1. Since the time when St. Augustine, in a transport of love for the most Holy Eucharist, burst forth with his celebrated exclamation, "O Sacramentum Pietatis," there is no one but understands by that beautiful title the Sacrament of the Altar. It is now one of the recognized Eucharistic names. The word piety, in its Latin form, as well as in our own language, may bear many interpretations, but in this place we employ it to signify that sentiment of religious devotion towards God, which is called the gift of Piety.

 

2. Christian piety finds its food in prayer, in heavenly affections, in sweet tears, in thoughtful contemplation, and in all those perfumes of grace which form the unction of the Holy Ghost. But the chief and strongest food of Christian piety is the wheat of the elect, the wine that generates virgins(Zach 9:17). No piety can be either solid or lasting which is not nourished by this food, so appropriately called the Sacrament of Piety.

 

Piety is naught else but filial love, or that worship of love which we pay to God, as our Father. But upon what title do we claim adoption as the sons of such a Father? Certainly, because we have been incorporated with his natural and only-begotten Son, Jesus Christ, with whom we form but one body: now this incorporation, begun in baptism, is perpetuated and perfected by means of the most Holy Eucharist. Baptism kindled within us the first spark of filial love; that spark becomes fire and flame through the use of the Eucharist, by which we are more closely united with Jesus Christ, and the title of adoption as sons of our Father’ who is in heaven is ratified and strengthened. Hence, the Eucharistic bread is called "the children’s bread."

 

3. True piety is one of the seven gifts of the Holy Ghost (Is 11:2), for the sentiment and consciousness of our adoption as sons of God proceeds, as St. Paul teaches, from the Holy Ghost who is given.us, through whom we cry, "Abba, Father" (Rom 8:15,16).

 

Still the Holy Ghost, like every supernatural gift, is given to us, as St. Paul expresses it, "but to every one is given grace, according to the measure of the giving of Christ" (Eph 4:7) and therefore it is through Christ and from Christ that the spirit of piety flows into our souls. Christ first sent down the Holy Ghost on Pentecost day, and He continues still to send Him by means of his sacraments, especially by the sacrament of the Holy Eucharist, from which souls have always drawn and draw the noblest sentiments of Christian piety.

 

This explains why it is that in praying before the Blessed Sacrament, and still oftener in receiving it, we penetrate the loving secret of those words: "Our Father who art in heaven" and feel, too, the filial instinct working within us in those unspeakable communings which at times we hold with God; "unspeakable groanings." (Rom 8:26)

 

4. The filial sentiment of Christian piety takes divers forms; but the safest and least liable to illusions of imagination is that which manifests itself in devout worship of the Blessed Sacrament, and therefore Holy Writ characterizes the primitive ages of devotion and piety by the spiritual joy with which the faithful then broke daily the Eucharistic bread (Acts 2:4).

 

On this subject we have that truly beautiful passage of the Imitation of Christ:

"Many run to sundry places to visit the relics of the saints, and are astonished to hear of their wonderful works: they look at the spacious buildings of their churches, and kiss their sacred bones wrapped up in silk and gold; and, behold, Thou art present here to me on the altar, Thou, my God, Saint of saints, Creator of men, and Lord of angels. Oftentimes, in seeing those things, men are moved with curiosity and the novelty of things not yet seen, and but little fruit of amendment is reaped thereby, especially when men so lightly run hither and thither without true contrition.

 

"But here, in the Sacrament of the Altar, Thou art wholly present, my God, the Man Christ Jesus; where also the fruit of eternal salvation is plentifully reaped, as often as Thou art worthily and devoutly received. And to this we are not drawn by any levity, curiosity, or by sense, but by a firm faith, a devout hope, and a sincere charity."