The gospel today starts with Jesus hearing of cousin John's death. This is a great blow. The two had quite a bit to do with each other even before they were born. Remember the story of Our Lady and Elizabeth, and John jumping around in the womb for joy so near was his Saviour. John baptised Jesus, they were cousins.So upon hearing of John's death, Jesus does the infinitely sensible thing.
He gets into a boat and withdraws to a lonely place.He needs a quiet place to weep, to reflect and just to be by himself. Maybe there were some things He needed to say to His heavenly Father and maybe there were some things that the Father needed to say to Him. Yes he gets into the boat to do some good, honest grief homework. And that ought to teach us something about the Master. We believe and love a compassionate Christ, who knows what it is to weep, grieve and miss someone. Jesus' withdrawal also ought to teach us about our need to take very good care of ourselves when we are mourning.
Alas, Jesus' cunning plan is thwarted. The people beat him there so as Jesus steps ashore, he is greeted by a great crowd who all have the lurgy, or a hammy leg, or an unfortunate rash on their shoulder. Being the sympathetic and understanding Messiah, he sets to and heals them. Night descends, so the disciples tell Jesus that he ought to send the crowds away to get something to eat before the supermarket closes. However Jesus challenges the disciples to give them something to eat. Does he know their meagre rations and does he know what is about to happen? Maybe…And then the really good bit occurs.Out of the meagre rations of five loaves and two fish, Jesus feeds the 5000. And that’s marvellous and miraculous, good and dandy. But look a little deeper at the four steps that make this possible. Jesus takes the bread Jesus blesses the bread Jesus breaks the bread Jesus distributes the bread.Sound familiar? It is the fourfold action of every Eucharist. Bread is taken, bread is blessed, bread is broken and bread is distributed.
See if you can spot this later when your local priesty guy gets to the altar. Listen for the words that are said … and … watch out for the outward physical actions.The words to look out for are “Before he was given up to death a death he freely accepted. “He took bread… and gave you thanks (or blessed it). He broke the bread… and gave it to his disciples…This is also a summary of Our Lord's own life. He was taken, blessed, broken and given for us. Now at one level the story is about the feeding of the 5000 tells us how generous and loving God is. He feeds us abundantly with more than we can ever need. Remember there were 12 baskets of leftovers for breakfast the next day. But remember where our story begins. It begins with Jesus bereft in a lonely place. It is with an embarrassingly meagre amount of food that so many are fed. So The Master nurtures us not only when things are good and luscious, but also takes our brokenness and out of our ache and muck, something quite magnificent occurs.
In ways that we know not, by means that are sublime and invisible, The Master continues to satisfy not only our immediate needs, but also our deepest longings into the future.I have watched this process often. Not only at the Eucharist but in my dealings with sad families. Somehow, from deep within, even in and particularly in, the most gruelling of circumstances, people rise and are outstanding in the way they look out for each other and love each other. I see it also in these COVID times. When all seems quite puzzling, scary and stupefying. The way you have grasped the opportunities and each other has left us all sustained and encouraged in ways that we never thought possible. In our brokenness, we actually feed the world.I conclude with Nouwen who put it this way.“When Jesus took bread, blessed it, broke it and gave it to the crowds, he summarised in these gestures his own life . Jesus is chosen from all eternity, blessed at his baptism, broken on the cross and given as bread to the world.“When we take bread, bless it, break it and give it with the words “This is the body of Christ” we express our commitment to make our lives conform to the life of Christ. We too want to live a people chosen, blessed, and broken and thus become food for the world.”
