This Sunday, after six weeks of reading it at the Sunday Masses, we conclude the Bread of Life discourse from the Gospel of John. As it comes to a close, we hear the reaction of those who have heard Jesus say: “Very truly, I tell you, unless you eat of the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you.” For many of Jesus’ contemporary listeners, the idea of eating His flesh and drinking His blood is incomprehensible and they reject the idea completely. And yet, while in many other cases when He is misunderstood, He explains himself more clearly, on this matter Jesus does not back away from his insistence that those who wish to have eternal life must consume His Body and drink His Blood. Unable to accept this idea, many of His followers state that it is a teaching that it is difficult to accept. We are told at this point, that many of Jesus’ followers turned away and no longer followed Him. When He asks the twelve if they also wish to leave, they do not indicate that they understand, they simply state that they have nowhere else to go because in faith they affirm that He has the words of eternal life and they have “come to believe and know that [Jesus] is the Holy one of God.” Continue reading →

This Sunday’s first reading, from the Book of Proverbs, contains an invitation that anticipates the great gift which Jesus will make to the Church in the gift of His Body and Blood— “Come, eat my food and drink of the wine….” Since the pandemic, throughout the world, it seems that people have lost sight of the importance of this great invitation. I regret to say, some of the changes in attitude towards the importance of the obligation to attend Sunday Mass, had to do with the message that people might have interpreted Church closures and restrictions in numbers, during these extraordinary conditions, to mean that attendance at Sunday Mass in normal circumstances was not important. However, as we hear Jesus say categorically in this Sunday’s Gospel, “Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of man and drink of His Blood, you do not have life within you,” it is important to emphasize just how crucially important our reception of the Eucharist at Sunday Mass really is to our faith life and our relationship to Christ and His Church. Continue reading →