{"parish":{"localizations":[{"locale":"es","slug":"ave-maria-es"}],"seo":{"metaTitle":"Ave Maria","metaDescription":"Eucharistic testimonies from Ave Maria Parish in Parker, CO","metaImage":{"url":"https://res.cloudinary.com/furrow/image/upload/v1654882069/i-am-here/220607_IAH_CVR_FB_CRD_01_58dbc6076b.png","alt":"220607_IAH-CVR_FB-CRD-01.png","width":1200,"height":630},"metaSocial":[{"socialNetwork":"Facebook","title":"Ave Maria","description":"Eucharistic testimonies from Ave Maria Parish in Parker, CO","image":{"url":"https://res.cloudinary.com/furrow/image/upload/v1654882069/i-am-here/220607_IAH_CVR_FB_CRD_01_58dbc6076b.png","alt":"220607_IAH-CVR_FB-CRD-01.png","width":1200,"height":630}},{"socialNetwork":"Twitter","title":"Ave Maria","description":"Eucharistic testimonies from Ave Maria Parish in Parker, CO","image":{"url":"https://res.cloudinary.com/furrow/image/upload/v1654882069/i-am-here/220607_IAH_CVR_FB_CRD_01_58dbc6076b.png","alt":"220607_IAH-CVR_FB-CRD-01.png","width":1200,"height":630}}],"keywords":null,"metaRobots":null},"name":"Ave Maria","location":{"city":"Parker","state":"CO"},"diocese":{"name":"Diocese of Colorado Springs","slug":"diocese-of-colorado-springs"},"cover":null,"stories":[{"title":"“The Eucharist has sustained me in all those highs and lows”","author":{"name":"Tanner Kalina","age":null},"slug":"tanner-kalina","featured":true,"cover":{"url":"https://res.cloudinary.com/furrow/image/upload/v1707490050/i-am-here/IAH_Tanner_Kalina_12_3001x2000_111bcae_b6f1f6f9bb.jpg","provider":"cloudinary","width":3000,"formats":{"large":{"ext":".jpg","url":"https://res.cloudinary.com/furrow/image/upload/v1707490051/i-am-here/large_IAH_Tanner_Kalina_12_3001x2000_111bcae_b6f1f6f9bb.jpg","hash":"large_IAH_Tanner_Kalina_12_3001x2000_111bcae_b6f1f6f9bb","mime":"image/jpeg","name":"large_IAH_Tanner_Kalina-12-3001x2000-111bcae.jpg","path":null,"size":43.34,"width":1000,"height":667,"provider_metadata":{"public_id":"i-am-here/large_IAH_Tanner_Kalina_12_3001x2000_111bcae_b6f1f6f9bb","resource_type":"image"}},"small":{"ext":".jpg","url":"https://res.cloudinary.com/furrow/image/upload/v1707490052/i-am-here/small_IAH_Tanner_Kalina_12_3001x2000_111bcae_b6f1f6f9bb.jpg","hash":"small_IAH_Tanner_Kalina_12_3001x2000_111bcae_b6f1f6f9bb","mime":"image/jpeg","name":"small_IAH_Tanner_Kalina-12-3001x2000-111bcae.jpg","path":null,"size":14.57,"width":500,"height":333,"provider_metadata":{"public_id":"i-am-here/small_IAH_Tanner_Kalina_12_3001x2000_111bcae_b6f1f6f9bb","resource_type":"image"}},"medium":{"ext":".jpg","url":"https://res.cloudinary.com/furrow/image/upload/v1707490052/i-am-here/medium_IAH_Tanner_Kalina_12_3001x2000_111bcae_b6f1f6f9bb.jpg","hash":"medium_IAH_Tanner_Kalina_12_3001x2000_111bcae_b6f1f6f9bb","mime":"image/jpeg","name":"medium_IAH_Tanner_Kalina-12-3001x2000-111bcae.jpg","path":null,"size":27.63,"width":750,"height":500,"provider_metadata":{"public_id":"i-am-here/medium_IAH_Tanner_Kalina_12_3001x2000_111bcae_b6f1f6f9bb","resource_type":"image"}},"thumbnail":{"ext":".jpg","url":"https://res.cloudinary.com/furrow/image/upload/v1707490050/i-am-here/thumbnail_IAH_Tanner_Kalina_12_3001x2000_111bcae_b6f1f6f9bb.jpg","hash":"thumbnail_IAH_Tanner_Kalina_12_3001x2000_111bcae_b6f1f6f9bb","mime":"image/jpeg","name":"thumbnail_IAH_Tanner_Kalina-12-3001x2000-111bcae.jpg","path":null,"size":4.66,"width":234,"height":156,"provider_metadata":{"public_id":"i-am-here/thumbnail_IAH_Tanner_Kalina_12_3001x2000_111bcae_b6f1f6f9bb","resource_type":"image"}}},"alternativeText":"IAH_Tanner_Kalina-12-3001x2000-111bcae.jpg"},"excerpt":"

When I was five years old, my mom started working for our nearby parish. Sister Ruth took us both under her wing and taught us about this man, Jesus, and we just fell head over heels for him. I have super early memories of staying up late and saying a rosary with my mom on her bed. It was a beautiful childhood treasure given to me. On the Easter Vigil after beginning work for the parish, my mom and I got baptized together.

For the next couple years, Sister Ruth continued catechizing me in fun ways – endless Doritos, cartoons, and hugs that would almost break my back. She was very adamant that for my First Communion, the consecrated host that I would receive would be Jesus’s body and blood. It might not taste like it, but I would legitimately receive his body and blood. Man did she drill that into me. Gearing up for my First Communion, I was so stoked, and on that special day I remember receiving Jesus and really believing that I was receiving his body and blood.

I remember going back to my pew and thinking, “Wow! Jesus must have been a massive man to be able to feed everyone in this church.”

As I grew up, I never really doubted that the Eucharist was important. For a large part of middle school and high school, I would either skateboard or drive to Mass by myself because I knew that the Eucharist was vital somehow to my spiritual life. Mind you, I grew up in the Bible Belt of America. All of my friends were Protestant, and I was really attracted to their churches. A part of me really wanted to tag along with my friends on Sundays and go to their services with them. I actually did a handful of times, and I always felt like I walked away having learned something. However, as badly as I wanted to be Protestant, I knew I could never leave the Eucharist because I just knew something was there.

This desire to be Protestant only grew during my freshman year of college when I began playing college baseball at a Baptist university. By the grace of God, my assistant coach was Catholic and made sure that I went to Mass every week. He was consistent in inviting me to his Bible studies, and after practice, he constantly fed me Dr. Scott Hahn CDs about the Eucharist.

I remember listening to one in my truck one day and thinking, “Wow! The Eucharist really is super special.”

I ended up transferring schools for various reasons, and I ultimately ended up at the University of Texas at Austin where I fell into a good group of Catholic friends who really made the faith come alive. One night, as we passed around a bottle of wine, one of my friends said that the Eucharist was the body, blood, soul and divinity of Jesus. And I was like, “Whoa, whoa, whoa. What do you mean, ‘soul and divinity?’” My friend simply responded, “Yeah, we believe that the Eucharist is not just Jesus’s body and blood, but that he is fully present to us in the Eucharist with his body, blood, soul, and divinity. He’s just as present to us today as he was 2,000 years ago.”

That rocked my world. I remember thinking, “Shoot! Wow! I knew the Eucharist was big. I didn't realize the Eucharist was this big. I didn’t realize the Eucharist was really a who and not a what.”

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