One June day I went to Quarr Abbey on the Isle of Wight to celebrate Corpus Christi with the monks. The liturgy of the day was beautiful. The Abbey Church was full of Gregorian chant, incense and a radiance through the smoke that lifted one into the clouds of glory. We then processed out into the monastic garden where there was a special altar set up for Eucharistic adoration.

Why do Catholics go to all this trouble? Because the whole mystery of Our Lord’s presence is true, and beautiful, so we celebrate it with beauty and reverence and love. What is beautiful and true evokes the response of Love in the human heart, and when someone experiences the congruence of beauty, truth and love together the soul is transformed.

Where else does one have gathered and concentrated in one place the little Trinity of Beauty, Love and Truth within one ceremony and one action, but in the liturgy? A lecture may inspire you with Truth. A picture or a piece of music or the face of a young child or a sunrise may inspire through beauty, but where else do they all come together? So we celebrate the liturgy of Love and we call it Opus Dei – the Work of God.