Gospel Reflection for Sunday August 18th 2024 – 20th Sunday in Ordinary Time

By Fr Brian Maher OMI

Gospel Reflection for Sunday August 18th 2024, 20th Sunday in Ordinary Time | John 6:51-58

In the wonderful poem, “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock”, T.S. Eliot invites us to join him on a strange and mysterious journey “through certain half-deserted streets” of a dreary city. It is a journey, he tells us, which will “…lead you to an overwhelming question…”, which, tantalisingly, he is afraid to ask or answer. “Oh, do not ask, “What is it?” he says, “…let us go and make our visit.”

In reading the Gospels, we too are led to an ‘overwhelming question’, which far too frequently we avoid answering because of fear, carelessness or simply lack of thought. The question is posed by Jesus himself, and posed in such a simple and gentle way that we cannot avoid answering it. In an informal conversation with his apostles Jesus asked them, “Who do people say I am?…”, and when Peter gave a rather vague, impersonal answer, Jesus pushed him further, “…But you, Peter, who do you say I am?”

This is the ‘overwhelming question’ of the Gospels. When we say the Creed together each Sunday we give our answer, like the apostles did, in a fairly vague and impersonal way. Jesus, however, does not let us get away that easily. “But YOU…”, he says to each one of us (calling us by name), “…who do YOU say I am?”

Every miracle done by Jesus, every parable told by Jesus, every word spoken by Jesus, every interaction Jesus had with another person, brings us one small step closer to seeing who he is, and after each one he looks at us, smiles, and says, “Now, (your name), who do YOU say I am?” It is the ‘overwhelming question’ of the Gospels, asked by Jesus over and over again as he waits, always patiently, until we are ready to answer.

For the last four weeks we have been on a journey through Chapter 6 of John’s Gospel. Each Gospel followed one from another, just as they were written. Unfortunately there was a full week between them and, with the best will in the world, very few of us remember what we heard yesterday, let alone a week ago!

Yet what we have been reading is truly incredible and brings us face-to-face with the ‘overwhelming question’ Jesus asks us, “…who do YOU say I am?”

(For those who need of a very short recap: The journey began when Jesus fed five thousand people on a hillside by the lake of Galilee. After the miracle he went by himself to the other side of the lake to rest and pray. However, the crowd, after getting one free meal from him, follow him and demand more to eat. Jesus, noticing their fickleness, tells them that the bread they are looking for can only fill them for a short time. Like the ‘Manna’ that God gave Moses and his people in the desert, it wastes away and they die.

He offers them a bread with will sustain them forever. This ‘bread of life’ comes directly from the Father, just as he tells them he comes from the Father. With their minds still on a free meal, they miss the astonishing revelation Jesus has made about himself and say, “Oh, give us this bread.”

“Have you not listened to me?” he says to them, “…I am this bread of life, sent by God to share it with you, and I will offer my own life so that you may have it.”  Here concludeth the recap.)

…And today, our journey with John through this chapter reaches its amazing climax, when Jesus tells the crowd that if they want to have eternal life they must “eat his flesh” and “drink his blood”. A group of people who were only looking for a free meal, find themselves being told to do something that, frankly, sounds very like cannibalism and is offensive to them.

What Jesus is saying to them is truly ‘overwhelming’ – a word which means ‘devastating, crushing, awe-inspiring’. Indeed, in next week’s Gospel, John tells us exactly how overwhelming it was. “…after hearing this teaching many of his followers said,  “This is a hard saying. Who can accept it? and from this time many of his disciples turned back and no longer followed him.”

The question, “Who do you say I am?” is not a vague and impersonal question that we can answer with a quick, “I believe in God, the Father Almighty, … and in Jesus Christ his only Son, our Lord, … who was crucified, died and was buried, and on the third day he rose again from the dead and ascended into Heaven…etc.”

No! it is a profoundly personal question, which is difficult and challenging, maybe even devastating and crushing, and which has consequences and implications that might lead us to “turn back and no longer follow him.”

I struggled, this week, to find some way to explain what Jesus meant by “unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you.” and in the end I failed – miserably. Every time I thought I had it, some new idea or concept forced its way to the surface and I was back to square one. The ‘delete’ key on my computer is looking more and more worn, and is even becoming slightly loose, as I sometimes hit it quite hard in my frustration!

I deleted another six hundred words of meaningless theology, and found myself wondering for the millionth time why John’s Gospel is the only one that does not have a Last Supper with the institution of the Eucharist. Without doubt John knew about it, and also without doubt he believed it. The Gospels we have read over the last four weeks make that abundantly clear. So why leave it out?

And then it struck me. Maybe the answer is not that he left it out, but that he had so much to say about the Eucharist that one Passover meal was just not enough space or time to say all he needed to say. The other Gospels give us the narrative and the words. “While they were at table he took the bread…..” etc. and at the end of the meal we have the first Eucharist, Judas has left to do his dirty deed, and Jesus goes to the Garden of Gethsemane with his disciples. In some ways it is a nice, neat package, telling the most unbelievable, astonishing story within the framework of a meal.

But how could John do that? He wants to set the eucharist in the framework of the Old Testament, where Jesus is the new Moses, and the Eucharist the Manna God sent as a gift to sustain them. Then he wants to say that Jesus himself is this new ‘manna’ sent by the Father to support and sustain his people. More than that, he will offer his own life – his flesh and blood – so that his people might learn that a life lived without integrity and love is a life not worth living. And finally, the climax…..that only those that eat his flesh and drink his blood can share in the life he offers.

If John had tried to squeeze all of that into one meal, it would have lasted days! And so, he takes away the narrow confines of the ‘upper room’ and begins his Eucharist on a grassy hillside by the Lake of Galilee with over five thousand people wanting to be fed. Here he has the space and time to develop his ideas. Later he moves across the lake and continues with a wider crowd, still wanting to be fed.

Now he can begin talking about offering them a ‘bread’ which will sustain them forever and that he himself is this ‘bread from Heaven’.

As I thought about it, it dawned on me that John’s account of the Eucharist was just too marvellous, too huge, and too important to be confined indoors, in a small room with a small group of people. John’s Eucharist was for the entire world and for all people, and it stretched to eternal life.

And that explained why I couldn’t find a way of explaining it. It is simply too great a story, and too marvellous a gift to be tied down into neat categories and logical statements.

What then can I say about today’s Gospel and Jesus’ statement that, “…unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you.”

I can say this: Like everything else in the Gospels it only makes sense the light of the Resurrection.

If the death of Jesus on the cross was ‘the end’ of the story then his followers would have disbanded, sad and disillusioned, to return to their fishing nets and families. It was the Resurrection that changed everything. They saw, met, talked to, ate with, and touched the risen Jesus. Their ‘new’ conviction was that Jesus was not dead, but alive.

Now suddenly, his words, “This is my body…This is my blood” were no longer calling to mind the words of one dead and gone but the words of one very much alive and present to them in a physical way.

But… there was more to it than that. Jesus was physical and alive but he was not a ghost (he even showed Thomas the holes the nails made in his wrists!) or a resuscitated body, who would grow old again and die. (He could appear in locked rooms, and in different places.)

He was really and truly present to them physically, and he was also really and truly present to them spiritually. The word John uses is ‘glorified’ meaning he was now ‘with God’, his presence was now eternal.

Put simply – and I realise that is a very silly thing to say! – the Eucharist is a gift from God to us. Through it we can really and truly immerse ourselves, and become intwined in the life and death of Jesus. We can do that only because his death was not the end of the story. The physical Jesus, who died horribly on the cross, lives again and because he lives we can become part of his cross. St. Paul says that we can ‘participate’ in it.

The Risen Jesus is also dwelling with the Father – he shares the mysterious inner life of the Trinity from all eternity – and in the Eucharist we can share in this life too – we can have ‘eternal life.’

And remember, when Jesus says, “Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life.” he is talking in the present tense. The promise of ‘eternal life’ is for NOW, not some time in the future when we die.

Think of it…In the Eucharist we have eternal life!

And all of this when we, “…eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood…”

Is it a gift? A mystery? A step too far? A challenge? A promise? Or something else?

So… back to our overwhelming question… “…But you,( name), who do you say I am?”

Somehow – and it still evades me – I think the answer is hidden in Chapter 6 of John’s Gospel.

And maybe I hope it will always evade me, because maybe it is the search itself which is the answer!

Many thanks,

Brian.

My flesh is real food and my blood is real drink