Year: 2024

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Gospel: John 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.”

The Gospel of the Lord.

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When I was a little kid, I had lots of stuffed animals.

A few of them had Velcro strips on their backs. You could open them up from behind and turn them inside out, transforming them into a globe. The globe would reveal where that particular animal was from.

For example, I learned pandas came from China; penguins from Antarctica.

These stuffed animals sparked my imagination, fueling a hunger inside of me to know more about the world around me. 

So, I devised a plan.

One day I started digging a hole in my backyard. I was determined to dig my way to China, a land of pandas, bamboo, and apparently a very big wall.

I didn’t get too far before Mom discovered me, breaking the bad news: I wasn’t making it to China that day. 

But that curiosity – that desire for the truth – has never left.

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We find this same type of curiosity unfolding in today’s Gospel.

For the last four weeks, we’ve been reading chapter six of John’s Gospel, which is commonly referred to as the “Bread of Life discourse.” 

It begins with Jesus feeding a crowd of thousands in the multiplication of the loaves. Then he leads them to acknowledge a deeper hunger – the hunger for truth, for meaning, for love.

The Lord declares that he is the Source that can satisfy that hunger. “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me will never hunger…whoever eats this bread will live forever and the bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the world.”

The crowds are stunned. “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?” they ask. 

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Seeing their irked reaction, the Lord doubles down, using even more specific and graphic language than before.

Whereas Jesus initially invited the crowds to “eat” his flesh, he now switches to a more particular verb, “gnaw; chew; chomp,” emphasizing the physical nature of his command. 

Unwilling to dig any deeper, people leave him in droves. They do not yet understand that the “living bread come down from heaven” the Lord promises will be the Eucharist; we do not receive his flesh and bones, as it were. Rather, his Resurrected Presence.

So, Jesus is left alone with his disciples, prompting him to ask them, “Do you also want to leave?”

This is the greatest test of his disciples’ faith thus far. If they cannot accept his words now – even without understanding – then how much harder will it be to accept the scandal of the cross?

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Why does Jesus insist on this gift of the Eucharist? Why is belief in his Word not enough?

To understand his logic, we must dig deep into the Old Testament.

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While there are many connections that can be made between the Old Testament and the Eucharist, I will focus on the first, which happens in the Book of Genesis.

How do Adam and Eve break their communion with God?

Through an act of eating.

As Satan the serpent slithers in the Garden of Eden, he convinces Eve to eat from the tree of knowledge. She then shares that fruit with Adam. 

This breaks God’s commandment first given to Adam: “You are free to eat from any of the trees in the garden, except the tree of knowledge of good and evil. From that tree you shall not eat; when you eat from it, you shall die.”

Christians understand the breaking of this commandment to be the origin of sin. Once humanity’s relationship with God was broken, “all hell broke loose,” as it were.

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Jesus reverses the curse of Eden in today’s Gospel, promising a new, final covenant between God and his people also through an act of eating. “Whoever eats this bread will live forever,” he says, “and the bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the world.”

We see this promise fulfilled at the Last Supper, when the Lord takes a loaf of bread and a cup of wine, telling his disciples plainly, “This is my Body… this is my Blood. Do this – eat this, drink this – in memory of me.”

Just as Adam and Eve ate from the tree of knowledge in disobedience, so at Mass we consume the Eucharist in obedience, restoring the communion with God that once was lost.

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This is a lot to digest, as it were. 

But unlike the crowds, who leave the Lord in disbelief, may our love for Jesus inspire us to continue digging for the Truth until we, “taste and see the goodness of the Lord.”

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Image credits: (1) Mother of Divine Providence (2) thearcheologist.org (3) St. John the Baptist Catholic Church

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Gospel: Matthew 19: 3-12

Some Pharisees approached Jesus, and tested him, saying,
“Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for any cause whatever?”
He said in reply, “Have you not read that from the beginning
the Creator made them male and female and said,
For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother
and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh?
So they are no longer two, but one flesh.
Therefore, what God has joined together, man must not separate.” 
They said to him, “Then why did Moses command
that the man give the woman a bill of divorce and dismiss her?”
He said to them, “Because of the hardness of your hearts
Moses allowed you to divorce your wives,
but from the beginning it was not so.
I say to you, whoever divorces his wife
(unless the marriage is unlawful)
and marries another commits adultery.”
His disciples said to him,
“If that is the case of a man with his wife,
it is better not to marry.”
He answered, “Not all can accept this word,
but only those to whom that is granted.
Some are incapable of marriage because they were born so;
some, because they were made so by others;
some, because they have renounced marriage
for the sake of the Kingdom of heaven.
Whoever can accept this ought to accept it.”

The Gospel of the Lord.

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Maybe you’ve heard this joke before:

What’s the difference between a good lawyer and a great lawyer?

A good lawyer knows the law. A great lawyer knows the judge!

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Throughout the Gospels, the Pharisees try leveraging their knowledge of the Law against Jesus to trap him, turning the tide against him. 

But herein lies the difference between the Pharisees and Jesus. While the Pharisees know the Law, Jesus knows the Judge – God, his Father in heaven.

Today the legal question is over divorce. “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?” 

Other days, the topic is different: “Is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar? A woman was married seven times, but each of her husbands died. In the resurrection, whose will she be? Why do your disciples not fast on the Sabbath? By whose authority do you do such things?”

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If the Pharisees can squeeze a legal ruling out of Jesus, then perhaps some of his followers will turn against him. Avoiding their trap, the Lord doesn’t convict anyone; rather, he responds, “From the beginning, it was not so.”

Jesus was there in the beginning – before there was sin; before there were laws; and before such laws were broken. From the beginning, there was only one force at work: God’s infinite love.

God created marriage to model the type of self-offering which exists between the Father and the Son; the Spirit being the love they share. 

No human being has ever modeled that love perfectly – be it in marriage or in friendship – “because of the hardness of your hearts.” In that sense, we’re all guilty, the Pharisees, too!

But instead of condemning the world, the Lord came to save us, creating a new, final law: “Love one another as I have loved you.” 

That is what the Judge asks of us.

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In what ways can I better love other people?

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That may include forgiving a spouse – or former spouse – who’s hurt me; putting the needs of others before my own; letting go of my tendency to judge prematurely; or encountering Christ in the poor.

Each in our own way, try to live life the way it was, “from the beginning.”

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Image credits: (1) SlidePlayer (2) Turning Stone Counseling (3) Daily Declaration

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Gospel: Luke 1:39-56

Mary set out
and traveled to the hill country in haste
to a town of Judah,
where she entered the house of Zechariah
and greeted Elizabeth.
When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting,
the infant leaped in her womb,
and Elizabeth, filled with the Holy Spirit,
cried out in a loud voice and said,
“Blessed are you among women,
and blessed is the fruit of your womb.
And how does this happen to me,
that the mother of my Lord should come to me?
For at the moment the sound of your greeting reached my ears,
the infant in my womb leaped for joy.
Blessed are you who believed
that what was spoken to you by the Lord
would be fulfilled.”

And Mary said:
“My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord;
my spirit rejoices in God my Savior
for he has looked with favor on his lowly servant.
From this day all generations will call me blessed:
the Almighty has done great things for me
and holy is his Name.
He has mercy on those who fear him
in every generation.
He has shown the strength of his arm,
and has scattered the proud in their conceit.
He has cast down the mighty from their thrones,
and has lifted up the lowly.
He has filled the hungry with good things,
and the rich he has sent away empty.
He has come to the help of his servant Israel
for he has remembered his promise of mercy,
the promise he made to our fathers,
to Abraham and his children forever.”

Mary remained with her about three months
and then returned to her home.

The Gospel of the Lord.

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While studying for the priesthood, I used to visit a children’s hospital located right next to our seminary. I’ll never forget meeting a 5-year-old girl there named Martina.

Martina suffered from a very rare condition, causing her to spend most of her life in the hospital.

She had no joints. The bones in her arms and her legs didn’t connect, so she could neither stand nor walk. All she could do was lay in her little hospital bed.

It sounds impossible, but making her life even harder, she was blind, deaf, and mute. 

Martina had never seen her mother nor heard her voice. She only felt her mother’s touch, a gift she experienced every single day.  

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Martina’s mother never left her side, because that’s who mothers are – they bring us into this world, they nurture us, and shower us with love and affection.

Witnessing their bond reminded me of a definition I once heard of love: “Love is a single soul dwelling in two bodies.”

It was as if Martina and her mother were one.

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That’s the type of bond we celebrate today – the inseparable bond between a mother and her child – specifically, the bond between Mary and Jesus.

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Mary was the only person who welcomed Jesus into this world and was also with him when he left it; from the day he opened his eyes in Bethlehem to the moment he closed them on Calvary, Mary was there.

She not only became the mother of Jesus, but also his disciple.

Some would say, his first disciple. 

Over the course of thirty-three years, Mary’s heart became so united to Christ, they were like, “a single soul dwelling in two bodies.” His will became her will; whatever was pleasing to Jesus was pleasing to Mary.

As she reminds Christians in every age, “Do whatever he tells you.”

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On this Feast of the Assumption, it makes sense that wherever Jesus goes, Mary would follow – not only in this life, but also in the next.

After he rose from the dead and ascended into heaven, we believe that Jesus called his mother home – body and soul. It’s what we celebrate today – our belief that human beings have a place in heaven, starting with Mary.

As Jesus says in John’s Gospel, “Do not let your hearts be troubled, you have faith in God. Have faith also in me. In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places.”

A place for Mary. A place for Martina. A place for you. A place for me.

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This is essentially the message I shared with Martina’s mother the day her daughter died. That bond of love between the two of them was so strong it was as if they were, “a single soul dwelling in two bodies.”

Wherever Martina went, her mother would eventually follow.

But in heaven, Martina’s body has been freed from the cross that bound her here on earth. She’s been given a glorified body like Mary, where she’ll be able to walk and run; in heaven, she’ll see her mother face to face, thanking her for never leaving her side.

It’s just who mothers are. Wherever the child is, surely the mother will follow body and soul.

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Image credits: (1) The Roman Catholic Diocese of Phoenix (2) Shutterstock (3) Aleteia