ST. MARY’S CATHEDRAL, SYDNEY, 7 JUNE 2026
A recent survey of nearly 11,000 Christians in Australia found that nine out of ten considered it riskier to profess their faith publicly today than it was five years ago, and almost half admitted to self-censoring their beliefs.[1] The stories behind the report highlight the worsening climate: for instance, public servants and other employees sanctioned for expressing their convictions or even for wearing them in the form of a crucifix on their neck. As one of the report’s authors put it, we are a society that supposedly “champions tolerance and inclusivity as the greatest of values” and yet inclusivity seems to “stop at the point of including Christians.”
Why might Christians hide their faith? In some parts of the world, publicly professing the faith endangers one’s life or loved ones; for being a Christian, people can lose their homes and homeland, employment and security.[2] In places like Australia, the pressures are more subtle. Some know that, in the circles in which they mix, their religious beliefs are not welcome. Some suspect it will affect the smoothness of their relationships with work colleagues or friends, or their opportunities for romance, employment, promotion. Some fear being ridiculed for their beliefs or unconfident about defending them if challenged.
The first followers of Jesus experienced this struggle too. As Jews, they knew that consuming even animal blood was expressly forbidden by the Law (Lev 17:10-14), and eating human flesh was an abomination beyond imagining.[3] Yet, as Christians, they knew that that Jesus had said that “if you do not eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you shall not have life in you” (Jn 6:51-58). He was asking them to accept something that challenged their Jewish traditions. For this reason, some “grumbled about him”, as we heard today, some “argued sharply among themselves” and some declared, “This is intolerable language. How could anyone accept it?” (Jn 6:41, 43, 52, 60, 61).
Many could not. John tells us that “From this time many of his disciples turned back and no longer followed him.” (Jn 6:66). Yet rather than soften His teaching in order to accommodate their beliefs and feelings, Jesus doubled down. Having begun with the rather innocuous promise that “God will give you heavenly bread for the life of the world” (Jn 6:32-33), He then says that He is that “bread of life come from heaven” (Jn 6:35, 41, 48, 58). If that weren’t hard enough to swallow, He next says, “This bread is my flesh, that I will give for the life of the world” (Jn 6:51) and that “whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood will have eternal life and I will raise them up on the last day” (Jn 6:53-56). Jesus’ words escalate their incomprehension and provoke their hostility. And, as if to underline that this is no mere metaphor, Jesus uses, not the ordinary verb for eating or feeding, but τρώγω (trógó), a blunt, physical term meaning literally to gnaw at or chew. Jesus was as clear as He could be: I really expect My disciples to eat My flesh and blood, take My body and soul, commune with My humanity and divinity, to receive all I am.
Those who stayed with Christ struggled with the logic of it just as much as those who left. But rather than self-censor, they trusted the One who spoke, and on that trust the faith of the Church was built and handed on through the ages unbroken. Just as John the Evangelist and Paul recorded Jesus’ teachings on the Holy Eucharist, so John’s disciple St Ignatius of Antioch, on his way to martyrdom around the year 107, wrote that the Eucharist is truly “the flesh of our Saviour Jesus Christ.”[4] In the same century, St Justin Martyr and St Irenaeus explained to the Roman world the Christian faith that by the Eucharistic Prayer the bread and wine become the flesh and blood of the very same Jesus who was God-made-flesh for our salvation.[5] In the next century Origen of Alexandria insisted likewise,[6] as did St Cyril of Jerusalem and other doctors of the Church in the fourth century and beyond.[7]
So this was established Catholic teaching by the time of the mediaeval councils of Lateran IV and Lyons II, the renaissance councils of Constance and Florence, the counter-reformation council of Trent, and the modern councils of Vatican I and II:all taught that Christ is substantially present in this sacrament, the bread having become really and truly His body and the wine His blood.[8] That so many great fathers, popes and councils had to keep clarifying and catechising about this doctrine reflects that it was always a hard teaching—from the day Jesus first expressed it by Lake Galilee through to our even more sceptical age.
But a hard teaching does not equal a false teaching. Moreover, God does not give us His Body and Blood just to confound us. He has His reasons. In his epistle today, the first Christian writer about the eucharist, St Paul, tells us that “The bread that we break is a communion with the body of Christ… [and] we form one body because we share in this one bread” (1Cor 10:16-17; cf. 11:23-29). In sharing in the one Bread, the Eucharist allows the faithful to commune with Christ Himself and with each other.
Recently Pope Leo XIV published his first encyclical, Magnifica Humanitas: On Safeguarding the Human Person in the Time of Artificial Intelligence. It ranges widely, over the new information technologies and the dignity of work, truth and freedom, war and the peace, and the call to a civilisation of life and love. But the Holy Father also reminds us of the centrality of the Eucharist, calling it the “sacrament of unity”: we are nourished by the Eucharistic body of Christ so that we might more fully participate in the Ecclesial body of Christ, uniting people of various sensibilities and convictions in an age of division.[9] Our “Eucharistic spirituality”, he says, allows us to see how God enters into our human condition and transforms it “by the gift of himself”, making us, as St Paul said, one body, one loaf.[10]
The Pope then speaks directly to our self-censoring age. In a world where “new economic and technological networks can generate exclusion, isolation and dependencies”, he says, the Church, fed on Christ’s Body and Blood, is “called to make visible a different paradigm, one that preserves human connections, gives a voice to the invisible, and ensures that processes are aimed at respecting people’s dignity.” The Christian antidote to a polarised and isolating culture is big-C and small-C Communion.[11]
My dear friends, against the temptation to keep our faith quiet and small, to self-censor, we are called to trust in a God who loves us so much that He gave us His all, and to share that with others. On this Feast of Corpus Christi we boldly proclaim that the ‘bread’ and ‘wine’ that we receive are no ordinary bread and wine, but Christ’s very Body and Blood, given for the life of the world. And we are promised what only Christ’s own words could justify believing: that “anyone who eats this bread will live for ever” (Jn 6:58). That promise is for you and all your loved ones who have died in Christ. Have courage, then, and take this Good News to our nation.
Remarks after Holy Communion
Some of you may be wondering whether our annual Walk with Christ is occurring today. Due to the Sistine Chapel Revelations immersive exhibition in the cathedral square, the procession could not be held on Corpus Christi this year. So, as in other years when it has been disrupted by works in the city streets, we will hold the annual Walk with Christ on the Feast of Christ the King in November.
Today I have written to the clergy and faithful of the Archdiocese a pastoral letter entitled Adoring the Eucharistic Lord. Printed copies are available at the door and it is also available on the archdiocesan website. I commend it to your reading over the coming days.
Today I acknowledge two very special men concelebrating this Mass with me: Fr Don Richardson, Dean of this cathedral, who endures that our worship of the Eucharistic Lord here at St Mary’s is worthy and welcoming every day of the year. Also, Fr John Anderson, a priest of this archdiocese, who has devoted most of his priestly life to being a missionary in Peru: muchas gracias Padre Juan, we are very proud of you!
It has been a joy to celebrate with you all my ‘return to work’ ten years ago today, after spending five months in hospital recovering from Guillain-Barré Syndrome. I thank the people of Sydney for their many prayers and messages of support at that time that helped me to maintain courage, patience and hope. May the Body of Christ that we honour this day continue to feed and heal our bodies and souls.
[1] Australian Christian Freedom Index 2025; James Morrow, ‘Almost half of Christians now self-censor their faith: Christian Freedom Survey,’ Daily Telegraph 28 May 2026.
[2] Open Doors World Watch List 2026 https://www.opendoors.org/en-US/persecution/countries/
[3] Dt 28:53; Lev 26:29; 2Kgs 6:28-29; Jer 19:9; Lam 2:20; 4:10; Ezek 5:10.
[4] St Ignatius of Antioch, Letter to the Smyrnaeans 7.1.
[5] St Justin Martyr, First Apology (c. 155 AD) 66; St Irenaeus of Lyons, Against Heresies (c. 180) 4:18; 5:3.
[6] Origen, Against Celsus (248) 8:33.
[7] Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechetical Lectures (c. 350) 19:7; 22:2; 23:7. Subsequently: St Ambrose of Milan, On the Christian Faith (378-80)IV, 10:125; Theodore of Mopsuestia, Catechetical Homilies (380s) 5:1 and Commentary on Matthew (420) 26:26; St Gregory of Nyssa, The Great Catechism (c. 385) 37; St Augustine of Hippo, Sermon 227 (414) & 234 (418); St John Chrysostom, Against the Judaizers (386) 1:6; St Athanasius of Alexandria, Sermon to the Newly Baptised (360s);St Cyril of Alexandria, Commentary on Matthew (c.428) 26 & 27; St John Damascene, Exposition of the Orthodox Faith (730s) 4:13;St Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae IIIa, qq. 73-81 (1273).
[8] E.g. Lateran Council IV, Constitution 1: Confession of Faith and Canon 1 (1215); Council of Lyons II, Profession of Faith (1274); Council of Constance, Sessions 8 & 15, Condemning various articles of John Wycliffe (1415); Council of Florence, Session 6, Definition of the Holy Ecumenical Synod of Florence (1439), Session 8, Bull of Union with the Armenians (1439) and Session 11, Bull of Union with the Copts (1442); Council of Trent (13th Session), Decree on the Most Holy Sacrament of the Eucharist (1551); Vatican Council I, Profession of Faith (1870) 7; Vatican Council II, Sacrosanctum Concilium (1963) 47 and Lumen Gentium (1964) 26 & 48; CCC 1374-78.
[9] Leo XIV, Magnifica Humanitas: Encyclical on Safeguarding the Human Person in the Time of Artificial Intelligence (2026), 88
[10] Leo XIV, Magnifica Humanitas 234.
[11] Leo XIV, Magnifica Humanitas 235.
INTRODUCTION TO MASS OF CORPUS CHRISTI
THE SOLEMNITY OF THE MOST HOLY BODY AND BLOOD OF CHRIST
ST. MARY’S CATHEDRAL, SYDNEY, 7 JUNE 2026
Welcome to Sydney’s St Mary’s Cathedral for the Solemn Mass of Corpus Christi, the Feast of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ. Today the Church celebrates the unfathomable gift by which the Lord gives Himself wholly to us under the signs of bread and wine.
Ten years ago today I “returned to work” after spending five months in hospital recovering from Guillain-Barré Syndrome, a rare autoimmune disorder that left me totally paralysed. I spent many weeks recovering the use of my nerves and limbs, learning again how to hold and manipulate things, to walk and climb stairs, and to do what a bishop must do. At that first Mass back I had a device on my left hand to help me hold the crozier and another was put on my right hand at the end of Mass to straighten my fingers enough to give the final blessing. I still struggled to walk, to climb the sanctuary stairs and to give out Holy Communion. But here I am today, fully recovered by God’s grace granted in answer to many people’s prayers and mediated to me by the finest health professionals at St Vincent’s Hospital and Mount Wilga Rehabilitation Hospital.
My return to work back then was an occasion for me to reflect upon many things including the centrality of the body in human life, the significance of God uniting himself to a bodily nature in the Incarnation, Crucifixion and Resurrection, and perhaps especially in His self-giving to us of His Body in the Holy Eucharist. Through this most wonderful sacrament we experience a person-to-person connection with Our Lord and healing of bodies and souls. To all of you present on this joyous feast, both regulars and visitors, a very warm welcome to you all!
