What is Eucharistic Adoration?

In Gethsemane Jesus asks his disciples whether they could not watch one hour with him — the origin of the expression holy hour.

Mary of Bethany sits at Jesus' feet listening, and Jesus says she has chosen the better part.

The wise men find the child with Mary his mother and fall down to adore him.

From the earliest centuries Christians kept the consecrated bread after Mass to bring to the sick and the dying.

Devotion to Christ present in the Eucharist grew in the Middle Ages. In 1264 Pope Urban IV extended the feast of Corpus Christi to the whole Church.

Tradition attributes the hymns for that feast, such as the Tantum Ergo, to St Thomas Aquinas.

Exposition of the Host in a monstrance, and devotions like the Forty Hours, spread from the 16th century.

The Church shows its faith in the real presence by adoring the Eucharist outside Mass too: keeping it with care, exposing it, and carrying it in procession.

The tabernacle was first meant for bringing communion to the sick; it became a place of adoration of the Lord really present.

Adoration is the first attitude of the creature before its Creator.