Mother of the Eucharist Chapel of Perpetual Adoration
Eucharistic Adoration
By the end of the eleventh century, Eucharistic adoration as we know it, began to take shape. Until then the Real Presence was taken for granted in Catholic belief and its reservation was the common practice in catholic churches, including the chapels and oratories of religious communities. Suddenly a revolution hit the Church when Berengarius (999-1088), archdeacon of Angers in France, publicly denied that Christ was really and physically present under the species of bread and wine. Others took up the idea and began writing about the Eucharistic Christ as not exactly the Christ of the Gospels or, by implication, as not actually there. The matter became so serious that Pope Gregory VII ordered Berengarius to sign a retraction. This credo has made theological history. It was the Church’s first definitive statement of what had always been believed and never seriously challenged. The witness came from the abbot become-pope, whose faith in the Blessed Sacrament had been nourished for years in a Benedictine monastery. Pope Gregory’s teaching on the Real Presence was quoted verbatim in Pope Paul VI’s historic document Mysterium Fidei (1965) to meet a new challenge to the Eucharist in our day — very similar to what happened in the eleventh century: I believe in my heart and openly profess that the bread and wine placed upon the altar are, by the mystery of the sacred prayer and the words of the Redeemer, substantially changed into the true and life-giving flesh and blood of Jesus Christ our Lord, and that after the consecration, there is present the true body of Christ which was born of the Virgin and offered up for the salvation of the world, hung on the cross and now sits at the right hand of the Father, and that there is present the true blood of Christ which flowed from his side. They are present not only by means of a sign and of the efficacy of the Sacrament, but also in the very reality and truth of their nature and substance.
With this profession of faith, the churches of Europe began what can only be described as a Eucharistic Renaissance. Processions of the Blessed Sacrament were instituted; prescribed acts of adoration were legislated; visits to Christ in the tabernacle were encouraged; the cells of religious men and women, built next to churches, had windows made into the church to allow the religious to view and adore before the tabernacle. From the eleventh century on, devotion to the Blessed Sacrament reserved in the tabernacle became more and more prevalent in the Catholic world. At every stage in this development, members of religious orders of men and women took the lead. The Benedictine Lanfranc, as Archbishop of Canterbury, introduced from France into England numerous customs affecting the worship of the Real Presence. St. Francis of Assisi, who was never ordained a priest, had a great personal devotion to Christ in the Blessed Sacrament. His first admonition on the Holy Eucharist could not have been more precise. Sacred Scripture tells us that the Father dwells in "light inaccessible" (I Timothy 6:16) and that "God is spirit" (John 4:24) and St. John adds, "No one at any time has seen God" (John 1:18). Because God is a spirit He can be seen only in spirit; "It is the spirit that gives life; the flesh profits nothing" (John 6:63). But God the Son is equal to the Father and so He too can be seen only in the same way as the Father and the Holy Spirit. That is why all those were condemned who saw our Lord Jesus Christ in His humanity but did not see or believe in spirit in His divinity, that He was the true Son of God. In the same way now, all those are damned who see the Sacrament of the Body of Christ which is consecrated on the altar in the form of bread and wine by the words of our Lord in the hands of the priest, and do not see or believe in spirit and in God that this is really the most holy Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. It was this clear faith in Christ's presence in the Eucharist that sustained Francis during his severest trials. It was this same faith which inspired a whole new tradition among religious communities.
It is this same faith that beckons us to solemn adoration of Jesus Christ, really and truly present in the Sacrament of His most holy Body and Blood.... come, let us adore Jesus! He is waiting for you in adoration. Come to our Mother of the Eucharist Adoration Chapel located in the parish center building. Give Jesus the Christ your heart, and He will give you Heaven! Jesus is waiting for you!
The chapel is located in our parish center at 195 South Kankakee Street. Please enter through the southeast door of the center. The chapel is a place of silent prayer in the presence of Jesus Christ, truly present in the Eucharist. All are welcome, and everyone is encouraged to stop in and make regular visits during the chapel's daily hours of 5 a.m. to 11 p.m.
The chapel is located at the Parish Center at 195 South Kankakee Street. Visit the Lord and the Eucharist every day from 5:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m.
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. I place myself in the presence of Him, in whose incarnate presence I am before I place myself there. I adore thee, o my Savior, present here as God and man, in soul and body, in true flesh and blood. I acknowledge and confess and I kneel before that sacred humanity which was conceived in Mary's womb and lay in Mary's bosom; which grew up to Man's estate, and by the Sea of Galilee called the Twelve, wrought miracles, and spoke words of wisdom and peace; which in due season hung on the cross, lay in the tomb, rose from the dead, and now reigns in heaven. I praise, and bless, and give myself wholly to Him, who is the true break of my soul, and my everlasting joy.
- Blessed John Henry Newman
