November 1. The communion of Saints consists not only of the great men and women who went before us and whose names we know. All of us belong to the communion of Saints, we who have been baptized in the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, we who draw life from the gift of Christ’s Body and Blood, through which he transforms us and makes us like himself. Pope Benedict XVI
November 2. O Jesus! Sweetness of Hearts, Delight of The Spirit, by the bitterness of the vinegar and gall which Thou didst taste on the Cross for Love of us, grant us the grace to receive worthily, Thy Precious Body and Blood during our life and at the hour of our death, that They may serve as a remedy and consolation for our souls. Amen. St. Bridget of Sweden
November 3. If the life of grace in us is to be preserved and brought to perfection in the resurrection, we must eat regularly of His Body and Blood. And that is the whole purpose of the Mass. Fr. Pius Parch
November 4. May the grace be granted to us not to die without the Viaticum, to enter the mysterious shadow of death with the only Friend who can cross its threshold with us. May we be granted the grace to meet again beyond the dark regions the One who so humbled Himself as to unite His flesh, His blood, and His divinity to a body already corrupt and more than half-destroyed. May He hear our imperceptible sob, the last, that no one else in this world will be able to hear. May He receive on His adorable face our last breath which will not even tarnish the mirror pressed to our lips. May we go to sleep with Christ, may we be buried in the Eucharist, to awake at the feet of Christ the King, conqueror of the world. And may He be blessed in our immense hope not to die alone. Francois Mauriac
November 5. The mode of Christ's presence under the Eucharistic species is unique. It raises the Eucharist above all the sacraments as “"he perfection of the spiritual life and the end to which all the sacraments tend.” In the most blessed sacrament of the Eucharist “the body and blood, together with the soul and divinity, of our Lord Jesus Christ and, therefore, the whole Christ is truly, really, and substantially contained. "This presence is called ‘real’ - by which is not intended to exclude the other types of presence as if they could not be ‘real’ too, but because it is presence in the fullest sense: that is to say, it is a substantial presence by which Christ, God and man, makes himself wholly and entirely present. Catechism of the Catholic Church
November 6. Come ye hither all, whose taste
Is our waste;
Save your cost, and mend your fare.
God is here prepared and dressed,
And the feast,
God, in whom all dainties are.
Come ye hither all, whom wine
Doth define,
Naming you not to your good:
Weep what ye have drunk amiss,
And drink this,
Which before ye drink is blood.
Come ye hither all, whom pain
Doth arraign,
Bringing all your sins to sight:
Taste and fear not: God is here
In this cheer,
And on sin doth cast the fright.
Come ye hither all, whom joy
Doth destroy,
While ye graze without your bounds:
Here is joy that drowneth quite
Your delight,
As a flood the lower grounds.
Come ye hither all, whose love
Is your dove,
And exalts you to the sky:
Here is love, which having breath
Ev’n in death,
After death can never die.
Lord I have invited all,
And I shall
Still invite, still call to thee:
For it seems but just and right
In my sight,
Where is all, there all should be. George Herbert
November 7. “This is my body, this is my blood”: this is not a giving of oneself in a gift, not even at a more profound level because the giver here is Christ, the personal revelation of the Father. No, what is given to us in the Eucharist is nothing other than Christ himself. What the sacramental forms of bread and wine signify, and at the same time make real, is not a gift that refers to Christ who gives himself in them, but Christ himself in living, personal presence. Fr. Edward Schillebeeckx
November 8. “What shall I render unto the Lord for all that He has rendered unto me? I will take the chalice of salvation.” Yes, O my God, if I take this Chalice, crimsoned with the Blood of my Master, and in utterly joyous thanksgiving, mingle my blood with that of the sacred Victim, He will impart to it something of His own infinity, and it will give You, O Father, wonderful praise. St. Elizabeth of the Trinity
November 9. The mystery of the Church is born when Jesus freely exercises the power he has to “lay down his life and take it up again” (Jn 10:8), when he exercises this power by giving to this surrender ‘for his friends’ (Jn 15:13) the form of a meal, of eating and drinking his Flesh and Blood (Jn 6:55), an act whereby he fills his friends with his own substance - body and soul, divinity and humanity. Fr. Hans Urs von Balthasar
November 10. When the Lord says, ‘unless you have eaten the flesh of the Son of Man, and drunk His blood, you will not have life in you’, you ought so to be partakers at the Holy Table, as to have no doubt whatever concerning the reality of Christ’s Body and Blood. For that is taken in the mouth which is believed in Faith, and it is vain for them to respond Amen who dispute that which is taken.” Pope St. Leo the Great
November 11. In receiving Jesus Christ, we receive Him wholly: His Body, His Blood, His Soul, His Humanity, His Divinity. Christ makes us sharers of His thoughts, and His sentiments; He communicates His virtues to us, but above all, He enkindles in us the fire that He came to cast upon earth, the fire of love, of charity: that is the result of this transformation produced by the Eucharist. Bl. Columba Marmion
November 12. Clothing yourselves with meekness, be ye renewed in faith, that is the flesh of the Lord, and in love, that is the blood of Jesus Christ. Let no one of you cherish any grudge against his neighbor. St. Ignatius of Antioch
November 13. [Lord], your work is made true for us when we sacrifice to you this your sacrifice. When we remember with the sure sacrament of faith and a pious affection of heart what you have done for us, faith, as it were, receives it with its mouth, hope chews it, and charity cooks into salvation and life the blessed and beatifying food of your grace. There you show yourself to the soul which desires you, accepting the embrace of her love and kissing her with the kiss of your mouth. As happens in a loving kiss, she pours out to you her spirit, and you pour in your spirit, so that you are made one body and one spirit when she receives in this way your body and blood. William of Saint-Thierry
November 14. After sharing in the body of Christ, draw near also to the cup of his blood. Do not stretch out your hands, but bow in adoration and respect, and say: “Amen.” Then sanctify yourself further by sharing in the blood of Christ. And while your lips are still wet, touch them with your fingers and sanctify your eyes, your forehead, and your other senses. Then, while waiting for the prayer, give thanks to God who has judged you worthy of such great mysteries. St. Cyril of Jerusalem
November 15. I adore You, Blood of the new, eternal Testament, flowing from the veins of Jesus in Gethsemane, from the flesh torn by scourges in the Praetorium, from His pierced hands and feet and from His opened side on Golgotha. I adore You in the Sacraments, in the Eucharist, where I know You are substantially present. St. Albert the Great
November 16. My Lord Jesus Christ, may your venerable body and your precious blood guard my body and soul for eternal life. Amen. St. Gertrude the Great
November 17. Mystery of divine and infinite mercy! Sign and efficacious seal of unity! Bond of charity, symbol of peace and harmony! …. One and the same Victim to be adored on every altar; one and the same divine food served everywhere at the Holy Table: and all people, without distinction of race or nationality, of social condition or class, all equally called to believe, adore and share, that all might equally partake of his Body and Blood. Ven. Pope Pius XII
November 18. GOD IS LOVE. He will forget the depth of our misery; he will bind us to his altar with unbreakable bonds. He will unite our will to his adorable will, merge our feeling with his own; he will transform in us everything opposed to the holiness of our state and with the burning seraphim permit us to offer perpetual homage of adoration to the chalice of his Blood. Ven. Catherine Aurelia Caouette
November 19. “Our loving Lord, teach me how to prepare for the royal banquet of Thy adorable Body and Blood.” Our Lord answered: “What did My disciples do when I sent them before Me to prepare the Pasch which I was to eat with them the night before My Passion? They prepared a large and well-furnished hall.” By this our Lord wished us to remember that with repentance He desires confidence- confidence in His immense bounty and liberality in lovingly receiving those who go to Him. St. Mechtilde of Helfta
November 20. Eat my flesh,’ [Jesus] says, ‘and drink my blood.’ The Lord supplies us with these intimate nutrients, he delivers over his flesh and pours out his blood, and nothing is lacking for the growth of his children St. Clement of Alexandria
November 21. The wide world does not possess anything more profitable thing for your soul than to receive the body and blood of our dear Lord Jesus Christ. Bl. Johannes Tauler
November 22. As a heavenly mother, the Church, nourishes with heavenly bread, the flesh of the Son of God. With this same flesh and blood of God’s Son she places in their hands a gift of oblation of which they can offer a perfect sacrifice to their heavenly Father. Fr. Matthias Scheeben
November 23. It is with Clement, the bishop of Rome and the third Pope, over whose body the church at Rome offers the sacrifice today. For when we undergo the mystical dying with Christ in the holy sacrifice, it is our blood too which pours into the ‘true chalice of salvation’; we are to have our triumph with Christ, with his holy martyrs, over the darkness which has now been defeated. Sr. Aemiliana Lohr
November 24 (Christ the King). Jesus is our King in the full sense of the word : He has created us, redeemed us, vivified us by His grace, He nourishes us with His Flesh and Blood, He governs us with love, and by love He draws us to Himself. Fr. Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalene
November 25. Those who eat this bread and drink this mystical wine really rejoice and exult and can exclaim in a loud voice: You put gladness into my heart. …even in the Book of Proverbs the Wisdom of God subsisting in himself, namely, Christ our Saviour, referred to this bread and wine when he said: Come, eat of my food, and drink of the wine I have mixed, indicating the mystical participation in the Word. St. Gregory of Agrigento
November 26. The same Christ who offers himself as food through the Eucharist, offers himself to the Father in the Eucharist and daily offers himself in sacrifice through the ministers of the Church. Nay more, among other goods which Christ left for us in his testament while he was dying, one was his body and blood, which we use both that we might offer them to God, and that from there our souls may take refreshment. St. Robert Bellarmine
November 27. You hear (attend) Mass …; but do you understand the nature of that tremendous sacrifice? In the old law, oxen, lambs, and other animals were offered to God; but in the sacrifice of the Mass, we offer to him the true body and the true blood of Jesus Christ our Lord, along with his soul and divinity. We offer Jesus entirely, true God and true man; and we repeat the very same action which was once performed on Calvary, with this difference, that on Calvary the most precious blood of Jesus was really shed, but, on our altars, it is shed only in a mystical manner. Saint Leonard of Port Maurice
November 28. In giving thanks with Christ and through him for his body broken and his blood shed which are given to us as the substance of the Kingdom, we represent to God this mystery which has now been accomplished in our Head, so that it may have its ultimate accomplishment in his whole body. That is to say that we give our consent to the completion body which is the Church, in the steadfast hope of his Parousia in which we shall all participate together in his resurrection. Fr. Louis Bouyer
November 29. Only by nourishing ourselves as we have been bidden to do by Christ, by eating His body and drinking His blood, can we become Christ and put on the new man. Dorothy Day
November 30. The good wine, the best wine, you [Christ] kept until now for us who live in the last age; to us you give the word of the gospel, your very self, your deepest Word, the Logos. To us you give the Mysterium of the Church and of her sacrifice; in them the God-life is white-hot. We drink your very blood, and gain increase for this life of yours, and new strength of it. It is this wine which is the pledge of our betrothal with you. The person who drinks of it is one with you, is bride to you, for ever. Sr. Aemiliana Lohr