A Sermon for the Feast of Corpus Christi

Extract

The glad commemoration of the feast which is kept to-day, Very Reverend Fathers, urges us to continue rejoicing in the praises ofthe most holy Body of Christ. For what is more sweet, what more delightful to the hearts of the elect, than to proclaim the depth ofdivine charity and to praise the fires of abounding love? By the hands of his priests, at the table of the New Covenant, he offers unceasingly his flesh for food and his precious blood for drink, to his sons, the heirs of the kingdom which God has promised to those who love him.

These works are thine, O Christ of immense power and overflowing goodness, who in this most sacred and supersubstantial bread hast devised a truly adorable and wonderful traffic, a memorial of former wonders; so that they who by eating of the forbidden tree fell sick and lost the unfading crown of eternal glory, may find a cure by feeding on the spotless and undefiled Lamb, Jesus Christ.

O ceaseless outpouring of divine goodness and most generous compassion, wonderful in our eyes and worthy of all praise, in which is set forth among us in this sacrament the fulfilment of all sacrifice until the end of time; by which the sons of adoption are refreshed with the bread of angels and made drunk with the charity of the sons of God!

O singular lowliness! pleasing unto God and proclaimed by him, which dreads no one’s dwelling nor fears the shelter offered by any man’s belly.