What is the source and summit of the Christian life? Is it feeding the poor and alleviating world poverty? Is it a holy life or the witness of a saint? Is it a life dedicated to self-sacrifice and service of others?
The Christian life is many things and it is certainly all of these. However, the source and summit of the Christian life is the gift of the Eucharist. It is this act of worship that reaches the very height, the very essence, the pinnacle of what the Christian life is. This is because the Christian life is Jesus Christ. To know him, love him and follow him.
In the Eucharist Jesus enters us and we enter Jesus. We consume him and he consumes us. The Eucharist is food: food for this life and food for the next. We are composed of body and soul. Just as food feeds our physical bodies, so the Eucharist feeds our souls.
As human beings we have profound needs: we need to know we are loved; we need to have meaning and purpose in our lives; we need to have hope in a destiny and future beyond the grave. The Eucharist answers these deep questions about human existence. The reason the Eucharist is the source and summit of the Christian life is because the meaning of life is to know Jesus. In the Eucharist we meet him in the most real and authentic of ways. Unlike mountaineers who strive with every fiber of their being to reach the summit of towering peaks, we simply receive the Eucharist as a gift. We can’t earn it, we don’t deserve it: it is God’s greatest gift to us.