How to Get the Most out of the Eucharist, part 4

From How to Get the Most Out of the Eucharist by Michael Dubruiel

OFFERING OUR S.A.C.R.I.F.I.C.E. AT THE EUCHARIST

Over the past four years I have given a series of talks on this topic. I found it helpful to come up with an easy-to-remember mnemonic device based on the word sacrifice. Each letter of S.A.C.R.I.F.I.C.E.stands for an action or attitude that,if fostered, will help us to get the most out of the Eucharist.The nine letters stand for:

S… Serve

A… Adore

C… Confess

R… Respond 

I… Incline
F… Fast
I… Invite
C… Commune
E… Evangelize
These actions and attitudes correspond specifically to certain parts of the Liturgy but they are also applicable to how we live out our Christian life.They offer a plan by which we can live out a spirituality of the Eucharist. The following chapters illustrate how each of the actions and attitudes listed here can be applied to the celebration of the Eucharist.At the end of each chapter there are five additional helps:

1. Keep Your Focus on Jesus offers a way to reflect on the action or attitude being discussed in the life and ministry of Jesus.

2. Learn from the Blessed Virgin Mary offers Our Lady as a guide for getting the most from the Eucharist. Mary is the perfect Christian and looking to her is the perfect way to learn how to follow her son Jesus.Pope John Paul II has said, “If we wish to rediscover in all its richness the profound relationship between the Church and the Eucharist,we cannot neglect Mary, Mother and model of the Church. . . . Mary can guide us towards this most holy sacrament, because she herself has a profound relationship with it.”

3   Attitude to Foster offers a simple verse taken from Scripture to help internalize the attitude or action.

4. Developing a Eucharistic Spirituality offers suggestions for putting the action or attitude into practice in our daily lives.

5. A Prayer for Today offers a prayer to recite or practice to help internalize the action or attitude.

There are also other suggestions throughout the book drawn from the teachings of the Catholic Church. The method being proposed here is simple: We must let go of our judgmental attitude and replace it with a sacrificial attitude.This is so simple, in fact, that in each section I have included a lesson I have learned about putting this into practice from my three-year-old son, Joseph.You’ll find that when you approach the Eucharist with the attitude that you have a sacrifice to offer, there will be no end of things to offer God at every Eucharistic celebration!