Testimony: Finding Jesus in the Eucharist

As a lifelong Catholic, I spent many years going through the motions of Mass, catechism class, sacramental preparation, and prayer, without allowing myself to appreciate the beauty of our faith. For a time as an adult, I even drifted away from going to church altogether. Often, even when I was present, I had zero realization of, or respect for, the Real Presence of Jesus Christ in the Eucharist.

I allowed myself to be disconnected. I didn’t desire to encounter him and accept his unconditional love found in his sacrifice and resurrection in the Eucharist. I didn’t appreciate the gift before me in the person of our Savior. Little did I know that his Body and Blood would become my point of conversion back to the faith I was baptized into. A fall morning Mass in Ordinary Time changed everything for me—not what I believed, but what I experienced.

I took my seat in the third row near the choir, which I’d been settling into for the past three years since I made my return to church. I was attending Mass because my wife had convinced me the kids needed the example of their father, if we were going to raise them Catholic. You could have called me an unwilling participant.

However, this day, instead of mentally checking out and simply being physically present, my attention remained on the words being offered throughout the entire liturgy. It was during the Eucharistic Prayer, at the moment when Christ’s Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity take the place of bread and wine, that I began to cry. “Holy tears,” as I would later learn they are called, flowed from my eyes, trickling down my cheeks.

Maybe for the first time ever, I realized Christ was in front of me in the Eucharist. There he was, for me, accepting me as I was: present but so distant, broken but loved.

There were no lightning bolts or shaking of the Earth at the instant I noticed him. Instead, there was a gentle peace. Our Lord connected with me at that moment to snap me out of the apathy I had allowed to consume me.

In a second, my road to conversion took a turn I never expected. When I received him in Holy Communion that day, I knew there was something different and I was being remade. This was not the first time he showed up in the Eucharist; it was just the first time I was willing to embrace him.

He had been calling to me since the day of my birth, but I had shut our Lord out. I took the riches of faith that were being offered and shoved them aside for worldly things that could never fulfill me. In a way, you could say it was this “Prodigal Son” moment that finally made me feel “at home” in his presence. He embraced me in the Eucharist, and I never wanted to let go ever again.

Conversion of the heart takes place through the Holy Spirit when we stop running from what is true and allow our entire being to recognize Christ’s love; in this case, for me, it’s the source and summit of our Catholic faith found in the Eucharist.

There weren’t hundreds of changes I needed to make in my life to find Jesus in the Eucharist. I didn’t have to go back to school, nor did I need to memorize specific Scripture verses. I needed to allow Christ into places in myself I was never willing to expose before. I had to be brave enough to surrender everything I was holding back in my heart from God.

By offering myself, I became aware how much he was offering me. I began to feel his presence and then allow everything he was and is to consume every part of me from the moment I received Holy Communion.

We can walk away from a lot of things in religion, even dismiss the everyday faith and real-life moments that occur in the world around us. However, we cannot deny the moment we feel our heart come alive because we have found all of Christ in the Supper of the Lord.

If we begin to accept how deeply he wants to give himself unconditionally over and over in this sacrament, no matter what happens or where we have been, nothing will ever be able to tear us away from our Catholic faith.

Greg Wasinski is an internationally recognized Catholic inspirational speaker and author from Cleveland, OH. His latest book is Unconditionally: Finding Jesus in the Eucharist. He also offers his radio talents as a daily contributor to SiriusXM Radio’s Catholic Channel with his “Faith and Real Life Moments.”