“For Catholics, the Bread of Life discourse can be too familiar. As we read John 6 for the next several Sundays, let us pray for gratitude for this teaching.”
Last week was a historic event in the history of American Catholicism: a National Eucharistic Congress. For five days, thousands of people converged upon Indianapolis for beautiful liturgies, times of Adoration, and inspiring talks. What some of us experienced last week should not simply be another event or just another conference. For the Congress to be effective, it must now be lived: In our parishes, in our communities, and in our homes.
And one thing we must take from those five days focused on the Eucharist is gratitude for the great gift of the Eucharist. Liturgically, this is aided by our Gospel readings for the next several Sundays.
For a few weeks during Year B, the Lectionary takes a break from the Gospel of Mark to bring us the Bread of Life discourse from the sixth chapter of St. John’s Gospel. Beginning with the multiplication of the loaves and fish, which we hear this coming Sunday, the narrative brings us to the next day, when Jesus is back at his home base in Capernaum, preaching in the synagogue. The people, stirred on by the previous day’s miracle, are coming to him seeking more free food.
He proceeds to teach them about the Eucharist, the true bread from Heaven that they should seek. For many of us Catholics, the Bread of Life discourse is familiar – perhaps too familiar. I have to admit, at times my brain shuts off when I begin to hear the words, knowing what comes next. As we continue through the chapter for the next several Sundays, let us receive the Word with renewed zeal and pray for gift of gratitude for this teaching.
Gratitude that we hear it.
Many of my convert friends admit that they never heard a sermon on the Bread of Life discourse before becoming Catholic. Without a Eucharistic theology, John 6 is hard to explain, so it’s no wonder that it’s often skipped over when the pastor needs to choose the next sermon series. These next Sundays, when there’s a temptation to zone out because I know what’s coming next (Jesus repeats himself about eating and feeding on his flesh five times in seven verses in John 6), I’m going to be grateful that we are hearing this beautiful Scripture proclaimed. I’m also going to ask God to open my ears to hear something new.
Gratitude that we understand it.
If you don’t read John 6 with the eyes of faith, it might be tempting to explain it away as spiritual and symbolic language. The more we delve into it, we see that such an interpretation is difficult to square with the language Jesus was using (to gnaw as an animal), His repetition, and His unwillingness to “correct” his listeners “misunderstanding” (who leaves a miracle worker over symbolic language?). We should be grateful that we understand what Jesus was saying – as much as we can understand it, anyway! But even an intellectual understanding doesn’t make acceptance easy. It’s a hard teaching, and we have to continually pray for those eyes of faith.
Gratitude that we can live it.
The Eucharist is our lifeblood as Christians, as Jesus reminds us again and again in the discourse. We must never take the gift of Jesus’ flesh and blood for granted, nor the gift of the priesthood that brings us the Eucharist. In this vale of tears, humans in the Church can cause plenty of them. But the Church brings me Jesus, and the Eucharist is our food for the journey through that vale. Even amidst the scandals in the Church, we must be grateful that sinful humans are capable of giving us the Eucharist, and we must be grateful to those men who sacrifice so much to act in the person of Christ for us.
Image credit: Photo by Sylvain Brison on Unsplash
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