Jun 13, 2020

Feast of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ - "Remember"


"I am the living bread come down from heaven"

John 6: 51 - 58


If there is any food which has been a universal experience for all humanity over the past thousands of years, I think it would be bread.  In some way, shape and form countless cultures have formed in some manner a food that we refer to as bread.  From the ancient Egyptians to our own day of various forms of “designer” bread filled with all sorts of grains and seeds and other fruits and berries, we all enjoy this universal source of food, gluten free or not.

One local well known bakery even sells bread named “Super Food” which is filled with all sorts of healthy grains in a very delicious combination.  (It's great toasted by the way.) Yet, the bread we reflect on today has far more benefits than even the most powerful of “super foods.” 

If we look carefully at our readings on this beautiful feast of the Body and Blood of Christ we will hear of bread.  The first reading from Deuteronomy begins with Moses address to the people and the word, “Remember.”  Later we hear this emphasized with the phrase, “Do not forget.”  Moses reminds the people of the super food God gave them in the desert; the “manna” bread like substance which appeared on the desert floor in a time of their great hunger and sustained them for the rest of their journey to the promised land.

That bread became a sign for the people and Moses reminds them that God provided for them in their need not just because they were hungry but to test their faith and loyalty.  To, “. . . find out whether or not it was your intention to keep his commandments . . . in order to show you that not by bread alone does one live . . .”  That event and God’s constant care for them is something to commit to their collective memory. This test of their personal connection with the Lord who would save and sustain them was all part of their formation and their understanding of who God was for them. This bread became a sign of life that God had given; bread from heaven to satisfy their hunger.

That story is part of our collective memory as well.  We remember what was done for our ancestors and we draw a collective spirit of thankfulness for God’s care of them and his promise to do the same for us.

If we move to the Gospel we hear Jesus say: “I am the living bread that came down from heaven; whoever eats this bread will live forever; . . .”   Jesus makes himself to be bread – food for life, eternal life. Like the manna from heaven, this living bread is beyond just food that satisfies physical hunger but is rather a super food that provides eternal life.  Every time, then, as Moses spoke to his people in the desert, we “remember” what God has done for us through his Son who gave us himself to be food, super food: “Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me and I  in him . . .”

This is a great sacramental mystery – the Eucharist – which we Catholics truly believe to be not a symbol, some sort of reminder or recall of a meal eaten with Jesus 20 centuries ago like one might remember a birthday party or family picnic.  But this IS a Person and every time we consume, literally eat and drink, this Person, we share in his risen life.  So, no we are not cannibals as the early Christians were unfairly labeled by pagan Roman Emperors and suspicious other non-Christians.  In the mysterious work of God, we encounter the risen Lord truly present to us in a substantive way behind the signs of bread and wine.  If that isn’t “super food” what would be?

This theme of memory runs through not only the readings this Feast but is a constant reminder to us in our sacramental life and in particular the celebration of our Mass. In the gathering of God’s people, albeit in a very different way for the present moment, we are still collectively reminded that we do so because of what God has done for us.
We gather together as one family in the Lord who becomes that food from heaven for our journey through this life.  The unity the Eucharist creates among us is meant to not stop in Church.  While everything is fine for an hour, where do we go afterwards?  Maybe an even more essential question may be, why do we come?

One of the best reasons might be to come because I am hungry and I need to be fed.  We begin the Mass with the sign of the cross and then right off the bat, we express our hunger for forgiveness and mercy.  We “recall our sins.”  It is either a downer to begin so negatively as we stress where we have strayed or it is an expression of our need for God – our hunger before him.  We carry that farther as we express “Lord have mercy.”  Lord, I am hungry and need to be fed by your mercy.  Only then can we enter this great mystery of God’s mercy for us.  While our memory recalls God’s great mercy to his people, his repeated efforts to forgive and win back those who have strayed, and in Jesus we see God’s mercy personified as he goes out to the forgotten and the cast aside.

To satisfy hunger we eat food and we drink.  As the Mass moves we now are fed by the word of God – the Scriptures.  It was the word of God to the ancient Hebrews, the sacred Torah that fed them now and continues to be the focal point of their worship. Those five books of the Sacred Law of God remain an essential reminder of God’s Covenant with his people.

Then, Jesus came as God’s word made flesh.  What God says brings confidence and hope. This is a time to remember what God did and we are given confidence that he continues to do for us today.  So, the word is a living word, not just a book of ancient history.

We move then to more food - from the living word on paper to the living word of person. Bread and wine come first as a symbol and then become sign.  It is the symbol of our lives, offered to the Father to be changed.  So, when the priest raises the bread and wine in prayer: “Blessed are you Lord God of all creation . . .” he offers at the same time the people gathered and himself. And as the priest calls upon the Holy Spirit what was once only a symbol now becomes a sign.  A true sign of God’s presence as we remember the words spoken by his Word among us: “This is my Body . . . This is my Blood.”  What was given as bread is now transformed into super food for us – the very life and presence of the risen one come to us as living bread. So we come because we are hungry for Christ himself and we need to be fed with Word and Sacrament. 

Yet, the Mass is not a private devotion.  It is the family of God gathered to actively and consciously participate. At the Last Supper he washed the feet of his Apostles.  As he was about to lay down his life for those he loved, he washes their feet as a sign they will never forget to imitate.  No great fanfare, no marching bands, no inspiring choir just the act of a slave as God humbled himself in a stark action that surely made an indelible impression on those gathered that night.  “As I have done so you must do . . .” A life of self-sacrificial service to others, after our Lord’s example, is the call of living out the Holy Eucharist.

Called to lay our lives, to sacrifice for the common good and for the good of others, we live out the meaning of this super food.  Jesus doesn’t come for me alone but for US in a way that brings about a bond of unity with him and with others through this bread from heaven. This encounter with Jesus in the Eucharist is a transformative moment for us.

While the theologians, St. Thomas Aquinas in particular in the 14th century, coined the term: “Transubstantiation” to explain the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist if it only remains on a shelf of books in some theological text, then we miss the whole point of Jesus’ example.  The “full, active and conscious participation” the Second Vatican Council called for in the celebration of Mass goes well beyond the walls of the Church – to the world outside.  I should hunger to be fully, consciously and actively involved in the life of Christ himself.

So “remember” but let us remember this great act of divine love and with humble hearts, share in the super food which has the power to change us to conform more to his own example.

“Go and announce the Gospel of the Lord”





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