Rome, Italy, Jun 23, 2019 / 10:50 am
Pope Francis said Sunday that the Eucharist exemplifies how God's love can accomplish great things with very little.
"Whatever we have can bear fruit if we give it away – that is what Jesus wants to tell us – and it does not matter whether it is great or small. The Lord does great things with our littleness," Pope Francis said June 23.
"God's omnipotence is lowly, made up of love alone. And love can accomplish great things with little. The Eucharist teaches us this: for there we find God himself contained in a piece of bread," the pope said in his homily for the Solemnity of Corpus Christi.
Pope Francis said that the Eucharist is "the antidote" to the mindset that says, "Sorry, that is not my problem," or "I have no time, I can't help you, it's none of my business."
"Being simple and essential, bread broken and shared, the Eucharist we receive allows us to see things as God does. It inspires us to give ourselves to others," he said.
Pope Francis celebrated at outdoor evening Mass in Rome's Casal Bertone neighborhood for the feast of the Holy Body and Blood of Christ, according to Italy's liturgical calendar.
A Eucharistic procession through the Roman neighborhood followed the Mass, ending at a homeless shelter run by the Missionaries of Charity.
"In our city that hungers for love and care, that suffers from decay and neglect, that contains so many elderly people living alone, families in difficulty, young people struggling to earn their bread and to realize their dreams, the Lord says to each one of you: 'You yourself give them something to eat,' Pope Francis said.
"You may answer: 'But I have so little; I am not up to it.' That is not true; your 'little' has great value in the eyes of Jesus, provided that you don't keep it to yourself," he added.
"You are not alone, for you have the Eucharist, bread for the journey, the bread of Jesus," he said.
The pope called the Eucharist "a school of blessing" and said that through the Mass Catholics are blessed by the Lord and can in turn be a blessing to others as "channels of goodness in the world."
"It is sad to think of how easily people today speak words not of blessing but of contempt and insult," Pope Francis said.
"Sadly, those who shout most and loudest, those angriest, often appeal to others and persuade them. Let us avoid being infected by that arrogance; let us not let ourselves be overcome by bitterness, for we eat the Bread that 'contains all sweetness within it,'" he continued.
"In the presence of the Eucharist, Jesus who becomes bread, this simple bread that contains the entire reality of the Church, let us learn to bless all that we have, to praise God, to bless and not curse all that has led us to this moment, and to speak words of encouragement to others," Pope Francis said.
