How can we eat this man's flesh?

+ J. M. J. +

Homily Outline for the 20th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year B

The bounteous repast that the Church spreads before us on this parish picnic weekend is rich indeed! We begin with Lady Wisdom, God’s wisdom here anthropomorphized and imagined as a wealthy and powerful queen. She has set up her home, prepared the feast, set the table, and then she sends out her maidservants and puts out a wide invitation:

"Let whoever is simple turn in here; To the one who lacks understanding, she says, Come, eat of my food, and drink of the wine I have mixed! Forsake foolishness that you may live; advance in the way of understanding."

The invitation is clear… if we will turn towards God’s wisdom, knowing our own simplicity and lack of wisdom, we will be filled, we will be lead deeper into the mystery of God. The door, my friends, is open to us.

St. Paul also calls us to wisdom, inviting us to live, “not as foolish persons but as wise, making the most of the opportunity…” We become wise and live wisely precisely to the extent that we seek the will of the Lord, turn away from sin and vice, and open the door to the Spirit. This wisdom culminates in a joyful outpouring of praise to the Lord, and most importantly, thanksgiving. We should be “giving thanks always and for everything in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ to God the Father.”

Here the plot thickens—the Apostle has told us to give thanks always. The phrase he uses in Greek is euxaristountes pantote, that is “giving thanks always…” Do you hear the connection? Euxaristountes? This is the very same root as for the word “Eucharist.” This is the Greek word for gratitude. If we are to cultivate grateful hearts and lives and so be wise, this means we must cultivate Eucharistic hearts!

Wisdom is not a popular category… it has been supplanted in our daily lives by knowledge, and even more by raw data. On the internet we have practically infinite information and data at our fingertips. But, then, we don’t know for sure if ANY of it is true, accurate, dependable or trustworthy. I think we can see that in our world information and data have exploded, but wisdom is just as rare as ever. How do we acquire wisdom? It comes from God, we can receive it as a gift if we realize that we are little and that we are not self-sufficient, and that we need a Savior. Jesus spoke the truest and deepest wisdom to those crowds, but it was difficult for them to accept. He said:

"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."

How can we eat this man’s flesh? The crowds had the very same question… and it’s a good question, a reasonable question. How indeed? Jesus doesn’t step back, or indicate that He’s speaking a parable, or using hyperbole, as He often did at other times. He continues:

"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.”

Once again, there’s a deeper connection here in the original Greek. Jesus makes a solemn declaration, “Amen, Amen. You must eat my flesh and drink my blood or you are without life.” Then Jesus ups the ante even further… He switches verbs, and instead of the common ordinary Greek words for eat and drink that He has used up to this point, He chose graphic words that mean literally to gnaw and gulp… words that explicitly emphasize real eating. He drives home the point, “For my flesh is true food and my blood is true drink.”

How are we to understand this??? We’re supposed to eat the Lord’s body and drink His blood? We’re supposed to gnaw his flesh and swallow His blood? PLEASE, don’t just say to yourself, “oh, yes, we say that all the time at church.” These are astonishing and even offensive words… if the people listening to Jesus that day struggled with this, it was at least in part because they were really listening to the Lord. We are incomplete, broken, starving, desperately in need of God’s help in ways large and small, in ways visible and hidden. God from all eternity has seen our poverty, and in the fullness of time He responded after centuries of preparation. That response to our poverty and starvation is Jesus Christ, and Jesus Christ who is Himself Truth Incarnate said, “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.”

This is not data that our data-saturated world is readily able to accept… neither is it data that we should gloss over too easily just because the words are familiar. When church-going Catholics in our country are asked in surveys, “Do we really consume the Lord’s body and blood at Mass,” a solid minority say, “No.” Yet, Jesus said, “My flesh is truly food and my blood is truly drink.” God in His wisdom has set the table, prepared the meal, and opened the doors…. But we have to forsake foolishness if we are to live, we have to forsake simple routine if we are to receive eternal life. Brothers and sisters, do not approach this altar half-awake, out of habit. Do not approach this altar unless you desire God’s wisdom which breaks our categories and our hearts and our lives so that we can be remade in His image. Please, today, perhaps even for the first time, approach this altar with reverence, with awe, aware that we receive here a mystery beyond our full comprehension. At this altar we receive the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of Jesus Christ, our Lord and King and He says to us, “This is the bread that came down from heaven. Unlike your ancestors who ate and still died, whoever eats this bread will live forever.”

+ A. M. D. G. +