I have been following the meditations of Fr. Jose A. Pagola.  His meditation on this feast says so many of the things I experience and have tried to say.  Pardon my reproducing his meditation for this Sunday.

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Sociological studies point out with hard facts that Christians in Western countries are giving up Sunday Mass.  The structure that the celebration of Mass has acquired over the centuries is no longer capable of nourishing the faith of people or bringing them to bond with the community of Jesus.

The surprising thing is that we are allowing the Mass to be lost to us without this fact causing hardly any reaction among us.  Isn’t the Eucharist the center of Christian life?  How can we remain passive without being able to take any action?  Why does the hierarchy remain silent and stuck?  Why don’t we believers express our concern and pain more forcefully?

The dislike for the Mass keeps growing even among those who unconditionally take part in it in a responsible manner.  It is the exemplary fidelity of these minorities that sustains communities, but can the Mass continue to survive based on preventive measures to assure compliance with the present rite?

Inevitably these questions must be asked:

Does not the church at the center need an experience of a livelier and culturally adapted supper of the Lord than the present liturgy provides?

Are we so sure that we are doing today what Jesus wished us to do in memory of him?

Is the liturgy we have been repeating for hundreds of years the best way to help believers live what Jesus lived in that unforgettable supper in which is concentrated, recapitulated and manifested what he lived and died for?

Is it what can most draw us to live as his disciples at the service of his project of the kingdom of God?

     Today everything seems to be working against the reform of the Mass.  Yet reform seems more necessary than ever if the church wishes to live in vital contact with Jesus.  It will be a long journey.  The change will come about when the church feels an urgent need to remember Jesus and live by his Spirit.  For that, even now, it will be most responsible not to absent ourselves from Mass, but to contribute to the conversion to Jesus Christ.