Father Koch: The living bread from heaven transforms our world view
August 16, 2024 at 8:24 a.m.
Gospel reflection for Aug. 18, 2024, 20th Sunday in Ordinary Time
The dialogue that Jesus has with the crowd following the multiplication of the loaves and fishes gets more intense in the extraction we read this week as Jesus tells them that: “unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life within you.” Jesus has moved this conversation from calling himself the “bread come down from heaven” to now telling them that they must eat his flesh and drink his Blood in order to have eternal life. This image first caused them to ponder the meaning and then, more substantively, to begin to reject what he has taught and then to reject him as well.
This does not mean that this is not a difficult passage to ponder and apprehend. The idea of eating the flesh of another person and drinking that person’s blood is entirely foreign to the Jewish world of the time of Jesus and to the vast majority of human beings throughout history. Cannibalism is an aberration and found only in the rarest and most desperate of situations. So, when Jesus says that he is the Bread that has come down from heaven and that they must actually eat his flesh and drink his Blood, it makes perfect sense that the crowd would react negatively.
The crowd misses where Jesus is leading them because they, like many of us, get hung-up on the expression “to eat.” Yes, we believe that as we receive the Eucharist we are physically and actually eating the flesh and Blood of Jesus, given to us through the mystery of transubstantiation. However, there remains the fundamental “why” question.
As elsewhere in his teaching, Jesus uses the image of “abiding” with his disciples, and in this case, with those who eat his flesh and drink his Blood.
He chooses to abide -- to remain in and with -- those who believe in him and who share in this mystery which he is leaving for them and for us. He is with us in the Eucharistic presence, and he is within us as we receive this Eucharist.
This abiding with us then, is not for us alone, it is for us to go forward to live as his disciples. While adoration of Jesus Christ present to us in the Eucharist is an important devotion, the transformation of our very lives is at the center of the Eucharistic presence. The Eucharistic is meant to be eaten by believers and then those believers take the presence of Christ into the world in their own person, represented through their own words and actions.
St. Augustine teaches us that we become what we receive: the Body of Christ.
Jesus abides with us - within us -- and we abide with one another. In a very literal sense this is the meaning of the term “Communion.” We talk about going to or receiving Communion, failing often to recognize that the very word itself suggests this relationship of abiding with Jesus. We communicate with him; we abide with him.
For our part, then, the most important time of prayer in our lives is that moment when we have just received Holy Communion. Jesus, then physically present within us, transforms us into a tabernacle. It is then, in those few fleeting moments, when we are in our most intimate moments with Jesus. Take that time for prayer and to engage fully and consciously with his presence, and with those around us who are sharing in the same experience. It is not for ourselves that Jesus make himself present in the Eucharist, it is for the building-up of his body -- the Church -- present in the world.
In a reflection on this Gospel passage, St. John Vianney wrote: “‘I AM with you,’ said Jesus, ‘the living Bread come down from heaven. He who eats this Bread shall live forever.’ I believe, I adore, because you have the words of eternal life. No one else can give it to me, and I know that apart from you there is only feebleness and decay. Grant, O Jesus, that I may fear above all things the indifference which, keeping me at a distance from the Holy Table, would deprive me of an increase of life divine and lead me progressively to death.”
May we desire this Communion always, and may we now grow indifferent to his presence in the Blessed Sacrament, transforming our world.
Father Garry Koch is pastor of St. Benedict Parish, Holmdel.
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Gospel reflection for Aug. 18, 2024, 20th Sunday in Ordinary Time
The dialogue that Jesus has with the crowd following the multiplication of the loaves and fishes gets more intense in the extraction we read this week as Jesus tells them that: “unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life within you.” Jesus has moved this conversation from calling himself the “bread come down from heaven” to now telling them that they must eat his flesh and drink his Blood in order to have eternal life. This image first caused them to ponder the meaning and then, more substantively, to begin to reject what he has taught and then to reject him as well.
This does not mean that this is not a difficult passage to ponder and apprehend. The idea of eating the flesh of another person and drinking that person’s blood is entirely foreign to the Jewish world of the time of Jesus and to the vast majority of human beings throughout history. Cannibalism is an aberration and found only in the rarest and most desperate of situations. So, when Jesus says that he is the Bread that has come down from heaven and that they must actually eat his flesh and drink his Blood, it makes perfect sense that the crowd would react negatively.
The crowd misses where Jesus is leading them because they, like many of us, get hung-up on the expression “to eat.” Yes, we believe that as we receive the Eucharist we are physically and actually eating the flesh and Blood of Jesus, given to us through the mystery of transubstantiation. However, there remains the fundamental “why” question.
As elsewhere in his teaching, Jesus uses the image of “abiding” with his disciples, and in this case, with those who eat his flesh and drink his Blood.
He chooses to abide -- to remain in and with -- those who believe in him and who share in this mystery which he is leaving for them and for us. He is with us in the Eucharistic presence, and he is within us as we receive this Eucharist.
This abiding with us then, is not for us alone, it is for us to go forward to live as his disciples. While adoration of Jesus Christ present to us in the Eucharist is an important devotion, the transformation of our very lives is at the center of the Eucharistic presence. The Eucharistic is meant to be eaten by believers and then those believers take the presence of Christ into the world in their own person, represented through their own words and actions.
St. Augustine teaches us that we become what we receive: the Body of Christ.
Jesus abides with us - within us -- and we abide with one another. In a very literal sense this is the meaning of the term “Communion.” We talk about going to or receiving Communion, failing often to recognize that the very word itself suggests this relationship of abiding with Jesus. We communicate with him; we abide with him.
For our part, then, the most important time of prayer in our lives is that moment when we have just received Holy Communion. Jesus, then physically present within us, transforms us into a tabernacle. It is then, in those few fleeting moments, when we are in our most intimate moments with Jesus. Take that time for prayer and to engage fully and consciously with his presence, and with those around us who are sharing in the same experience. It is not for ourselves that Jesus make himself present in the Eucharist, it is for the building-up of his body -- the Church -- present in the world.
In a reflection on this Gospel passage, St. John Vianney wrote: “‘I AM with you,’ said Jesus, ‘the living Bread come down from heaven. He who eats this Bread shall live forever.’ I believe, I adore, because you have the words of eternal life. No one else can give it to me, and I know that apart from you there is only feebleness and decay. Grant, O Jesus, that I may fear above all things the indifference which, keeping me at a distance from the Holy Table, would deprive me of an increase of life divine and lead me progressively to death.”
May we desire this Communion always, and may we now grow indifferent to his presence in the Blessed Sacrament, transforming our world.
Father Garry Koch is pastor of St. Benedict Parish, Holmdel.