My friends in Christ, perhaps by now many of us have heard from Bishop Daly that he is declaring a special year of prayer and catechesis for the Diocese of Spokane:  The Year of the Eucharist.  When I had a chance to visit with him in private back in   February about various troubles that I personally was experiencing and about various troubles that I have been observing in many areas of diocesan life and ministry, he confided in me that he, too, has been experiencing spiritual attacks and that he has observed what I have observed, and more.  

In addition, he mentioned the heart-breaking survey, published in August 2019, which reported that only about one-third of self-identifying Catholics profess any belief in the Real Presence of the Lord Jesus Christ in the Eucharist.

And finally, I am certain that we are all painfully aware of the renewed clergy abuse crisis that seems to have permeated a vast unknown quantity of priests in the United States and elsewhere.  Bishops and priests of the sort that would abuse children, abuse their positions of influence and power, and abuse the trusting confidence of their parishioners are wolves in sheep’s clothing, false shepherds who, among other things, have long ago ceased to pray, long ago ceased to have any appreciation that sin and hell are certainly real…and one wonders when they stopped believing in the Eucharist.

For all of these reasons and more, the Bishop has decided to call for a Year of the Eucharist.  What providential timing that we are called to be renewed in our faith in the Eucharistic Lord when all the world seems fit to tear itself apart.  Only the Lord can combat and conquer all of the evil that attacks us, surrounds us, and pervades our world and our Church.  It is high time that we recapture the faith of our Catholic forebears, the faith of the Apostles and their company for which they would joyfully give up their lives, the faith sung by the choirs of angels and saints forever in Heaven.  Every single one of us needs to be renewed and strengthened in our faith in God, our belief in the Eucharist, in our missionary zeal to share this faith with others and to proclaim to a fallen, broken world that is desperately in need of the Good News now more than ever.  In short, we need to be the light in a world otherwise trapped in darkness.

To that end, for ourselves here at St. Mary, I have discerned that our own parish participation in the diocesan Year of the         Eucharist is a call to us once again to be “the light of the world.”  Hence, Fiat Lux.

The very first thing that God created in the beginning at the foundation of the world was light.  “Let there be light,” and so it  happened. (Genesis 1:3)  The theme of light (its symbolism, its power) then becomes abundantly present throughout Sacred Scripture.  And so, when Jesus Christ Himself says to His disciples, “You are the light of the world,” hopefully we understand the magnitude of that; if God created light first above all else that was created, and we are declared to be the light of the world that God created, then what high praise we have been given…and also what a critical responsibility with which we have been entrusted and commissioned.

But though Jesus entrusts and commissions us with this grave duty of being the light of the world, He does so with it fully in mind that He is the source and summit of our every effort and activity, for He is the vine and we are the branches.  “I am the Bread of Life,” He says (John 6:48).  “The bread that I will give is My flesh for the life of the world,” (John 6:51) that very same world that God had created in the beginning and of which we are entrusted and commissioned to be the light.

“I am the Bread of Life…. You are the light of the world.”  Therefore, fiat lux.  Be the light!  For the salvation of souls, be the light.  For the glorious majesty of God, be the light.  For the salvation of the world, be the light…. Fiat lux.  Amen.

~ Fr. Lewis