Eat Well to Live Well By Rev Fr Paulinus Ike Ogara

Eat Well to Live Well

By Rev Fr Paulinus Ike Ogara

Food is a basic human need. It is in fact the third most essential requirement for life after air and water. Without the nutrients that the body receives from the food we eat, it cannot perform necessary functions. That much we know about food. Food is an essential requirement for the growth and maintenance of the human body. If the world seems to be obsessed with the idea of food security this is the reason. Man does not live on bread alone, but by the same token, man cannot survive without bread. 

Unfortunately, when it comes to the question of feeding the soul, that simple recognition is too often absent. The problem today is not that people do not feed their bodies but that they do not feed their souls. They are not bothered that they do not receive holy communion. Such people should be reminded that the human person is a composite of body and soul and that just as the body requires physical bread to stay alive, so does the soul require spiritual bread to stay alive. What is more, spiritual food is more important than physical food because it brings about spiritual health and conduces to salvation and eternal life. 

It is all about feeding well and staying healthy spiritually. We all know the importance of healthy eating. This is the great gift our Lord has given us in the Eucharist. The Eucharist contains Christ himself and is therefore rightly described as the soul of the Church and the medicine of immortality. As it were, those who do not receive communion do not eat well and naturally cannot live well spiritually. They are spiritually malnourished and endangered. That is what Jesus meant when he said: "Except you eat the flesh of the Son of man, you shall not have life in you”(John 6:53). 

That is the hallmark of today's liturgical celebration. We celebrate the Lord who, for love of us, has reduced himself to food. We are thankful that he is with us always, quenching our thirsts, satisfying our hungers. Of all the the ways through which our souls receive nourishment, the Eucharist is the richest and most important. In the Eucharist, the Lord has served us a balanced diet, complete with all the graces we need to function properly in the spiritual life. We have all we need to eat well and live well. 

May God give us the grace to receive him worthily in the Blessed Sacrament. And may the reception of the body and blood of Jesus bring us closer to God, strengthen the bond between us and heal our bodies. Happy feast day!