A reading from the holy gospel
according to John (Jn 6, 51-58)
Jesus said to the crowds: "I
am the living bread that came down from heaven; whoever eats this bread will
live forever; and the bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the
world. The Jews quarreled among themselves, saying, "How can this man give
us his flesh to eat?" Jesus said to them, "Amen, amen, I say to you, unless
you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life
within you. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I
will raise him on the last day. For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true
drink. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks
my blood remains in me and I in him. Just as the living Father sent me and I
have life because of the Father, so also the one who feeds on me will have life
because of me. This is the bread that came down from heaven. Unlike your
ancestors who ate and still died, whoever eats this bread will live
forever." (Jn 6:51-58)
Often, when I meet friends and
they ask me “How are you?”, I answer them “I am older than
yesterday!”. Once I said this to a Roman friend, he answered “Yes, of course,
but you are younger than tomorrow!”. I enjoyed this and I have been repeating
it ever since. Others try to console me, and tell me that I am still young; and I hope that they know that I know that they are
lying. One young lady asked me if I wanted to grow younger. I answered
sincerely: “No, I do not want to grow younger, even
if this were possible!”.
We were born to live, and we want to live and we
do not want to die. We know that sooner or later we shall die. But we are
afraid to die! That’s normal. We do not know how it feels to be dead.
People today not only try to live longer but also do everything to cancel all signs of old age. It is good to live
healthy, but what good can we harvest from cheating ourselves into thinking that we are not as old as we are?
But we have a better offer! We know that sooner
rather than later, our body shall die, but we shall live forever! For the last
few Sundays we have been listening to Christ’s words about Him being the bread of life. He said: “I am the living bread that came
down from heaven. Whoever eats of this bread will live forever; and the bread
that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.”
On hearing these words the Jews disputed among
themselves, saying, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?”. We often
repeat the same question on different occasions: “How?”. Internet gives us the opportunity to contact anybody, anywhere, even in
space if there is anybody out there in a spacecraft. “How do they do it?” “I do
not know! I know they do it, for I use internet!”. In the same way, our minds cannot answer this question “How can Jesus give us his flesh to eat”. Our knowledge comes from our senses, and these cannot explain how he does it. I know that he did it and does it everyday, all the time, all over the
world.
Jesus told us: “Those who eat my flesh and drink
my blood have eternal life, and I will raise them up on the last day; for my
flesh is true food and my blood is true drink”. We go to church and we do not
see or taste human flesh and blood. We are given consecrated bread and wine as
food, which we believe is Jesus Christ as he is now in his glory, in his resurrected body and in his divinity.
The question arises again: “How can this be?” I do
not know. All I know is that he who said these words is the same
person who created the earth, and the universe with all its billions of stars and systems that we cannot even count. For he is a
creator God, and what he says, becomes!
So?
All we have to do is to believe and trust. Some
would tell us: “You are fools!” We can answer: “Yes, we are. But we are not
stupid!”. We can say with the apostle Paul: “I know
the one in whom I have put my trust, and I am sure that he is able to guard
until that day what I have entrusted to him. Hold to the standard of sound teaching that you have heard from me, in the
faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. Guard the good treasure entrusted to
you, with the help of the Holy Spirit living in us” (2 Tim 1, 12-14).
All we have to do is to accept Christ’s
invitation, insistently repeated by his Church, and go to church where we can
receive him in the Eucharist as frequently as possible. And let our faith
supply what our senses cannot offer us when we receive the Sacred Host. Our
eyes cannot see Christ’s glory in the white host for our heart is unable to bear
such beauty and love if it can even taste a little bit of it. That’s
why in moments of great joy we burst out crying. Our heart can bear only so
much! St. Paul wrote: “What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the human heart
conceived, God has prepared for those who love him”. These things God has
revealed to us through the Spirit” (1 Cor 2, 9-10).
So let us not be too much preoccupied with our
growing old. Let us take good care of our bodies, to keep them as healthy as
possible, for our body is meant for the Lord. St. Paul questions us: “Do you not know that your
body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, which you have from God, and
that you are not your own? For you were bought with a price; therefore glorify
God in your body” (1 Cor 6, 19-20).
At the end of our bodily life on earth life is
changed not ended, and, when this earthly dwelling turns to dust, an eternal
dwelling is made ready for us in heaven. This is what the liturgy teaches us
during the Mass for the Dead, and this is what Jesus promised in today’s
gospel: “Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood have eternal life,
and I will raise them up on the last day ... Those who eat my flesh and drink
my blood abide in me, and I in them. Just as the living Father sent me, and I
live because of the Father, so whoever eats me will live because of me”. We are afraid to die, and Jesus knows it,
and so he offers us abundant life on earth and resurrection afterwards!
Let us not
waste any opportunity we have to receive Holy Communion so that, even long
before the end of our life on earth, we will eat Him whom we love and in whom
we hope so that we will live here
and now because of Him.
Indeed, eternal life starts here on earth!
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