "The species of this sacrament," in other words, bread and
wine, "are symbols of communion, which means the union of many in one,
because bread is prepared out of many grains and wine from many grapes."31
"By the very fact that Christ unites all to Himself, He unites them with
each other, because if several things are united to a third they are also united
with each other."32
In conclusion, Albert the Great affirms that "the true body of Christ is the
cause of the unity of the mystical body. The special effect of the Eucharist is the
grace of incorporation, which is the greatest effect of the union."33 (And of the
Ideal.)
The Holy Father Paul VI, Vicar of that Christ whom we have been
contemplating as Love, such great love, has said some expressions on the
Eucharist. I will quote just one: "The Eucharist... has been instituted to make us
brothers and sisters; so that from being strangers scattered far and wide and
indifferent to one another, we become united, equal and friends. It is given to
change us from an apathetic and egoistic mass, from being a divided people
and hostile to each other, into a people, a real people, believing and loving, one
heart and one soul."34

The Eucharist and the Ideal of Unity

Ours is the Ideal of unity. Now – this is something marvellous – Doesn’t it

seem significant that Jesus should turn to the Father with that special prayer
where he asks for unity among his disciples and those who will follow them,
immediately after the institution of the Eucharist which makes a that unity
possible?

29 P. JACQUIMONT, "Origéne" in "L'Eucharistie chez les premiers chrétiens". Paris 1976, p. 181.
30 ALBERTO MAGNO, In Jo 6, 64 in PIOLANTI, op. cit. 153-157
31 Idem, De eccl.. Hierarchia 3,2 in PIOLANTI, op.,cit , p..153-157
32 Idem, IV Sent., d~8, ao11 in PIOLANTI, op, cit,, 174-178.
33 Cf, PIOLANTI, op, cit., po 167, 169-171.
34 "Insegnamenti di Paolo VI", Poliglotta Vaticana 1966, III, p. 355-359.
 This is how Jesus prayed while walking towards the garden of Olives (Jn
17:11-23):

Holy Father, protect them in your name that you have given me, so that
they may be one, as we are one...

I ask not only on behalf of these, but also on behalf of those who will
believe in me through their word, that they may all be one. As you, Father, are
in me and I am in you, may they also be in us, so that the world may believe
that you have sent me...

The glory that you have given me I have given them, so that they may be
one, as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become
completely one...

If we love our Ideal, our vocation to unity, we will surely have an

immense love for the Eucharist.