Why she’s called Mother of the Eucharist

In his 2003 encyclical letter Ecclesia de Eucharistia, Pope St. John Paul II goes into detail about Mary’s relationship to the Holy Eucharist, telling us “Mary can guide us towards this most holy sacrament, because she herself has a profound relationship with it.” 

Mary was present at Pentecost and the first eucharistic celebrations, he continues, and was “a ‘woman of the Eucharist’ in her whole life. The Church, which looks to Mary as a model, is also called to imitate her in her relationship with this holy mystery.” Hence, “Mary can act as our ‘support and guide’ in our devotion to the Eucharist.” 

He concludes, “If the Church and the Eucharist are inseparably united, the same ought to be said of Mary and the Eucharist. This is one reason why, since ancient times, the commemoration of Mary has always been part of the Eucharistic celebrations of the Churches of East and West.” 

WHAT’S IN A NAME?

Sister Joseph Andrew Bogdanowicz, a founding member of the Dominican Sisters of Mary, Mother of the Eucharist, believes her community’s name encapsulates the emphasis of the order because “like Mary, we are spiritual mothers in the Church, and we do a daily Holy Hour and are devoted to the Eucharist.” 

She recalled that when founding the community in 1997, Mary, Mother of the Eucharist was not a well-known title of the Blessed Mother. She noted that it was used by St. John Eudes, known for his devotion to Mary and the Eucharist, and more recently by John Paul II. She and the sisters were drawn to the title, she said, “because the best way we can realize that the Eucharist is truly Christ’s body, blood, soul, and divinity is to realize He had a human mother, with a human body, and that His DNA came from her.”

Quoting John Paul II, Joseph Andrew continued, the Eucharist has the “taste and aroma” of the Blessed Mother.

Mary points us to Christ, she believes. She is unique in the Church because “she was His first tabernacle, and she joined with St. Joseph to form the first Corpus Christi procession.” Unlike us, “she is totally open to Him, and can help us in our struggle to become saints.”

While eucharistic adoration developed later in the history of the Church, Mary certainly attended the eucharistic celebrations of the early Church, the Dominican said. “Scripture tells us Jesus entrusted her to the care of St. John, so she would have had regular access to the Eucharist through him,” she added.

Joseph Andrew encourages all Catholics to grow closer to Christ through Mary. “She won’t let us down, and Jesus loves it that we go to Him through her,” she said.

TITLE BORNE OF FAITH

Gloria Falcão Dodd of the International Marian Research Institute at the University of Dayton believes the title Mary, Mother of the Eucharist logically flows from basic Catholic belief: “If the Eucharist is Jesus, and Mary the mother of Jesus, it makes sense that she is Mother of the Eucharist.”

While Mary exemplifies many virtues, Dodd believes her particular virtues of faith and love especially lead us to Christ. “If we are to believe as Mary did that Jesus is God — remember at the Annunciation the angel said her child would be ‘Son of the Most High’ — we can have a faith in Him like hers that perseveres,” explained Dodd, who holds a doctorate in sacred theology. “So much so that when a need arises — like when there is no wine at the wedding feast at Cana — we can approach Him [as she did], and He will act.”

Referencing Pope St. Paul VI’s 1964 dogmatic constitution Lumen Gentium, Dodd believes that like Mary we can advance on a “pilgrimage of faith” so that we can “keep our faith even at the foot of the Cross, believing God’s word to be true.”

Mary’s love also leads us to Christ. Mary gave her whole life to Christ as His mother and as a perpetual virgin, Dodd noted, “leading a sinless life.” We, too, should want to follow Christ as closely as we can, “walking with Him through death into eternal life.” 

When we attend Mass, we must try to look with the eyes of faith and see Christ on the cross, “standing with Him in love, and receiving Him in love in the Holy Eucharist as the Apostles did at the Last Supper,” she said. “In faith and love, Mary shows us how to follow Christ.”

MEETING THE EUCHARISTIC CHRIST THROUGH MARY

Father Edward Looney, a priest of the Diocese of Green Bay and president of the Mariological Society of Mary, notes that many Marian apparitions promote reception of the Holy Eucharist. One example was when Mary at Fatima asked the young visionary Lucia to share the Five First Saturdays devotion, one condition of which includes reception of Holy Communion. 

Even Mary’s requests for a church to be built, such as occurred at the apparitions of Lourdes and Guadalupe, imply eucharistic devotion, he continued, as Catholic churches contain tabernacles where Our Lord is present.

Looney said that in his life he has “a profound sense of Mary being an intercessor, through which I am able to attain many graces.” 

He encouraged those Catholics who have little devotion to Mary begin by “praying to Jesus, asking Him to introduce you to His mother. His last act on the Cross was giving Mary not only to the Apostle John but to all of us.”