Francis presides closing of International Eucharistic Congress held in Budapest

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The closing Holy Mass, presided by the Holy Father in the Heroes’ Square of Budapest, Hungary, gathered around 100 thousand faithful.

Hungary – Budapest (13/09/2021 17:09, Gaudium Press) On Sunday, September 12, the Pope Francis presides closing of International Eucharistic Congress held in Budapest, Hungary, came to a conclusion. The closing ceremony was presided over by Pope Francis through a Solemn Holy Mass that gathered around 100,000 faithful gathered in Budapest’s Heroes’ Square.

Commenting on the Gospel of the day, Our Lord Jesus Christ asks His apostles what they said He was, Francis explained that although the disciples lived familiarly with Jesus, being witnesses to His miracles and following wherever He went, they still did not think like Him.

From admiration for Jesus to imitation of Jesus

They had to take that decisive step, from admiring Jesus to imitating Jesus,”  accomplished through three passages: the announcement of Jesus, discernment with Jesus, and the journey after Jesus.

In addressing the first point, the proclamation of Jesus, the Holy Father said that by asking “and you, who do you say that I am?”, Jesus sought to elicit this proclamation. The Eucharist is here to remind us who God is. It does not do so just in words, but in a concrete way, showing us God as bread broken, as love crucified and bestowed. We can add ritual elements, but the Lord is always there in the simplicity of Bread ready to be broken, distributed and eaten,”he stressed.

Discernment with Jesus and the way behind Jesus

On the second point, discernment with Jesus, the Pontiff presented adoration as essential.  We do well to spend time in adoration before the Eucharist in order to contemplate God’s weakness. Let us make time for adoration, a way of praying too frequently forgotten. Let us make time for adoration. Let us allow Jesus the Living Bread to heal us of our self-absorption, open our hearts to self-giving, liberate us from our rigidity and self-concern, free us from the paralyzing slavery of defending our image, and inspire us to follow him wherever he would lead us.”

Finally, addressing the third and final step, Francis responded to the inquiry about what it would be to walk after Jesus. “It is to advance through life with Jesus’ own confident trust, knowing that we are beloved children of God. It is to follow in the footsteps of the Master who came to serve and not be served (cf. Mk 10:45). It is to step out each day to an encounter with our brothers and sisters. The Eucharist impels us to this encounter, to the realization that we are one Body, to the willingness to let ourselves be broken for others.”

May the encounter with Jesus in the Eucharist transform us

Concluding his homily, the Pope urged the faithful to allow our encounter with Jesus in the Eucharist to transform us, just as it transformed the great and courageous saints you venerate. I am thinking in particular of Saint Stephen and Saint Elizabeth. Like them, may we never be satisfied with little; may we never resign ourselves to a faith based on ritual and repetition, but be ever more open to the scandalous newness of the crucified and risen God, the Bread broken to give life to the world.” (EPC)

Compiled by Gustavo Kralj

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