Eucharist, stronger families are antidote to secularism – bishop

By REGINA LINSKEY
Catholic News Service
Quebec City

Catholics who rely on family members and the Eucharist can better resist secularization, Bishop Edward Braxton told pilgrims at the International Eucharistic Congress.

Braxton, bishop of Belleville, Ill., noted that the family in the Western Hemisphere "has changed dramatically."

Citing statistics that only 25 per cent of American families are made up of a mother, father and children, he said changes in the family and decreased attention on the family dinner have made the meal "merely feeding time."

"We are challenged not to imitate secular society," which can undermine the family and marriage, said the bishop.

The family "relies on the Eucharist" by praying and going to Mass together as well as having a family discussion of the homily, he said.

"There is nothing wrong with telling children" to turn off the computer and TV and "every distraction to pray," he said.

Braxton was one of several U.S. prelates who spoke to pilgrims June 16 about what the Eucharist is and how its meaning can be applied and enriched in family and Church life.

He said renewed faith in the Eucharist is not a quick fix that can be used and manipulated to solve family problems.

"God is not God the way we would be God if we were God," Braxton said. Prayers and petitions are an important part of the Catholic faith but "it is important not to have a simplistic view of this," he said.

God accompanies people through troubled times but does not "remove them from us," the bishop said.

Catholics can risk thinking that receiving the Eucharist is about "Jesus and me . . . like a personal Jesus or an insurance policy to heaven," Braxton said. But the Eucharist "is a call to each one of us to a conversion as a community."

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