Bread of Life - 15th Sunday Ordinary time (Cycle B)

    In today’s mass readings once again we find ourselves, in the 6th chapter of the Gospel of John; And I say once again because for the next few week the gospel reading is taken from this  important chapter of the Bible; important because it contains what is also known as the “Bread of Life Discourse”.  The one place in the bible in which Jesus explains in his own words the mystery of the Eucharist. In other words today there is going to be a lot of talk about eating bread, so, If you are following a low carb. diet, I apologize.
    As I was reflecting on this chapter of the bible, I found myself wondering about something I have asked myself many times: Who was the first person ever to figure that if you take a grain like wheat and grind it into a fine powder, and then add some milk and some yeast (of all things!), and then let it rise, and then you punch it and stretch it, and then you let it sit again and rise again, and then you punch it and stretch it again, and then you place it in a mold and let it rise again, and then you put it in an oven and bake it...You would actually get a loaf of bread.
    What I’m trying to say is that a making bread is not easy. This is quite a process to just figure out by accident. And yet if you think about it… every society in the world from the most advanced to the most primitive, have figured out a way of making their own version of bread. The steps and ingredients might be different but the results are almost always the same. It is as if making bread is a human universal.
  I would venture to say that this interesting fact about bread is not an accident. It explains why God, who as a pure spirit became a man, when it was time to return to his heavenly glory, and desiring to remain in a physical form here on earth, chose the one form of life giving food which is universal: bread. Not only this but, he made sure that his presence would remain throughout all of time, by giving priests the power to transform a regular piece of bread into his body, blood, soul and divinity for us the feed at every mass.
  In fact if you think about it a little more and you look at the steps you follow to make bread. They in themselves are a lesson, signs of the mystery which is the incarnation, life, death and resurrection of our Lord. The wheat which has to be transformed from beautiful wheat stalks into a fine powder, reminds us of how God in all his glory and beauty took our lowly human nature, which literally comes from the dust of the earth. The yeast which needs to be added to this flour in order to make it rise points to the divinity of the Lord who by assuming our lowly state, made our own human nature capable of rising to a point in which we can touching divinity. All the punching and knotting are the grim reminders of what he had to suffer on the Cross so that we could be saved from the brokenness of sin. And the final result, that loaf of steaming, golden fresh bread reminds us of community, of love, of one family sharing life giving nourishment.
   In today’s Gospel our Lord declares that he is the Bread of Life and that whoever eats of this bread will never hunger. With these words he takes advantage of the universality of bread, so that every  men, woman and child who ever lived, including you and me could know precisely what he is talking about.
   My brothers and sisters If today I could place an image in your mind it would be this: Jesus looking into our eyes and telling us, he is the only one that can satisfy all the hungers of your heart... this is the message of today’s Gospel, the message of the Eucharist, the message we will hear about again and again in the next few weeks as we continue reading from this chapter of the Book of John. So  As we revisit this most important teaching of our faith,  it is my prayer that we all have a renewed encounter with the bread of life who came down from heaven to feed us so that we would never ever hunger for anything else again. Blessed be Jesus, in the most holy sacrament of The Eucharist. Amen.