JULY 1, 2018
12:00 NOON EXTRAORDINARY FORM (LATIN) MASS
Today we celebrate the First Class Feast of the Most Precious Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ.
The feast was initially commemorated on the Friday of Fourth Week of Lent.
In 1849, the Blessed Pope Pius IX fled Rome during an uprising. A truce was signed on July 1; and in honor of a restoration of peace, the Holy Father extended the Feast of the Precious Blood to all of Christendom.
Later that year, he included it in the General Roman Calendar for the first Sunday in July; and in a simplification of the calendar, it was moved to July 1.
Pope Saint John XXIII raised it to the level of first class, and in the revised Missal of 1969, it was removed … and reduced to a votive Mass.
In the middle of the 15th century, Franciscans and Dominicans – in the presence of Pope Pius II – debated whether the Precious Blood was an essential part, or merely a concomitant part of Our Lord’s sacred humanity. One hundred years later, the Council of Trent stated that the Precious Blood was indeed part of Christ the Lord. (I don’t know if the debate was an error in theology or biology, but I’m glad it’s been settled.)
Closely associated with the Sacred Heart – which is sometimes devotionally referred to as the “wine cellar of the Precious Blood.”
Emeritus Pope Benedict XVI spoke in England in 2010, saying: “The outpouring of Christ’s blood is the source of the Church’s life.” And that the Precious Blood is represented “by the martyrs of every age, who drank from the cup which Christ himself drank, and whose own blood, shed in union with his sacrifice, gives new life to the Church.”
The martyr comes from the Greek word for “witness,” and the Emeritus Holy Father encourages us to be “witnesses of the beauty of holiness, witnesses of the splendour of truth, witnesses of the joy and freedom born of a living relationship with Christ!”
As we approach this altar to receive the Sacred Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ – may we remain united to Him in His Mystical Body the Church … and may His Blood course through our veins … so that He may increase the Divine Life of Grace within us … more and more … each day.
