Day 6: The Eucharist

The sixth day of the Saint Anthony Novena turns to a dimension of the saint's life that runs through his preaching, his miracles, and his theology: his profound Catholic devotion to the Most Holy Eucharist. The Miracle of the Mule (treated on Day 2 of this novena) is only one of many Eucharistic incidents in the saint's life, and his sermons preserve some of the most beautiful passages of medieval Catholic Eucharistic theology.

Today's invocation

O glorious Saint Anthony of Padua... (the full opening prayer)

Today's meditation

The thirteenth century in which Saint Anthony preached was the great age of Catholic Eucharistic devotion. The Fourth Lateran Council in 1215 (six years before Anthony entered the Franciscan Order) had definitively defined the Catholic doctrine of transubstantiation, the technical theological term for the change of the substance of bread and wine into the substance of the Body and Blood of Christ at the consecration of the Mass. The Solemnity of Corpus Christi (the great Catholic feast of the Eucharist celebrated on the Thursday after Trinity Sunday) was instituted in 1264 (just over thirty years after Anthony's death) at the urging of Catholic theologians like Saint Thomas Aquinas, whose Eucharistic hymns (the Pange Lingua, the Adoro Te Devote, the Tantum Ergo) are still prayed by Catholics today.

Anthony's preaching against the Albigensian denial of the Eucharist was part of this thirteenth-century Catholic Eucharistic flourishing. His sermons include extensive expositions of the Eucharistic doctrine, drawing on the Sacred Scriptures (particularly John 6, the Bread of Life Discourse), on the Catholic patristic tradition, and on his own deep personal experience of Eucharistic adoration. Modern critical editions of Anthony's Sermons preserve passages on the Eucharist that bear comparison with the great Catholic Eucharistic theologians of any age.

The traditional iconography of Saint Anthony often includes a Eucharistic motif: the saint preaching to a kneeling mule (the Miracle of the Mule), the saint elevating the Host at Mass, or the saint kneeling before the tabernacle in adoration. The Catholic devotion to him as a Eucharistic saint runs through the eight centuries of his veneration.

Today's intention

Today, in addition to your principal intention, ask Saint Anthony for a deepening of your own Catholic Eucharistic life. Saint Anthony of Padua, you preached the Eucharist with such fervor that even a mule was converted. Awaken in me the same Eucharistic fervor. Make me hungry for Holy Communion. Draw me to Eucharistic adoration before the tabernacle.

If at all possible, make a holy hour of Eucharistic adoration today, or attend a daily Mass in addition to your usual Sunday obligation. The Catholic tradition has long observed that the daily Mass and the weekly holy hour are among the most spiritually fruitful Catholic disciplines, and the Saint Anthony Novena is a fitting occasion to begin or to deepen them.

Reflection

The Catholic spiritual tradition has long observed that the saints' devotion to the Eucharist is the surest sign of their sanctity. The soul truly conformed to Christ has, almost without exception, a profound personal relationship with Christ in the Eucharist. The Catholic faithful who wish to imitate the saints in any age are pointed first toward the Eucharist: the daily or weekly Mass, the periodic holy hour, the silent visit to the tabernacle, the careful reception of Holy Communion in the state of grace. These are the disciplines that have made saints in every Catholic century, and they are the disciplines that continue to make them in our own.

Saint Anthony's particular Eucharistic devotion is offered to the Catholic faithful as a model: the soul that loves the Eucharist as Anthony loved it, and that preaches the Eucharist as Anthony preached it (in our own ordinary Catholic conversations and witness, rather than in his public sermons), is participating in the same Catholic Eucharistic mission that has run through the Franciscan tradition for eight centuries.

Closing prayers

Conclude with the Our Father, the Hail Mary, and the Glory Be, and if at all possible the Anima Christi.

Saint Anthony of Padua, who preached the Eucharist, intercede for us. Make us hungry for the Lord Jesus in Holy Communion.