A Word for the Eighth Sunday After Pentecost (14)

Today’s Gospel reading, beloved brothers and sisters, tells us of the Lord’s mercy toward people and of His divine, almighty power—it speaks, that is, of the healing of many sick people, and of the wondrous feeding of five thousand people with five small loaves and two fish, wondrously multiplied.

It teaches us the truth that the Lord Jesus Christ is the Creator of all things, our Giver of life and our Feeder, and the Physician of soul and body; He made, and makes, every fruit of the earth in abundance for our food and delight; He sends down from heaven the early and the latter rain; He thunders in the vault of heaven and flashes lightning fearsomely; He brings forth the winds from His treasuries; by Him we live, move, and exist (Act 17:28). Therefore, beloved brothers and sisters, using every day the various gifts of God, let us be thankful to the Lord for them, and, in return for so great a love of His for us and so rich a providence over us, let us repay Him with love, and, in the measure of His generosity to us, let us be generous in turn to our neighbors. If we act this way, the earth will not cease to bring forth every fruit abundantly; for, in the measure of the fruits of our love for God and of our good deeds, the earth too will be filled with fruits, and there will be no crop failures or famine or grievous costliness of every need. But if we are unmerciful and hardhearted, then the earth too will be hard beneath our feet and will not yield its fruit. The Lord requires nothing more of us, brothers and sisters, in return for His gifts and for His love toward us, than that we keep His holy will and love one another. What does the All-sufficient and All-blessed One need from us? Nothing. See what touching compassion the Lord shows toward the people who came in great numbers to hear His sweet, life-giving word and to be healed of their infirmities! Seeing the multitude, says the Evangelist, the Lord had compassion on them, and healed their sick. Does He not, by this, teach all of us too, compassion and mercy toward one another? Yes, He gives us, in Himself, an example of every virtue. I have shown you an example, so that you too would do the same things I do (Jn 13:15), says the Lord—within the bounds of what is possible, of course. You cannot heal? But you can sympathize with the sick, visit them, comfort them with your love, help them in whatever way and however you can; or you can feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty, clothe the naked, or buy them some clothing and footwear and the like. Today’s Gospel further teaches us not to hesitate to share with our neighbor even out of our own small means, according to our own strength: for even a small amount, the Lord is able to multiply, so that «he who gives to the poor will not become poor» (Prov 28:27). The Apostles had only five loaves and two fish, and thought it was not even worth dividing so small an amount among so great a multitude of people. Yet this small amount became a great abundance; all ate and were filled, and there remained besides forty times as much as there had been.

Does not a like wonder happen even now with merciful people? — Quite often indeed. In the measure of their giving, the Lord grants them back ten, twenty, a hundred times as much. «The Lord is faithful in all His words» (Ps 144:13).

But above all, today’s Gospel teaches us that our true bread—bread not of temporal but of eternal life—is the Lord Jesus Christ, and that we must care not only for perishable food, but especially for the imperishable food which gives eternal life to the soul: namely, for Communion of the most pure Body and Blood of Christ, for the hearing and reading of the Word of God, which is the spiritual food of our souls, and for prayer, which sanctifies and fills the soul with grace. When, after the wondrous feeding, the people began to follow Jesus Christ so as to eat once more of the wondrous meal, the Lord said to them, in reproof: «truly, truly, I say to you, you seek Me not because you saw the signs, but because you ate of the loaves and were filled. Labor not for the food which perishes, but for the food which endures to everlasting life, which the Son of Man will give you» (Jn 6:26,27). Truly I say to you: «My Father gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is He who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world. Then they replied to Him: Lord, give us this bread always. And Jesus told them: I am the bread of life; he who comes to Me shall never hunger, and he who believes in Me shall never thirst» (Jn 6:33-35). Earthly, perishable food strengthens only the body, and not the immortal soul. The Apostle says: it is good that the heart be established by grace, and not by foods, from which those devoted to them have received no profit (Hebr 13:9).

Food is for the belly, and the belly for food, but God will destroy both it and them (1Cor 6:13). And so, brothers and sisters, even as we take care for perishable food, let us take still greater care for the spiritual food by which our immortal soul is fed—for Communion of the Body and Blood of Christ, for the hearing and reading of the Word of God, and for prayer both public and at home. «May Your holy Body be to me the bread of life everlasting, O merciful Lord, and Your precious Blood the healing of manifold infirmities». Amen.