“The Eucharist . . . is the greatest gift in the order of grace and of sacrament that the divine Spouse has offered and unceasingly offers to His spouse" (John Paul II, Dominicae Cenae 121. The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is the source and summit of the whole Christian life and contains the entire wealth of the Church (cf. Lumen Gentium, 11, Presbyterorum Ordinis, 5). Yet it is possible for one to attend Mass and ‘get nothing out of it.’ Why is this? 

The reason: people do not know how to meditate; they do not know how to engage in mental prayer. “What do you mean, Christians, when you say that mental prayer is unnecessary? Do you understand what you are saying? I really do not think you can" (St. Teresa of Avila, Way of Perfection. 22). “Mental prayer is the blessed furnace in which souls are inflamed with the love of God. All the saints have become saints by mental prayer” (St. Alphonsus de Liguori). Mental prayer is not complicated. It is the active use of our intellect and will to ponder and conform ourselves to divinely revealed truths. By mental prayer we abandon our natural, worldly way of thinking and acting to conform ourselves to the thoughts and desires of God which are most fully manifested to us by the life of Jesus Christ. The Church exhorts all of her children to embark upon the way of mental prayer (which also can be called meditation). 

In the section of Canon Law where the Church exhorts her priests to a life of holiness, she identifies the means to sanctity, one of which is mental prayer: "Priests . . . are to be conscientious in devoting time regularly to mental prayer” (Canon 276, §2). Holy Mother Church also teaches lay people to travel the way of mental prayer in the Second Vatican Council's decree on the laity: "Only by the light of faith and by meditation on the Word of God can one always and everywhere recognize God in Whom ‘we live, and move, and have our being' (Acts 17:28), seek His will in every event, see Christ in everyone” (Apostolicam Actuositatem, 4). The Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2654 states, "Seek in reading and you find in meditating; knock in mental prayer and it will be opened to you by contemplation “ (Guigo the Carthusian, Scala Paradisi).

In mental prayer we fix our gaze on the unseen (cf. 2 Cor. 7:18;1 Pet. 1:8) and seek to penetrate with the eyes of our soul, the eyes of faith, into the inner sanctuary where Christ has gone on ahead of us (cf. Heb. 6:19 20). We do this by pondering divine revelation which gives us access to supernatural reality which we could not come to know through the five senses and human reason. Jesus is the fullness of divine revelation (cf. Dei Verbum, 2), and mental prayer is primarily concerned with unlocking the infinite riches of Christ and letting His light shine in our lives. The function of mental prayer then, is to study the features of the life of Jesus and to beg the Holy Spirit to fashion our lives according to this resplendent pattern. 

If we are still imprisoned in vice, we are spiritually blind and cut off from spiritual realities; in this condition we are not able to see the brightness of eternal light shining on the face of Christ. “The unspiritual man does not receive the gifts of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned" (1 Cor. 2: 14 15). 

Jesus speaks of the need for spiritual discernment in reference to the mystery of the Eucharist when He say, "It is the spirit that gives life, the flesh is of no avail; the words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life” (John 6 :63). The flesh is of no avail in discerning the reality that lies hidden in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Yet that reality is solemnly and repeatedly proclaimed by the authority of Jesus Christ: "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the Flesh of the Son of Man and drink His Blood, you have no life in you" (John 6:53; cf. John 6:51, 54 55, 56). 

The unspiritual man will reinterpret Jesus' words, diminishing them to something that can be naturally understood, thus showing himself to be in direct rebellion against the authority of the Gospel and the authority of Christ Himself. This is the nature of the flesh: it wars against the spirit (cf. Gal. 5 :17). The Flesh of which Jesus speaks in John 6:51, 53 56 is the same that is spoken of in John 1:14: “The Word became Flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth." When we are united to Jesus by eating His Flesh and drinking His Blood we too become full of grace and truth. 

Mental prayer disposes the follower of Jesus to receive the Body and Blood of the Lord efficaciously, in the spirit of faith end reverence. This meditation has a basic threefold structure: (1) Consider a divinely revealed truth (2) Perform acts of the will, and (3) Make a resolution. For example, one could consider the truth divinely revealed in the Scripture, “And Jesus said, ‘Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do’” (Lk. 23:34). Then one could perform an act of love by saying, “I love you Jesus, for your heart is full of mercy, even for those who are crucifying you.” Also one could form a petition such as, “Make my heart like unto yours dear Jesus.” After making other acts of the will which arise spontaneously from one's heart and flow from the point of consideration, in conclusion, one could make a resolution such as, "Lord I resolve today to pray for those who have hurt me."

Holy Mass basically follows the same threefold structure: (1) the readings provide points for our consideration (2) the Creed, intercessions, preparation of the gifts, and the offering of the divine Victim to the Father are acts of the will, and (3) our going forth to love and serve the Lord sends us into the world with a deepened resolve to live a holy life in imitation of Jesus whom we heard about in the readings and personally encountered in Holy Communion. 

As we practice mental prayer outside of Mass, we will be able to enter into the Holy Sacrifice in a recollected, meditative spirit, which will dispose us to perceive the reality of the mysteries of the faith. We will be attentive to the Word of God and make many acts of the will during the Mass. We will resolve to imitate Jesus more closely, not by our own strength. but by means of the increase of sanctifying grace imparted to our souls in the reception of Holy Communion. 

As we leave sin behind and grow in our conversion so that our lives become truly built on the same principles which animated the life of Christ. then we advance in the spiritual life and slowly God works within us the transition from meditation to contemplation. As the practice of mental prayer progresses, we discern with an ever greater clarity the interior, discreet activity of God which manifests itself in us through the deepening of our faith, the illumination given to our intellect, and the strengthening of our will in the love of God and others. Let us, then, imitate Mary who “kept all these things, pondering them in her heart” (Lk. 2 :19). 

Let us acknowledge mental prayer as the first means to love Jesus and listen to Jacinta of Fatima who said, “ The world is perishing because people do not meditate.” “Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every encumbrance of sin which clings to us, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the Cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God" (Heb. 12:1 2). Adoremus in Aeternum Sanctissimum Sacramentum!