If I asked you if you remembered a man by the name of Jep Cadu, most of us would probably not be able to think of who he was.  Mr. Cadu died a few years ago now.  He never wrote a best-selling book.  There are no statues of him anywhere as far as I know.  He was never on TV or in the movies.  But if I asked you if you remembered the older gentleman who was the greeter at the Westfield/Carmel Wal-Mart for several years, named “Jep”, then perhaps you would remember him.  Jep was the man who welcomed all of us with his hearty “Welcome to Wal-Mart.”  It didn’t matter if you were young or old, or rich or poor, or an I.U. fan or a Purdue fan, everybody who walked into Wal-Mart got the same “Welcome to Wal-Mart.”  You could be running in to buy some toothpaste, or shopping for a birthday card, or wanting to pick-up the latest DVD, but first you had to get by Jep.  And nobody got by Jep without a “Welcome to Wal-Mart.”  I have no idea what Jep did before he became a “greeter” for Wal-Mart.  He could have been a surgeon.  He could have been the CEO of a company.  He could have been a traveling salesman.  I don’t know.  What I do know is that for hundreds of thousands of people in Westfield and Carmel, Jep was that friendly old guy at the Wal-Mart store.  One night a few years ago, Jep went home and simply died.  And for thousands of us in our local community, a trip to Wal-Mart would never be the same.  Jep will always be remembered for his friendliness.  Not a bad way to be remembered.  Not a bad way at all!

     Tonight, we come together to celebrate how Jesus wanted to be remembered.  We come together for the Mass of the Lord’s Supper, our annual celebration of the anniversary of the institution of the Holy Eucharist.  And as we celebrate the Blessed Sacrament tonight, Jesus great gift to us to remember Him by, Jesus Himself forever ties the Eucharist, to a life of service, to serving one another out of love.  We see this in St. John’s Gospel that we read tonight.  St. John, after spending all of chapter six of his Gospel on the Eucharist, finally gets to point of the institution of the Eucharist at the Last Supper, and what does St. John do?  He replaces the institution of the Eucharist with washing of the feet.  Scripture scholars have wondered about this for years.  Just when you think that St. John is going to tell us something about the Last Supper that we’ve never heard before, something about that first Mass where he was right there next to Jesus at the institution of the Eucharist.  He doesn’t.  St. John spends all of his time, as we just heard, with the washing of the feet.  My brothers and sisters, this is NOT by accident.  Both Jesus and St. John want us to make the connection, the get the connection, between what we do at this Altar, and how we serve one another.  Together, that’s how Jesus wanted to be remembered.  It’s what we were supposed to do as Church, during this time, as we await the fulfillment of His Kingdom.  What an extraordinary legacy!  When Jesus says to us tonight and at every Mass, “Do this in memory of me!” -  He’s not just talking about the Eucharist.  And He’s not just talking about service.  He’s talking about BOTH of them together.  It’s not either or.  It’s both!  We can’t eat His Body and drink His Blood, and NOT serve.  And the truth is, that we really can’t serve in His name and in His image, without the Eucharist.  We need this strength.  We need His power.  He need His help to serve.

       So how do you want to be remembered?   What kind of memories are people going to have of you?  How have you served others with your life?  How have you made our world a better place?  What Jesus did at the Last Supper both in the Eucharist and in the Washing of the Feet, is supposed to make all of us better people.  We are not here for ourselves.  We are here to serve and make a difference for other.  If you’re thinking only about yourself and who can serve you, you’re going to have a pretty miserable life.  It’s not what we were created for.  We can all serve others.   We don’t all have to wash feet.  We don’t all have work at soup kitchens.  We don’t all have to be greeters at Wal-Mart.   But we DO ALL have to serve in some way.  There are an infinite number of ways that we can help to make this world a better place every day.  It’s time that all of us do more.

       We are creating daily our own legacies.  People will remember us a whole lot more by our actions, than by our words.  Jesus knew that.  May we too remember it every day.

God bless us on this Holy Thursday,  Father, Son, and Holy Spirit…AMEN !!!

St. Maria Goretti…Pray for us !!!