John 6:1 - 15
The miracle of feeding a crowd by multiplying loaves and fishes appears six times in the gospels. It must have meant a lot to the early Christians. The place is sometimes different, the number of the crowd is different; in today’s account from John we meet a little boy who provides the material, whereas in other accounts, the apostles themselves come up with the food to be multiplied. There’s been a lot of speculation -- was there only one miracle, recalled in different ways? Was there a miracle at all, or did the people find among themselves enough food to share with each other -- that being the real miracle. But none of that speculation really helps. I think most of us can see the Eucharist being foreshadowed, and we can hear echoes from the Old Testament of when God fed his people with manna from heaven, or as we heard today, the prophet Elisha performing a similar miracle in days long ago.
Maybe we can look at this in a different way. Think about it. People have been following Jesus; he’s been teaching them; and they’ve been hearing his message. And the day is over and they’ve got to get home. I don’t think anyone was going to starve to death; they might have been in a deserted place but they could probably get home before sunset. But what if the reason Jeuss worked this miracle was to keep the people together, to allow them to sit and leisurely discuss what he had been teaching them? In Mark’s version, Jesus has thim sit in groups, which would be more oriented towards discussion. Because that’s what Jesus really wanted, I think. He wanted them to take his teaching and discuss it and interiorize it. In another place two apostles describe their encounter with the risen lord “Were our hearts not burning within us …” they say after their conversation with Jesus along the way to Emaus? Because that’s the effect we should be looking for -- when we’ve heard the word of God and digested it, our hearts should burn within us. That is the sign that the Holy Spirit stands ready to help uis change, to help us repent, to help us be more effective disciples.
We do know that in the early days of the church the agape meal which is the ancestor of our Mass, was accompanied by scripture readings, by a reflection given by the presider, and it says in that early description that after this went on until it seemed appropriate, the Eucharistic actions with the bread and wine would take place. These were small groups and I;m sure much discussion of the scriptures and the sermon took place. And in those moments of reflection and discussion, the Christian people left the assembly more desirous of following Jesus than before.
In our day the Church places before her people at each weekend celebration of Mass, a reading from the Old Testament, one from the epistles or the Acts of the Apostles, and one from the Gospel. Sometimes the sermon builds on one or more of these readings, sometimes not so much. But there is a lot more to chew on than we ever do; God speaks to us and we check to make sure our watches are running. Our church tells us how important the scriptures are to our faith and by the time we get to the car we’ve sort of forgotten what the readings were about.
Jesus made the crowd sit down and he gave them supper. He wanted them to be fed not only with the food he provided, but with the words he had spoken. And in order to feast upon the word of God, it’s important to digest it, to turn it over in our minds, to see how it applies to us, and very often that goal is better achieved when we discuss with each other what we have heard and what it means to us.
When my children were young we would now and then, not every Sunday, spend a little time discussing the readings and the sermon. They knew that I would ask questions so it became a game to see who could answer them. It wasn’t perfect, but I think it made a difference to learn that their mother and I took this seriously.
Today, we should ask, how are we accepting the spiritual food the Lord gives us in this weekly assembly? Are we preparing for Mass by reading the scriptures beforehand? Do we have a commentary we can turn to that explains the scriptures? Do we have someone else with whom we can discuss the scriptures we’ve heard? God gives us his written word, and the Church offers us a weekly portion. Like the people Jesus fed, we need to find a way to take in the word, to let it burn within us, to allow it to change us. If we don’t, we are missing a God-given opportunity.
