So they said to him,
“Sir, give us this bread always.”
Jesus said to them,
“I am the bread of life;
whoever comes to me will never hunger,
and whoever believes in me will never thirst.”
In the great reform and renewal of our liturgy mandated by the Second Vatican Council and more specifically, by its first of sixteen documents, The Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy, promulgated in 1963, the Council fathers called for a richer opening of the Sacred Scriptures in the Sunday and daily Eucharistic celebrations.
The pre-reformed Eucharistic celebration, commonly known as the Tridentine Mass, about which much has been written today in light of Pope Francis’ recent appropriate restrictions in its celebration, there was a highly limited selection of Epistles and Gospels in a cycle that repeated each year. The revised and reformed lectionary of Mass readings provided for a three-year cycle on Sundays and a two-year cycle for first reading in the daily Eucharistic celebrations.
Our Jewish sisters and brothers are often referred to as ‘people of the Book,’ and so it should be for us as Catholic Christians. Our faith is rooted in the person of Christ whose living Word is found in the Sacred Scriptures. It is impossible to know Christ without a living understanding of and appreciation for the Sacred Scriptures, especially the Christian Scriptures that enshrine his words and the memory of his saving actions for us.
Every three years in the “B” cycle of Sunday readings falling during the summer months, the Church places before us selections from the 6th chapter of St. John’s Gospel, often referred to as the “Bread of Life” discourse. This provides the opportunity for us to understand and appreciate anew the greatest gift that the Lord left as a lasting legacy of himself to the Church, the gift of the Eucharist.
It is all together fitting that we focus our attention on this saving mystery of our faith considering the front-page news that the Eucharist and those “worthy or unworthy” of so great a gift has gained attention amid the lively controversy surrounding the United States Bishops’ future pastoral statement on the Holy Eucharist.
In the coming Sundays, as has been my custom every three years since my ordination, I will offer my own reflections on this central Sacrament of our Faith, as mirrored through the prism of God’s Word, historical tradition, our venerable theology and the great Conciliar teaching of our Church.
It is a sad commentary on the Sacrament of Unity, that it has become the ideological pretext for ‘liturgy wars’ and contentious debate over who should be ‘barred’ from the Sacrament rather than an invitation to the healing mercy and unfailing and unconditional love that it signifies.
So they said to him,
“Sir, give us this bread always.”
Jesus said to them,
“I am the bread of life;
whoever comes to me will never hunger,
and whoever believes in me will never thirst.”