There’s more than one way to appreciate the Eucharist

As soon as we started “The Spiritual Life,” I knew I wanted to have Adriana Trigiani, the New York Times bestselling novelist and author of the new book, The View from Lake Como, on the podcast. She’s a fun, lively and articulate woman who I’ve come to know from her own podcast (I’ve been a guest), and I thought that her ebullient personality would be a great addition to our conversations.

I wasn’t wrong! Adriana, who (like me) comes from an Italian background, who (unlike me) was raised in Appalachia and who has been throughout her varied career a writer, director and producer (I can claim only “writer”), is also a faithful Catholic who loves talking about her faith.

Our conversation ranges from the importance of what she calls “authentic prayer” with God, her feeling that one should only pray for other people (rather than for oneself), the importance of having a dedicated physical prayer space, the need for journaling one’s spiritual experiences (she gives some great tips) and the importance of Mary in her life, as someone who “shows up” even when times are bad.

But what stood out for me the most in our conversation was something that not many of our guests have focused on as clearly as Adriana did: the centrality of the Eucharist in her spiritual life. “What has gotten me and kept me Roman Catholic is the breaking of the bread,” she said. She believes—as I do, of course—in what Catholics call the “real presence,” the belief that Jesus is made really, truly and fully present in the bread and wine thanks to the action of the Mass.

I wasn’t surprised that a Catholic would be devoted to the Eucharist. What touched me most were the various ways that Adriana understands it. Some of this has to do with her Italian-American family background. She sees a natural continuum between her family’s love for cooking and sharing meals and the Eucharist. “The most important thing we would do together is to cook and put on meals,” she said. And for her, the most important thing about the Catholic Church is also the meal par excellence: the Eucharist. She calls it “really God and spirituality made manifest.”

The breaking of the bread, she says, also represents people coming together during the Mass, each showing up “in whatever state they’re in.” Her devotion was fostered by the Glenmary Sisters, a religious order that ministers to underserved communities, especially in Appalachia, during Masses held in a simple basement church with folding chairs and homemade banners. 

There have always been many wonderful ways to understand the Eucharist, in addition to the real presence. I’m no liturgical theologian, but I think it’s fair to say that the two main ways of understanding it would be as sacrifice (Christ’s sacrifice on the cross) and as a meal (a “re-presentation,” as theologians say, of the Last Supper). Of course, it is both. When the priest says, “Take this all of you and eat of it, for this is my Body, which will be given up for you,” both aspects—sacrifice and meal—are present.

Christ offers up his body on the cross, but he offers it in other ways as well: taking his body from place to place during his public ministry, from Nazareth to Capernaum to Cana to Jericho to Nain to Samaria, to many other places in Galilee and Judea, and finally to Jerusalem. During those times, Jesus also shared meals with his apostles, disciples and followers. The list of meals (and “food miracles”) recorded in the Gospels is almost too long to include here. So meal and sacrifice are both present in the church’s understanding of the Eucharist because they were both present in Jesus’ life.

When I say the words of consecration, I often think of these two dualities of the Eucharist. Not only meal/sacrifice, but what you might call Last Supper/public ministry. In other words, Jesus offered us his body and invited us to a meal not only during the Last Supper and on the cross, but during his public ministry. And the Eucharist encourages me to “offer myself” as much as I can in my own life.

I really enjoyed listening to Adriana talk about her love of the Eucharist and, of course, Jesus. There is nothing like hearing someone on fire with their faith to help you in your own faith journey. I know you’ll enjoy our rich, lively and often fun conversation as well.