Listen, my brothers: If the Blessed Virgin Mary is honored so much–and rightly so –because she bore him about in her most holy womb; if the blessed Baptist trembled all over and did not dare to touch the holy crown of his God; if the tomb in which he lay for a while is venerated so much: then how holy, just and worthy ought the person be who freely handles him, receives him in mouth and heart, and presents him for others to receive, not in a mortal state any more, but, as going to live and as glorified forever, “whom the angels yearn to gaze upon” (1 Pet. 1, 12).
Look at your dignity, priestly brothers, and be holy because he is holy. And as the Lord God has honored you more than all people by means of this mystery, so should you love, revere and honor him more than all people. It is a great pity and a pitiable weakness that you should have him thus present and still be interested in anything else in all the world.

Let everything in man halt in awe, let all the world quake, and let Heaven exult when Christ, the Son of the living God, is there on the altar in the hands of the priest! Oh, admirable dignity and amazing condescension! Oh, sublime lowliness! Oh, lowly sublimity! That the Lord of the universe, God and the Son of God, should so humble himself as to hide under the tiny little form of bread for our welfare. Look, brothers, at the humility of God and pour your hearts out before him. Be humbled yourselves, so you can be exalted by him.

So, do not keep anything about you back for yourselves, so that he may have you altogether as his own. He, who puts himself altogether at your disposal.

St. Francis

(Taken from the book: “Words of St. Francis” 192d. and 192e.)