An excerpt from the reading by Rev. Ronald Rolheiser called:
The Eucharist as a Call to Justice.

The Eucharist fulfills what Mary prophesized when she was pregnant with Jesus,
namely, that, in Jesus, the mighty would be brought down and that lowly would be
raised up. It was this very thing that first drew Dorothy Day to Christianity. She noticed
that, at the Eucharist, the rich and the poor knelt side by side, all equal at that moment.

Sadly, we often don’t take this dimension of the Eucharist seriously. There is a common
tendency to think that the practice of justice, especially social justice, is an optional part
of being a Christian, something mandated by political correctness rather than by the
Gospels. Generally we don’t see the call to actively reach out to the poor as something
from which we cannot exempt ourselves.

But we are wrong in this. In the Gospels and in the Christian Scriptures in general, the
call to reach out to the poor and to help create justice in the world is as non-negotiable
as keeping the commandments and going to church. Indeed striving for justice must be
part of all authentic worship.

To say that Eucharist calls us to justice and to social justice is not a statement that
takes its origin in political correctness. It takes its origin in Jesus who, drawing upon the
great prophets of old, assures us that the validity of all worship will ultimately be judged
by how it affects “widows, orphans and strangers.”

The words of Rev. Ronald Rolheiser.