Most Holy Body and Blood of Jesus (Corpus Christi) 2025
Did you know that Lake George wasn’t always called Lake George?
Back in 1646, the Jesuit missionary St. Isaac Jogues gave it a more sacred name:
Lac Saint Sacrement—Lake of the Blessed Sacrament.
He saw this vast, sparkling lake as a symbol of the Eucharist—something that nourishes, refreshes, and sustains. The lake was sacred because it reminded him of the Real Presence of Jesus, offered in the Blessed Sacrament.
About a century later, British forces renamed it Lake George during the French and Indian War, in honor of King George II. But I have to say… I kind of prefer the first name, don’t you?
I thought of that image again this week as I prayed with today’s Gospel.
We find ourselves with Jesus and His disciples surrounded by a great crowd—thousands of people, in the middle of nowhere, hungry. They had followed Jesus, listening to Him teach, hoping for healing, craving hope. And now… their stomachs are growling.
So the disciples come to Jesus with what sounds like a pretty reasonable suggestion:
“Send them away so they can get something to eat.”
And Jesus gives what sounds like a completely unreasonable response:
“You give them something to eat.”
Can you imagine their faces?
“Us? Really? We’ve done the math, Jesus—five loaves, two fish, five thousand people. It’s not going to cut it.”
But Jesus doesn’t ask them to solve the problem. He doesn’t expect them to feed the crowd from their own resources.
He simply says, Bring me what you have.
And in His hands, that not-enough becomes more than enough.
That’s what the Eucharist is.
At every Mass, we do the same.
We bring what we have—our time, our prayers, our efforts, our week, our joys, our exhaustion. It’s not always much.
But we place it in His hands—and He gives it back to us transformed.
He gives us Himself. His Body. His Blood.
Poured out for us. Abundant. Overflowing.
Like Lac Saint Sacrement.
But here’s the thing we sometimes forget:
The Eucharist isn’t just something we receive.
It’s something we become.
After feeding the five thousand, Jesus doesn’t say, “Now everyone relax.”
He says, in effect, “Now you’ve seen what God can do. Go do likewise.”
Go nourish the world.
Go comfort the lonely.
Go forgive your enemies.
Go serve the poor.
You give them something to eat.
We can’t just consume the Eucharist and go home unchanged.
We are sent out to be living tabernacles, carrying Christ into our families, our workplaces, our towns.
So maybe the question this week is simple:
What small gift am I being asked to place in Jesus’ hands?
And who in my life is hungry—for love, for hope, for belonging?
Because Jesus is still speaking those words to His disciples—to us:
“You give them something to eat.”
And just like those disciples, we may not feel like we have enough.
But if we trust Him, if we offer what we have, He will take it, bless it, and multiply it.
The Blessed Sacrament doesn’t end at this altar—it overflows into our lives.
So may we receive Him today with grateful hearts—and then go out and feed a hungry world.
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