- Food is a sign of celebration – but it is also nourishment. The image in John’s gospel is that the people long for this food but no longer for the miracle of food.
- They long for the secular world, in which we all live, but loose focus on the larger picture of God’s working in Jesus the miracle of the loaves and fishes.
- The day before Jesus gave them bread to satisfy their hunger and this is why they are looking for him. They want to eat.
- But why make this party when someone close and dear is offering them more? When the poor of the earth sit on our borders.
- Jesus is disappointed: it says that he questioned their integrity. He is, as we are sometimes, feeling low, at a loss about what to do.
- But the following words show that the people really want life. Jesus corrects their understanding of the bread and indicates that it is not from the Abraham, the earth, that God gives life. It is from God, from heaven that bread is given.
- This is a renewal in our understanding that we must hold onto when we feel a ‘dead-end’ in life/overwhelmed by people.
- It is not a coincidence that death and sadness; poverty and sickness; are followed by miracles of healing and abundance of life in the sharing of food.
- This is what Christians hope for and belief will happen when we are out of patience or short of hope.
- We believe that the best is yet to come.
- I recall a family leaving their home city for a job overseas; children changing schools and wife to a place where she had no family or friends. – Refugees taking boats. – people leaving for new medicine in stem cells etc.
- The words: “The best is yet to come” measure a follower of Jesus against a pragmatic attitude.
- But that is exactly what the food is: death brought sadness and an end but this is healed and transformed into joy and new life; food in abundance and a new satisfaction/food is blessed and God’s presence and sharing proves ample sufficient.
- This is why we call the gospel: Good News.
This gospel is often linked to the Holy Eucharist.
- this is probably because of the Food of life.
- But it extends to include the way in which Mass reminds us that death is followed by life.
- Every time we celebrate the Eucharist, we celebrate thanksgiving for the God who makes change and difficulty into a moment of shared nourishment.
- The cry of Jesus in the Eucharist is to the Father, that he should somehow stay in the world. The Eucharist is the Father’s answer.
- We are the receivers of this food that brings life to others (without borders).
- The God who comes into darkness, despair and death to bring new beginnings and abundance – justice.
- I know that this is no magic for those of us in the middle of changes in life; or who are struggling with sickness and age; or who have no money to get home; or who work jobs that are boring and hard; or who feel betrayed by friends and partners/refugees and immigrants.
- These are painful times and endlessly lonely but the sharing of bread does not go away. But beware that we are not the cause of that pain.
- We must be followers of God who brings people in, blesses their pain, sharing our bread and healing them.
It took a Pope like Francis to leave the High table of plenty and join the cafferteria queue at Casa Santa Marta ; where, in the breaking and sharing, the Church was taught something more about God in Jesus Christ.
- In this we are schooled again in the food of life; a humble service that is being Jesus in the world.
- The outstanding words of this gospel stay with me often:
- I am the bread of life. Believing that I can only say: Give me that Bread!