Friday, 27 August 2021 08:21

Feast of Saint Eymard

Each year August the 2nd is a very important day for the Eymardian family in celebrating the feast of Peter-Julian Eymard, particularly since Pope John Paul II named him in the decree of 1995 “an eminent apostle of the Eucharist” among all the faithful. Our religious family continues to promote the Eucharistic mission inherited from the founder about the Eucharist being the centre of Christian life and the renewing energy of society and the world.

Very often, in each sociocultural context where the Blessed Sacrament Congregation is present in the world, the Eucharistic mission is lived and promoted in a slightly different way depending on the creativity of the religious, although the Eucharist encompasses the entire human reality.

In the Colombian cultural and religious tradition, people are freer at weekends to participate in religious activities such as the celebration of the Eucharist. Thus, it makes sense that the religious of Colombia celebrated the feast of the founder, on Sunday, August 1, to foster a greater participation by the faithful of our SSS communities.

 

Triduum “Let us walk in faith with Saint Peter-Julian Eymard”

 

Feast of Saint Eymard 1

The community of the Vocational House held a Triduum in preparation for the Founder’s feast on the theme “Let us walk in faith with Saint Peter-Julian Eymard”. This was aimed at assisting the faithful of the local com-munity to gain a better appreciation of our Eucharistic spirituality and to know some-thing about the charism of the Founder. The majority have no knowledge of our spiri-tuality; though coming to our community, they live disconnected from our Eucharistic source.

In this perspective, the triduum this year presented a programme that focused on a brief approach to the life of the founder by holding a formative session that took place after the Eucharistic celebration on the first day. On the 2nd day, the same logic continued, showing how Eymardian Eucharistic spirituality was constantly nourished by the word of God through a structure linking the word with Eucharistic reflections. Finally, the last day was concluded with Eucharistic worship outside of Mass, using the method of the four (4) ends of sacrifice, thus extending the preceding Eucharistic celebration.

In this preparatory manner, the celebration of the liturgical Feast of St Peter-Julian was brought forward to Sunday, August 1 at 9 am at the Vocational House. In accordance with our spiritual legacy regarding the prolongation of the Eucharist celebrated around the table, a meal was shared afterwards with the participants to mark this very important event in the life of our religious family.

As the last activity of this commemorative day and in accord with the tradition of our Saint John XXIII Province, all the SSS religious present in Bogotá gathered at the Corpus Christi Parish at the midday Eucharistic celebration presided over by Father Carlos José Sierra, Provincial Vicar and afterwards shared lunch concluding this festal day in the life of our little family of the Saint John XXIII Province.

 

Father Elibien Joseph, sss
Bogotá, Colombia, 2 August 2021

Last modified on Friday, 27 August 2021 08:27