Vatican City, Jun 14, 2020 / 08:00 am (CNA).- Here is the full text of Pope Francis’ Corpus Christi homily, delivered June 14 at the Basilica of St. Peter.
“Remember all the way which the Lord your God has led you” (Deut 8:2). Today’s Scripture readings begin with this command of Moses: Remember! Shortly afterwards Moses reiterates: “Do not forget the Lord, your God” (v.14). Scripture has been given to us that we might overcome our forgetfulness of God. How important it is to remember this when we pray! As one of the Psalms teaches: “I will call to mind the deeds of the Lord; yes, I will remember your wonders of old” (77:11). But all those wonders too, that the Lord has worked in our own lives.
It is vital to remember the good we have received. If we do not remember it, we become strangers to ourselves, “passers-by” of existence. Without memory, we uproot ourselves from the soil that nourishes us and allow ourselves to be carried away like leaves in the wind. If we do remember, however, we bind ourselves afresh to the strongest of ties; we feel part of a living history, the living experience of a people. Memory is not something private; it is the path that unites us to God and to others. This is why in the Bible the memory of the Lord must be passed on from generation to generation. Fathers are commanded to tell the story to their sons, as we read in a beautiful passage. “When your son asks you in time to come, ‘What is the meaning of the decrees and the statutes and the ordinances which the Lord our God has commanded you?’, then you shall say to your son, ‘We were slaves… [think of the whole history of slavery!], and the Lord showed signs and wonders… before our eyes’” (Deut 6:20-22). You shall hand down this memory to your son.
But there is a problem: what if the chain of transmission of memories is interrupted? And how can we remember what we have only heard, unless we have also experienced it? God knows how difficult it is, he knows how weak our memory is, and he has done something remarkable: he left us a memorial. He did not just leave us words, for it is easy to forget what we hear. He did not just leave us the Scriptures, for it is easy to forget what we read. He did not just leave us signs, for we can forget even what we see. He gave us Food, for it is not easy to forget something we have actually tasted. He left us Bread in which he is truly present, alive and true, with all the flavor of his love. Receiving him we can say: “He is the Lord; he remembers me!” That is why Jesus told us: “Do this in remembrance of me” (1 Cor 11:24). Do! The Eucharist is not simply an act of remembrance; it is a fact: the Lord’s Passover is made present once again for us. In Mass the death and resurrection of Jesus are set before us. Do this in remembrance of me: come together and celebrate the Eucharist as a community, as a people, as a family, in order to remember me. We cannot do without the Eucharist, for it is God’s memorial. And it heals our wounded memory.
The Eucharist first heals our orphaned memory. We are living at a time of great orphanage. The Eucharist heals orphaned memory. So many people have memories marked by a lack of affection and bitter disappointments caused by those who should have given them love and instead orphaned their hearts. We would like to go back and change the past, but we cannot. God, however, can heal these wounds by placing within our memory a greater love: his own love. The Eucharist brings us the Father’s faithful love, which heals our sense of being orphans. It gives us Jesus’ love, which transformed a tomb from an end to a beginning, and in the same way can transform our lives. It fills our hearts with the consoling love of the Holy Spirit, who never leaves us alone and always heals our wounds.
Through the Eucharist, the Lord also heals our negative memory, that negativity which seeps so often into our hearts. The Lord heals this negative memory, which drags to the surface things that have gone wrong and leaves us with the sorry notion that we are useless, that we only make mistakes, that we are ourselves a mistake. Jesus comes to tell us that this is not so. He wants to be close to us. Every time we receive him, he reminds us that we are precious, that we are guests he has invited to his banquet, friends with whom he wants to dine. And not only because he is generous, but because he is truly in love with us. He sees and loves the beauty and goodness that we are. The Lord knows that evil and sins do not define us; they are diseases, infections. And he comes to heal them with the Eucharist, which contains the antibodies to our negative memory. With Jesus, we can become immune to sadness. We will always remember our failures, troubles, problems at home and at work, our unrealized dreams. But their weight will not crush us because Jesus is present even more deeply, encouraging us with his love. This is the strength of the Eucharist, which transforms us into bringers of God, bringers of joy, not negativity. We who go to Mass can ask: What is it that we bring to the world? Is it our sadness and bitterness, or the joy of the Lord? Do we receive Holy Communion and then carry on complaining, criticizing and feeling sorry for ourselves? This does not improve anything, whereas the joy of the Lord can change lives.
Finally, the Eucharist heals our closed memory. The wounds we keep inside create problems not only for us, but also for others. They make us fearful and suspicious. We start with being closed, and end up cynical and indifferent. Our wounds can lead us to react to others with detachment and arrogance, in the illusion that in this way we can control situations. Yet that is indeed an illusion, for only love can heal fear at its root and free us from the self-centeredness that imprisons us. And that is what Jesus does. He approaches us gently, in the disarming simplicity of the Host. He comes as Bread broken in order to break open the shells of our selfishness. He gives of himself in order to teach us that only by opening our hearts can we be set free from our interior barriers, from the paralysis of the heart.
The Lord, offering himself to us in the simplicity of bread, also invites us not to waste our lives in chasing the myriad illusions that we think we cannot do without, yet that leave us empty within. The Eucharist satisfies our hunger for material things and kindles our desire to serve. It raises us from our comfortable and lazy lifestyle and reminds us that we are not only mouths to be fed, but also his hands, to be used to help feed others. It is especially urgent now to take care of those who hunger for food and for dignity, of those without work and those who struggle to carry on. And this we must do in a real way, as real as the Bread that Jesus gives us. Genuine closeness is needed, as are true bonds of solidarity. In the Eucharist, Jesus draws close to us: let us not turn away from those around us.
Dear brothers and sisters, let us continue our celebration of Holy Mass: the Memorial that heals our memory. Let us never forget: the Mass is the Memorial that heals memory, the memory of the heart. The Mass is the treasure that should be foremost both in the Church and in our lives. And let us also rediscover Eucharistic adoration, which continues the work of the Mass within us. This will do us much good, for it heals us within. Especially now, when our need is so great.
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#1. The Pope should be concentrating on how to help Catholics attain eternal life.
#2. The Pope should realize that Islam – led by Iran – DECLARED WAR against the West a long, long time ago. Some of us in the West are just now waking up to that fact. Islam wants to see Westetn Culture, including Christianity, wiped off the face of the earth. Unfortunately, Pachamama Popes can’t see through all the smoke they generate to see this.
How does Iran “lead Islam”? You realize we are defending Islamic countries in this conflict including those that have supported genocide against Christians?
If you’re triggered by popes decrying war, you probably need to log off for a bit. How dare the pope lament a conflict that has already resulted in 100+ schoolgirls get killed by an errant US missile strike
Jesus said that wars “must come.” All leading to deception, false peace. “Before Christ’s second coming the Church must pass through a final trial that will shake the faith of many believers. The persecution that accompanies her pilgrimage on earth will unveil the “mystery of iniquity” in the form of a religious deception offering men an apparent solution to their problems at the price of apostasy from the truth.” –Catechism 675
Deacon: Didn’t you study Catholic Social Teaching in Deacon School?
Liberty and democracy become unholy when their hands are dyed red with innocent blood – Mahatma Gandhi
As there appears to be no intersection between The Islamic Revolutionary Regime running the police state over the Iranian people, and “the innocent,” it seems Mr. Ghandi’s quote is not apt.
The Islamic Revolutionary Regime agrees, and has reminded the world for some 50 years: “Death to America,” etc.
Please explain that to the Iranian regime, Dr.Coelho. It would save many lives.
Right. This is the same Ghandi whose every “non-violent” protest broke out into mob violence. Hardly a coincidence, and hardly someone who should be held up as an example.
Iran has been the largest instigator of terrorism for the last forty years. Countless diplomats and national leaders have attempted to negotiate with this rogue state to no avail. Terrorism has marched on and nations have wrung their hands in chagrin. Exactly what should the nations of the world do – any nation. Should any nation dare to strongly reprimand Iran? As for me and my house, we will not worry for one instant that any nation will finally attempt to cut the head off of the beast.
We will continue to support the people of Iran. They are loved and supported even as their national leaders murder them in the tens of thousands as they protest for change. May the war continue until the Iranian people are free.
Do I have this right?
The Pontiff Leo, who with his “vice-president” the Eminent Pietro Parolin, persists in maintaining a Secret Accord with the Homicidal Chinese Communist Party Regime, whereby their “co-accordists” decapitate the Body of Christ in China, and substitute Chairman Xi in place of Jesus, is calling on us all, including our “Vatican-betrayed” brethren in China, to “come out of cramped spaces” and “walk in the light of love.”
That’s “rich.”
Yep. You have it right. Except we might make note of the overall entropic moral sloth that currently passes for Catholic witness from Rome. Unless I missed it, I’m still waiting for a prominent prelate, anywhere, just one prelate, to publicly announce to the world that Catholics hold to the truth that raping a child is an intrisically evil thing to do.
At times with the first gush of victory papal admonitions appear the same old same all. That illusion of victory has passed, the U.S. now drawn into an increasing, complex spread of hostilities.
A visibly battered foe, most military assets presumed demolished, except for tenacity and hidden missile sites, retains a crushing grip on our most valuable, private assets. Oil flow through the Strait of Hormuz.
Netanyahu has played Pres Trump like a fiddle convincing him the decapitation of command would spell defeat for our common enemy. Israel has behaved excessively in Gaza and Lebanon to the detriment of Christians.
Now, perhaps, the usual papal appeals for negotiation and peace do not appear so naive. Our President is struggling for a resolution, a means to avoid a non ending war, the resumption of oil flow, the stability of world economies.
President Trump, his advisors require our prayers and support. If an administration that has achieved so much good loses its balance and falls, the Church and the world will suffer greatly because of it.
“Netanyahu has played Pres Trump like a fiddle convincing him the decapitation of command would spell defeat for our common enemy”
What a lot of CRAP!
Whether one is a fan of Donald Trump or not I think most of us understand that no one plays him like a fiddle.
Well, how about a viola de gamba?
Yes, wholeheartedly, especially to your last comment.
A dire situation today, but one added perspective might be this: how would things look in a few years, instead, if Iran’s cards included nuclear blackmail?
Peter Beaulieu. Although we’re in a difficult bind, unexpected since strategic forecasts: civilian rebellion, collapse of hierarchical structure, complete destruction of delivery systems didn’t occur, the resiliency of the Iranians, the effectiveness of their drones – I certainly hope we eventually meet the objective of at least pushing back, and to continually degrade their nuclear capability.
Since we had already destroyed their major nuclear development sites with the B-2 stealth bombings, there was only an alleged stockpile of uranium that we could have eventually detected and destroyed. The Strait had remained open. At the moment the decision to go all out hoping to topple the government has failed. Iran’s hold of the Strait of Hormuz has to be resolved. A major dilemma.
Given the vast cultural divide, the initial goal of eliminating a nuclear capability, the navy, and ballistic missile program was precise and coherent, before assuming a western style regime change in a non-western context.
About that context, what if what we’re dealing with is not radical Islam, but rather the absorbed Zoroastrian (and Persian) ingredient. Meaning that the world rejects the peace of cosmopolitan Islam because the fallen world is the doings of a second and evil deity, and not a sin “original”, instead, to ourselves (Islam rejects the Redemption because it does not recognize original sin). A small step, then, even in the 21st century to see the outside world and the west as Satan.
A bit of clumsiness for some clericalists and witless journalists to use interchangeably the term interreligious and interfaith.
To oppose this war is to favor the status quo, which is Iran killing many thousands of its own citizens, as it did in January, to continue funding and supplying weapons to terrorists – Hezbollah, Hamas, Houthi’s, to issue fatwas against foreign leaders, etc. Just as those who believe that this war fits Just War criteria, and must accept the consequences, those who oppose it should state clearly that they accept the consequences (listed above) of continuing the status quo.
All well and good, but where and how to go from here while people are still dying and suffering?
You must mean the 20,000 Iranians who were murdered by their islamic mullah leaders.
I believe most of “the narratives” and attempts at explanation fail to grasp the fundamental situation.
It appears that the fundamental situation is that The Islamic Revolutionary Regime, an ally of homicidal empire of Red China and homicidal empire of Russia, intends that the world and its own people submit to its conventional terror, until such time as they acquire nuclear weapons, when the world will be told to submit to its nuclear terror.
As the Islamic Revolutionary Regime has been content to have the world and its own captive Iranian people live in terror for 50 years, it is time now to turn the script against them, and provide for the Islamic Revolutionary Regime that they will now themselves live in fear every day, year in and year out, until their power is somehow brought to an end.
If they are unwilling to end this voluntarily, they should live in constant threat of annihilation, because annihilation of others is the only thing they live for.
While the Pope and the bishops continue to endanger us, our families and our children by protecting people whose first evidence of ethical behavior is to disregard and violate our laws by entering illegally.
An illegal alien, released into the United States by the Biden administration, is now charged with murdering 18-year-old Sheridan Gorman, a freshman at Loyal University in the sanctuary city of Chicago, Illinois.
https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2026/03/23/illegal-alien-charged-murder-sheridan-gorman/
Feds Charge Azerbaijan Migrant with $90M Healthcare Fraud
Federal prosecutors have charged an Azerbaijani national with perpetrating $90 million in healthcare fraud.
Anar Rustamov, 39, “who appears to have entered the United States illegally,” has been indicted on 14 counts of allegedly orchestrating a scheme to file thousands of false claims for medical equipment with the Medicare Advantage program, according to a statement by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of California.
https://www.breitbart.com/crime/2026/03/23/feds-charge-azerbaijan-migrant-90m-healthcare-fraud/
Pape Leo and non-Muslims to convert to Islam to avoid death by these punishments from God natural disasters floods wildfires strong earthquakes more mag 7 earthquake tsunami volcano meteorites plane crash in Europe in Africa in Asia in Pacific Ocean in North and South America March 24, 2026 and to avoid hell if the world end of the world on March 27, 2026 Surah Al-Imran 85/3.