Hi! My name is Sophie, I’m 19 this year and I graduated from EJC in 2020.
Throughout JC, I was getting more preoccupied with my social life, grades, and mental health, and had a lot of inertia that hindered me from going to church. Not only that, with masses going online during circuit breaker, I had no incentive to watch online masses when I did not feel any pull towards God in this season of my life. However, God was still working to pull me back closer to Him. Around April this year, I began booking morning masses three times a week with other parish friends before going for community activities afterwards. However, I am far from being a morning person. And so I struggled greatly to wake up on those days to reach church in time, and the only thing that motivated me to continue going was less because of God and more because everyone else was doing it. But God works through even my need for social conformity to draw me closer to Him. It was through that one month of painfully early mornings that I grew to fall in love with the mass, of which the Eucharist was a significant part of.
A quote from St John of Bosco says: We do not go to Holy Communion because we are good; we go to become good.
As mass became a more regular part of my life, I had to relearn a healthier perception of God and redevelop my relationship with Him. Now I have come to realize that the beauty of God is that he calls us closer to Him, not for Himself but for us. Jesus did not come to heal the healthy but the sick, and in the same way, the Eucharist is our medicine and life support just as we are wounded and broken. As I look at the Eucharist, He gives me a sense of peace, peace not in the absence of problems, but in the knowledge that God is with me; That no matter how tired or imperfect I may feel, the Eucharist is there to nourish and strengthen me, and it is a testament to God’s love for me, with His desire to be in such intimate union with me.
Brothers and sisters, I would like to invite you to see the precious Body and Blood of Christ raised up above the altar and be reminded of how Jesus died on the cross for each one of us. See and believe that He wants to be in you, and you in Him. Despite the busyness of school, will you accept this invitation from Him to His heavenly feast and let Him love you as you are?
