Eventide & Altar

Stay with us, for it is nearly evening and the day is almost over. That sentence is the prayer of the Emmaus disciples, and it is the prayer of the evening of life. The light is fading. The road has been long. The companion on the way has been speaking, and the heart has been burning, but the full recognition has not come yet. Stay with us, Lord. It is getting dark.

The recognition comes in the breaking of the bread. After a lifetime of receiving the Eucharist - thousands of Masses, thousands of Communions - the Emmaus moment is the template for every one of them. He took bread, blessed it, broke it, and gave it to them. Their eyes were opened. Every Mass you attend between now and the end of your life is an Emmaus table. The bread is broken, the eyes are opened, and the recognition deepens. You may have received Communion ten thousand times. The next time may be the time when the burning becomes recognition.

Peter writes that you were ransomed not with perishable things like silver or gold but with the precious blood of Christ, known before the foundation of the world but revealed in the final time for you. In the evening of life, the final time is approaching, and the Christ who was known before the foundation of the world is being revealed to you in ways you could not have understood at thirty. The revelation deepens as the evening comes. Stay with us, Lord.

The first Glorious Mystery is the Resurrection. The Emmaus disciples did not know it, but they were walking with the Risen Christ the entire time. The Resurrection was not only an event behind them in Jerusalem. It was the person beside them on the road.

• For those in the evening of life who pray the Emmaus prayer daily - stay with us, Lord, for it is nearly evening - that his presence at the table would deepen and that the breaking of the bread would open their eyes one more time, we pray to the Lord.
• For those who are walking away from the faith in the evening of life, discouraged by loss or disappointment or the slow erosion of hope, that a companion would join them on the road and make their hearts burn, we pray to the Lord.
• For the dying, that the recognition which came to the Emmaus disciples in the breaking of the bread would come to them in the final Communion they receive, and that the path of life would lead them to abounding joy in the presence of God, we pray to the Lord.

Pray the Emmaus prayer tonight: stay with us, Lord, for it is nearly evening and the day is almost over. Then receive whatever bread is broken for you today - the Eucharist at Mass, the meal at your table, the presence of someone who sits with you - as the place where Christ is made known.