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Sunday 18 (Year B): read John 6: 24-35
This Sunday we continue reading Chapter 6 of St. John’s Gospel. Last week, we read the miracle of the loaves
and the fishes: this was a sign Jesus gave to elicit the response of faith in His Divine person and to prepare the way for
his teaching on the Bread of Life. But the crowd misunderstood the sign and thus misunderstood Jesus Himself, wanting to force
Him to be a political messiah. So Jesus eludes their grasp by fleeing to the hills to pray. The next scene in John 6 comes
between last week’s miracle and the Gospel extract we heard today: it is the further miracle of Jesus walking on the
waters. In some ways, this miracle was a special gift of Jesus’ love just for his twelve apostles who were struggling
to cross the sea of Tiberias (symbolizing the struggle to live a life of faith in the face of so many headwinds). He was making sure that they did
not misunderstand Him as the crowd had: by walking over the sea He reveals Himself to be God (“It is I [I Am Who Am]!
Do not be afraid!”), just as Yahweh had revealed Himself to Israel by
opening the way through the Red Sea. This second miracle again links Chapter 6 of St. John with the events of the Passover
and Exodus and, for the Apostles, it strengthens their faith in Jesus as the fulfillment of the Old Testament.
Today’s Gospel extract could be called the introduction to that long speech which Jesus will give on Himself
as the Bread and Drink of Life. It serves as a link between the miracle of the loaves and the doctrine He will teach, and
which we will hear developed over the next few Sundays. The scene it portrays is rather confrontational, testy even. The crowd,
like all crowds, seems to contain a mixture of sincere searchers for Jesus, opportunists and cynics. And being no fool, Jesus
strips away immediately the pretences with which some would come to Him. The very first words He says are poignantly realistic,
and not without a hint of bitterness: “You are looking for me not because you saw signs but because you ate the loaves
of bread and had your stomachs filled.” They are words which remind us of the complaints of the Israelites against Moses
in the desert when, in dire need, they lamented: “Why did you take us away from the flesh-pots of Egypt, the cucumbers
and the rest, to lead us here to die of starvation?” Ah, yes, the human heart, without persevering trust and faith in
the Lord’s providence, becomes –and understandably so- absorbed with what is most tangible, with what we would
call today “materialism”. So Jesus flags the warning: “Do not work for food that perishes but for food that
endures for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you.” Again these words are reminders of Yahweh’s words
to Israel, which Jesus Himself uses to defeat the Devil in the hour of His own temptation:
“Man does not live on bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.”
The crowd seems to muster renewed interest with this talk of food for eternal life (“no need to go shopping any
more or spend money on food … yes, give us that bread and the one who can make it!”), and so they ask: “What
can we do to accomplish the works of God?” And then Jesus drops the bomb: “Believe in me!” This talk of
faith puts the crowd on the defensive; they demand a sign, apparently already having forgotten the multiplication of the loaves.
The sign they ask, however, is indeed the sign that the prophets associated with the coming of the Messiah, namely, the return
of manna falling from heaven. But, on His side, Jesus attempts to raise their hearts and minds to a higher level, away from
manna and bread understood as perishable fragments. First of all, He states clearly that the true bread from heaven and the
true Giver of that bread are not what they think: the true bread is not bread for the bodily appetite, but the incarnate Jesus
Himself, the bread to satisfy the hungry heart; and the true Giver was not Moses, but the Father of Jesus. One can almost
see the jaws of the crowd drop in collective disbelief. “This Jesus of Nazareth is God’s Bread of eternal life?!
You must be joking!” But Jesus, unperturbed, goes even further: “whoever comes to me will never hunger, and whoever
believes in me will never thirst.” Eternal life will render the needs of the body irrelevant; indeed, eternity means
to feast on God Himself. But to obtain the gift of that life, one needs to be open to receive the gift of coming to Jesus,
that is of believing in Him, of preferring absolutely nothing to His life, His love, His truth, His goodness, His grace and
His beauty. The author of Psalm 62 seems to understand this when he says: “O God, you are my God, for you I long, for
you my soul is thirsting. My body pines for you, like a dry, weary land without water. So I gaze on you in the Sanctuary to
see your strength and your glory. For your love is better than life. …
On my bed I remember you, on you I muse through the night … my soul shall be filled as with a banquet, my mouth shall
praise you with joy.”
It is important to remember that, for the Jews, the manna also symbolized the Torah or the law, the heart of which
was the Decalogue or the Ten Commandments. These were God’s demands of his sons and daughters based on the truth of
who and why they were created. The ten commandments educate us to be true human beings in the order of nature (I-III: respect
God; IV: respect parents; V: respect life: VI: respect marriage and sexuality; VII: respect others’ property; VIII:
respect others’ reputation; IX: have purity of intention in relation to others’ possessions and relationships;
X: avoid greed). To eat the manna was like eating the Decalogue, the Word of God, God’s truth about Himself, ourselves,
our relationship to Him and our relationship to each other. On the mouth of Jesus, and in the hearing of the crowd, this meaning
is not lost. Jesus feeds the mind and heart with the bread of His Truth and Love. Only He goes much further than Moses and
the Old Testament could ever have imagined. God Himself becomes our bread and our truth, both together, unconfused and inseparable.
The seed of eternal life lies within them, and once we receive them sincerely, that life not only enters into and grows within
us: we also enter and grow into it. It is no coincidence that the Mass serves us at two tables: the table of the Word, of
the Truth, of the Decalogue, and the table of the Eucharist, the Bread, the Manna. These are the two main parts of the Mass
because they are the two main constituents of our diet for eternal life. By receiving the Word, each of us, if our heart is
truly open, is drawn magnet-like into oneness of faith and understanding about the mysteries of Christ and his Church. By
receiving the Eucharist, if our heart is truly open, each of us is drawn magnet-like into oneness of love and freedom, the
love and freedom of Christ Himself, the glorious liberty of the children of God. The Word feeds our minds so that the strength
our hearts draw from the love given in the Eucharist can enable us to choose, to act and to persevere in living the truth
of Christ: His truth about Himself and the Trinity (which may seem easier to live), but also His truth about the human person
and the human family (which is definitely more difficult to live).
So we come to Mass not merely to be edified, but to be fortified in living out the meaning of what we do here at this
altar and at this pulpit. Living out means witnessing and witnessing will mean suffering, both in the personal realm of getting
our own lives sorted out, and in the family and social realms, in speaking up, in working and in all other forms of activity
which the Truth of Christ demands of us. If we could only understand that the obedience of faith is not a real restriction
of our freedom! It is the response of a heart and mind that absolutely needs and must do what the Lover-God and the Loving
God requires: if you like, obedience is a slavery, a slavery to the truth and love of Christ. But blessed is the one who can
renounce the kind of slavery today’s world offers us under the guise of freedom and embrace freedom in Christ which
that same world has the audacity to call slavery!
Christ’s claim upon humanity is not, for it cannot be, one among others: it is, and must be, exclusive; it is,
and must be, a monopoly, for He is its only Creator and only Redeemer. The Truth and Bread of Life He offers are not one alternative
among others; they are THE Truth and THE Bread of THE Life. Yes, give to Caesar what belongs to Caesar, but do not give to
Caesar (whatever form he takes in history) the mistaken notion that he can tamper even minimally with what belongs by right
to God alone: and what belongs to God includes marriage, the family, human life, human death, and the human being made in
the image, not of Caesar, but of God, and made male and female. And at the end of the day, all Caesars belong to God and will
answer to God for how they have respected God in respecting His rights, His laws, His people. Anyone, no matter what his political,
social or ecclesiastical credentials, who thinks that there exist within the Truth of Christ, as taught by the Church, acceptable,
differing opinions about pedophilia, divorce, artificial contraception, abortion, incest, extra-marital sex, be it heterosexual
or homosexual, and numerous other moral questions – that person has not yet understood that Truth according to the mind
of the Church. Christ’s untouchable sovereignty over the structures of creation and redemption has already defined these
matters. Indeed, there may be many in the Church who hold different opinions on these questions: but many opinions to not
constitute many doctrines, for the doctrine of Christ’s Church is not defined by majority opinion, nor by social convention,
nor by cultural trends, but by Christ’s gift of the Magisterial authority of His own Church, and by that authority alone.
That is why we must come to Christ, not looking for ideas that fit or satisfy our earthly agendas, perceptions or preconceptions,
or those of the “crowd to which we belong”, whatever its name or nature, but to heed and believe, with open and
sincere heart, in the signs of His Eucharist and of His Gospel, the signs of His Divine “I AM”, His Presence,
His Truth. Fortified with these, we will, for we must, reach out in dialog and discussion, with respect, understanding and
compassion, to all men and women of good will. Indeed, we are called and sent to communicate the unsearchable riches of the
wisdom and grace of Christ in ways that are appropriate, creative and imaginative, but always compatible with the Gospel as
it is taught and understood according to the mind of the Catholic Church.
These are difficult times; the questions are difficult and complex; they require of us great love, courage and compunction;
but they demand all the more of us an unapologetic clarity and conviction about the doctrine and principles of our Catholic
faith. That clarity and conviction must reflect, on the one hand, the uniqueness of Christ and His exclusive sovereignty over
humanity, and, on the other, the courage and fortitude of the true believer. Yet we need not fear, for, all of this, He will
instill in those who feed abundantly with a noble and generous heart at the dual Table of the Word and of the Bread of everlasting
Life.
Msgr.
Peter Magee
Sunday, August 3rd, 2003
Mother
Seton, Germantown 5.00
pm (Vigil); St. Matthew’s, DC, 10.00;
St.
Michael’s, Silver Spring, 1.00
pm.
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