The less of you and the more of Me
Bishop Fulton Sheen has talked about the law of life. He has said that life must consume food and nourish itself and if it is going to live a higher life, it must surrender itself and be consumed. For example, minerals are surrendered to plants and thus are taken up by plants and transformed and live as part of the plant. Plants are food for animals. The plants die and are consumed by animals and become part of the higher form of life. Likewise, animals are food for man.
The soul has to have nourishment. It is spiritual and requires spiritual food. Jesus has become the Spiritual food.
As we feed on the Spiritual food of Jesus, His Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity, His Love, our souls are nourished. As we feed on His words, we are nourished on God’s will. But as in nature, for a lower form of life to be raised to a higher form, the lower form must die and become transformed into the higher form. So we must die to our ways and be transformed into the self sacrificing Love of Jesus. We must die to our will and be transformed into His will.
Therefore, we must prepare to be nourished by partaking in the Bread of Life and also dying to our old self so our souls can be transformed into the higher life of Jesus.
Jesus said to Nancy, “Please partake of My Body and Blood in the state of grace and in total abandonment of your will to My Will. Separate not your state of grace and your surrender. Come before Me in this way.”
Jesus also said, “A soul cannot come to God unless the soul has surrendered its will to God’s will. God takes you deeper into Him. You abide with God and God abides with you. When God abides in a soul, you are not separate from God.”
Jesus is telling us abandonment of our will to God’s will draws us deeper and deeper into communion with God.
He said, “Begin to perceive Me through each of your senses. Then I will draw you unto Me and I will take you beyond your senses…
“You can never comprehend the greatness of God’s love. In all eternity you will soar higher in God’s love. It is endless and it will never cease.
“The more you experience God’s love, the more you will want. It is ongoing. There is so much more waiting, always.”
Therefore communion begins with communion of the senses. When we consume His Body and Blood, God will take us higher as we merge our hearts and will. He said, “When the will is merged, the heart is merged. All become one in perfect union with Me, every action, every thought, every word.”
Bishop Sheen in his book, “Life of all Living” [see bibliography], said “the law of transformation works consistently throughout the whole order of nature and the supernatural. The lower transforms itself to the higher. The plant transforms itself into animal when it is taken in as food, but man is transformed by grace and love into Christ. When he takes Christ into his soul as food, for the quality of love is to transform itself into the object loved…
“When I receive Holy Communion, I receive Christ, this does not mean that my substance becomes His substance… But it does mean that Christ comes in me to vivify me and transform my activities so that I love what He loves, I hate what He hates, I will what He wills, His interest become my interests, His affections become my affections, His desires become my desires.”
Therefore, as we begin to commune through the senses, God then, takes us into a communion of Love. This communion of love occurs more and more as we approach the Eucharistic table prepared with our hearts and wills merged in the self sacrificing love which is Jesus.
Jesus said, “I am a living sacrifice of love,” and “I am the Cross.” Communion is more complete and lasting the more we are in union with the cross, which is Jesus, a living sacrifice of love… “The less of you, the more of Me.”