Commentary of the Gospell for August 18th, 2024

“I am the living bread”

Dear brothers and sisters, peace and all good.

This Sunday, the book of Proverbs reminds us of a need of our time: we need a culture of meaning, rich in knowledge and truth, that can be communicated. No matter how we find ourselves, or how old we are, we all need to know the meaning of life. It is enough to become aware of our poverty and desire to be initiated into that culture. Communion with the Lord and our discipleship offer us the necessary rations of truth and word.

The second reading refers us to another need of believers: that of being prepared for the critical times of faith that have come and continue to come. “Take advantage of the opportunity.” The Greek word used, “Kairós”, has the sense of opportunity, of possibility. It is not a generic time, but a favorable moment, which we can take advantage of to improve, to change for the better. The Christian, as a child of God, can recognize his presence and try to fulfill his will, in order to be happy.

That is why it is advisable not to abuse wine, which is a bad advisor. It is better to dedicate oneself to prayer, to give thanks to God and, like Mary in the “Magnificat”, to thank Him for all that He has done for us. It is good to be grateful. Because in everyone’s life there are enough moments to recognize God’s passing through it. And every day try to fulfill what God wants from us.

The Gospels of all these last Sundays are full of the smell of good bread. The Lord has been telling us that He is the bread come down from heaven, the living bread, that whoever eats of this bread has eternal life. And one wonders why the Lord Jesus is called the Good Shepherd, and the title of the Good Bread or the Good Baker has never caught on. The whole Gospel smells of freshly baked bread…

• Bethlehem, where the Lord was born, translates as the House of Bread
• When Jesus feels sorry for the hungry crowd, what he multiplies is bread.
• When he teaches us to ask for what we need, he teaches us to ask for our daily bread.
• To the poor Canaanite woman he says that it is not right to throw the bread that the children eat to the dogs and the Canaanite woman retorts that the puppies eat the crumbs of that bread under the table
• And when he says goodbye to us with the promise that he will be with us until the end of time, he leaves us his Body in bread to be food for our journey.

With the evangelist Saint John, we go through this sixth chapter step by step. There is still one last stretch, the crossroads before the word of Jesus. It will be the moment for the disciples to take the floor, and decide what to do. Today, it is still the Master who has the floor.

He presents himself again as the Bread of life come down from Heaven. And he repeats the words we have already heard, “‘my flesh is true food and my blood is true drink.’ To understand these words, we must take into account the whole life of Jesus: his journey, his destiny, his self-giving. That self-giving was total, he emptied himself so that we might live. To eat his flesh and drink his blood is to open oneself in faith to Him, to participate in that journey, in that destiny, in that self-giving.

“‘My flesh is true food and my blood is true drink.’ Here a mysterious maternal dimension of the Lord is revealed to us: just as the mother, in the womb, gives of her own substance to the child, and makes it viable; just as, once born, she breastfeeds it with her own milk, and makes it more viable; so He gives his own flesh and his own blood, and makes us viable. The child receives from the fullness of the mother; we receive from the fullness of the Lord. Just as the child has been literally entrained in the mother (and carries her entrained), we are entrained in Him and we must entrain Him in us (sacramental communion).

“‘My flesh is true food and my blood is true drink.’ Jesus is not deceptive water that does not quench thirst, nor wine that stuns and intoxicates, nor loneliness without roads, nor lost path or cut off road.

This was the profound and authoritative teaching that Jesus dispensed in Capernaum. Its essential characteristics revolve, more than on the sacrament itself, on the mystery of the person and life of Jesus, which is gradually revealed. That mystery embraces in unity the Word and the sacrament. The Word and the sacrament set in motion two different human faculties: hearing and sight, which place man in a life of communion and obedience to God.

To my flesh, perishable and destined to death, is offered today the possibility of eternal life through the resurrected and, therefore, incorruptible flesh of the Son. Eternal life, the life of God, the blessed life, the happy life, the life without shadow, without mourning and without tears, comes to me through the Son, through his flesh, which becomes bread to eat. The Eucharist puts me in contact with eternal life, allows me to overcome death and unhappiness. What gift could be more desirable? Can I ask for anything more than eternal life?

In the Eucharist is present all of God’s desire for communion with me, his desire that I accept his gift as an act of love, that I understand the unique importance that his Son has for my life and for my fulfillment. Life comes to me from the Father, through the flesh of the Son, thanks to the mediation of the apostolic Church, which celebrates the Eucharist so that I too, with my purified and surrendered flesh, may become a bridge to bring life to the world. This is the mystery of our faith! The flesh is truly “the foundation of salvation” (Tertullian).

Your brother in faith,
Alejandro, C.M.F.