Jesus went with His disciples to the villages
of Caesarea Philippi. On the way He asked His disciples, “Who do people say
that I am?” And they told Him, “John the Baptist, and
others say Elijah, and others, one of the prophets.”
And so, dear People of God, a considerable number of pious Jews
of Jesus’ time were expecting the promised Messiah to appear as one of the
prophets of Israel. Therefore, when in
today’s Gospel reading, Jesus told His
disciples to have the people sit down and prepare for a meal, He undoubtedly
remembered the miracle performed by the prophet Elishah of which you heard in
our first reading, when the prophet miraculously fed one hundred people using
20 best barley loaves saying:
Thus
says the Lord, ‘They shall eat and have some left.’
Take special note of Jesus, however, because He is no mere
restored prophet, He is one much greater than that! He, for example, does not invoke ‘the Lord’
as did Elishah, He simply told His disciples to make the people sit down, gave
thanks for the food available, as was customary for all pious Jews, and His
will was directly accomplished!
He was feeding over five thousand people, using only one
boy’s measure of food -- given most probably by his mother on his setting out
from home to follow the new Galilean prophet called Jesus -- a little parcel
containing just five pieces of bread and two little fish -- and He said nothing!!
Jesus deliberately played down the miraculous aspect of
that feeding because He knew that the people were getting too excited about Himself
and the renown His miracles had already won for Him; moreover, some of those who
had just been fed, having seen what Jesus had just done, were wanting,
planning, to seize Him immediately and make Him king!! We, however, are just told that:
Jesus withdrew again to the
mountain …. by Himself !!!
Dear People of God, Jesus loved His people, was concerned
about their needs, but He did not want to be used by excited followers
for their own purposes … make Him king as they then wanted.
Jesus wanted to be known, loved, and obeyed in the calm
strength and deep intensity of forthcoming Christian faith and humble,
self-less, commitment.
Looking still more closely at the difference between Our
Lord’s miracle and that of the prophet Elisha again, we see that whereas Elisha
multiplied bread, Jesus multiplied loaves and fish… what does that
difference help us to understand about Jesus? In what way does it instruct us about the
Kingdom of God that He was introducing?
Bread, of course, reminds us of the word of God:
Man shall not live by bread
alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God. (Matthew 4:4)
Fish, however, evoked the end days for which that other
great prophet Ezekiel (47:7-10) predicted that a stream would flow from the Temple
in Jerusalem and become a river that would purify even the Dead Sea:
The Lord
God said to me, “This water flows towards the eastern region down upon the
Arabah, and goes down into the Arabah, and enters the sea; when the water flows
into the sea, the water will become fresh. Wherever the river goes, every living creature
that swarms will live, and there will be very many fish. For this water goes there, that the waters of
the sea may become fresh. Its fish will
be of very many kinds, like the fish of the Great Sea.
Note, note most carefully dear friends in Christ, in
the Kingdom of God being introduced by Jesus, He Himself, JESUS, is the new
and only Temple!! And that water flowing from the Temple envisioned by the
prophet Ezekiel in Jerusalem was a God-given, partially understood, vision of
the water soon to be seen flowing from the pierced side of the Christ on the
Cross in His sublime act of saving love and salvation on Calvary!
The multitude of fish-of-all-kinds foretold by the prophet foreshadowed,
and would be realized in, the stream of sanctifying and purifying grace, that
GIFT of Jesus, His most Holy Spirit, and the many, many, many wonderful
gifts to be bestowed on Jesus’ saintly Catholic followers in the times of
Mother Church soon to come.
Ultimately the Greek word for ‘fish’ in the New Testament
became an acronym among the early Christians -- ICHTHYS -- for the
ancient creed: ‘Jesus Christ, Son of God, Saviour’.
Elisha, as a prophet of God multiplied bread; Jesus, being far
more than a prophet, multiplied bread, symbol of God’s word, and
He also multiplied fish, being a present fulfilment of God’s promises to the
remaining faithful few Israel, and a treasury of help for all His followers who
would become members of His Body, the Catholic Church, bringing to the fulness
of revelation that the Word of God is ultimately the very Person of Jesus the
Christ, become man – born of the Spirit from Mary the Jewish Virgin of Nazareth
-- for the salvation of all mankind.
Jesus symbolically left His Apostles 12 baskets’ full of
food, that is, a plenitude of food for the new Israel to be founded on faith in
Jesus by the proclamation of the Gospel of Jesus in the power of the Spirit of
Jesus. This nourishment for God’s
Christian People, looks like bread and wine, because it is to be food for His disciples; but it is not like
ordinary food which we eat and, by digesting, change into our own bodily
substance, since the food that Jesus gives is intended to gradually change the
recipient into a member of the Body of Christ living by the Spirit of Christ.
Saint Paul told us in the second reading that, for the
disciples of Jesus, on their way, not to the holy mountain, but to their
heavenly home:
There is one body and one
Spirit, one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is over
all, and through all, and in all.
Notice those words: “there is one body and one
Spirit”. “One body” refers to the Church
as the Body of Christ, but it can also be related to the one Body, the one
food, for all those who are living members of the Church which is Mystical Body
of Christ. “There is one Body and one Spirit” because the Body, the Eucharistic
Presence of Christ, is given so that we might be endowed -- every one according
to his or her measure -- with the one Holy Spirit of Jesus, in Whose power
alone it is that each of us will be enabled to walk towards the mountain of the
God and find our heavenly home there.
That is why it is so important for good Catholics to
appreciate the real nature of the Presence of Jesus in the Eucharist: He is
there as food for the way – to sustain those who are on the way. And to those on the way to what is beyond
their imagining and largely hidden in the future, He says, ‘You have My
promises, so’:
Ask, and it will be given to
you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. (Matthew 7:7-9)
That is what Jesus expects from all ‘good’ Catholics, that
we ask with unshakeable trust, seek with patience and
perseverance -- unashamedly persistent in our knocking -- because a true Catholic
is one who is spiritually alive, that is, one constantly searching for Jesus,
and in Him -- by His Spirit -- for the Father.
Dear People of God, the humble appearances of our
Eucharistic Food should help us appreciate that we can best show our love and
appreciation of Jesus in the Eucharist by walking humbly and perseveringly along
that journey whither He is calling us.
It is in and through this simple Eucharistic
food-for-the-way that Jesus communicates to us His Spirit so that He, the
Spirit, abiding in us and working with us, might enable us to progress along
the way of Jesus which ultimately leads to the glorious Supper of the Lamb in
that heavenly home which is the Father’s house:
In My Father's house are many
rooms. If it were not so, would I have
told you that I go to prepare a place for you. (John 14:2)
Jesus does not ask great actions to be seen by men from
those who eat and drink such simple food, but He does expect what the angels
rejoice to see: an ever deeper, more humble and grateful confidence and peace –
spiritual joy -- in the hearts and minds of those aware of and responsive to the
love of Jesus knocking gently at the door of their conscience; and they
themselves -- like ever new-born children -- forming those initially stumbling,
but growing ever more sure and secure words
Come, Lord Jesus, come!
