Gospel Reflection for Sunday August 11th 2024 – 19th Sunday in Ordinary Time

By Fr Brian Maher OMI

Gospel Reflection for Sunday August 11th 2024, 19th Sunday in Ordinary Time | John 6:41-51

When Jesus proclaimed after his baptism in the Jordan that “…the Kingdom of God is near at hand…” he set out on a dangerous journey which would lead to his horrific death on the cross and from there to the resurrection, his victory over the last great enemy – death itself.

Why was it a dangerous journey? Simple! Israel at the time of Jesus was under the rule of another Kingdom – Rome – a Kingdom which ruled with an iron fist and did not tolerate even the slightest opposition to the authority of the Emperor, who himself claimed to be Divine. Jesus must have known that even mentioning a ‘Kingdom’ other than Rome put him in grave danger.

On the other side of the coin, Israel’s hatred of Roman occupation ran very deep. That the nation which believed itself to be ‘God’s chosen people’ could be subjugated in such a crushing way was intolerable. Looking back to their great Kings of the past, like David and Solomon, and their great Prophets, like Isaiah and Jeremiah, they read about promises of a ‘new’ King who would arise among them, a King who would be anointed by God and who would, once and for all, destroy Israel’s enemies and establish God’s eternal Kingdom on earth. The name given to the ‘anointed one’ was ‘Messiah’.

At the time of Jesus, Israel was a seething cauldron of unease, anger, tension and hidden conflict, always close to exploding into rebellion. If Jesus allowed himself to be identified as the Messiah, and in some way produced evidence to back that up, then he could be an extremely powerful and popular leader of his people. Unfortunately, he would also place himself in Rome’s direct line of fire.

Why is this of relevance to this week’s Gospel?

Because I believe the ‘grumbling’ of those listening to him; Jesus’ mention of the ‘Prophets’; comparing himself to Moses (only greater!); making his ‘I am…’ statement of his own identity; and at the very end of the Gospel, moving towards an awareness of his own death, are all directly related to the expectations of the Jewish people for the coming ‘Messiah’. As we read it we are getting a picture of how Jesus understood the Kingdom of God, and his growing awareness of his own place in that Kingdom – in particular, that it would lead to his own death.

Understanding this Gospel is a lot more than just an interesting ‘history lesson’! In it we come face-to-face with Jesus, struggling to overcome the prejudices of his own people while grappling with his own identity and the demands the Kingdom of God will make on him. Behind his words we can perceive a sense of his own frustration; the inability of some Jews to understand who he is, and a longing to be able to share the wonders of the Kingdom of God with those who are listening to him.

Remember, the context of these words is a teaching Jesus gave one Sabbath in the synagogue at Capernaum. It is a very ‘Jewish’ context. All of those present would instantly understand his references to the Prophets, ‘manna’ in the wilderness’ and ‘bread from Heaven’. It is how he identifies himself with these things that disturbs them.

The Gospel opens with an explicit reference to ‘the Jews’. John is not talking about the ‘people’ who were present in the synagogue, listening to him, but to the ‘Jewish authorities’ who were present. They are the ones who start the ‘grumbling’ against him. They are also the ones who were most knowledgeable about the Law of Moses and the Prophets, and therefore they are the ones we might expect to understand what Jesus was saying better than anyone else. Yet…they are the grumblers, the rejecters, those who set out to misunderstand what Jesus is saying.

The story of the Moses leading his small group of people from Egypt, through the desert for forty years, until finally they reached their ‘Promised Land’ is at the heart of Jewish faith. It was during this journey that God ‘introduced’ him/herself to Moses and his people. It was during this journey that God gave them the Ten Commandments, and said to them, “You will be my people and I will be your God.”. It was a journey which started with the ‘Passover’ meal – a meal still celebrated annually by Jewish people throughout the world.

One part of their desert journey tells of their struggle to get food and how they began to starve. The story tells that, “they grumbled against God” but after Moses interceded for them God sent them, every night, a sweet bread-like substance that sustained them until they reached the ‘Promised Land’. This was their “bread from Heaven”, which they called ‘Manna’.

As it developed, the ‘Manna’ or ‘Bread from Heaven’  came to have a meaning wider than just the bread which fell each night. It came to mean anything unexpected that sustained them in difficult times. Interestingly the phrase is still used today. An example might be, “Joe Biden dropping out of the presidential race for the White House was like ‘manna in the desert’ for the Democrats!

What Jesus was saying was that he was the one whose words and actions would sustain them. His message of love, forgiveness and compassion would ‘feed’ them at a deeper level than bread alone. All of those listening to Jesus in the synagogue knew that he was not talking about physically coming down from Heaven, but that his message about the coming Kingdom of God was the new ‘manna in the desert’ that would feed and sustain them forever.

The Jewish authorities listening to him chose to misrepresent what he said, twisting it to ridicule him in front of all in the synagogue. And why did they do this? Because the person saying it was an unimportant carpenter from the back-water village of Nazareth. Their statement, “Is this not Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know?” said everything which needed to be said.

Jesus did not fit into the ‘Messiah’ mould they had created. The Messiah would be a ‘King’ but Jesus was the simple son of Joseph and Mary; the Messiah would be a ‘Military Leader’, capable of leading his people against Rome, but Jesus was the simple son of Joseph and Mary; the Messiah would be a Prophet, yet this simple son of Joseph and Mary went himself to the prophet John the Baptist to be baptised; the coming Messiah would be a Judge, a person of wisdom and education who would vindicate his people and punish their enemies, but Jesus was the simple son of Joseph and Mary.

What is particularly sad is that these people saw the miracles Jesus worked, they heard his words of wisdom and compassion, they listened to his parables which spoke of a loving and forgiving God and we are told that “they were amazed at his wisdom and wondered where he got it from”… and yet…they rejected him, dismissed him, tried to ridicule him in the synagogue.

What we are seeing here is prejudice at its worst. Jesus did not have the ‘right’ education; the ‘right’ address; the ‘right’ connections; the ‘right’ background and wealth; and therefore he could not have anything to offer them and could be written off and laughed at.

Their blindness is amazing. They acknowledged his wisdom, were amazed at his miracles and liked his message yet they rejected it because he was just “…Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know?”

Today, we read this Gospel and we criticise those who could treat Jesus like this. We condemn them as short sighted, bigoted and arrogant.

But think for a minute: They did not have the advantage of the Resurrection, or Pentecost, or the Roman Emperor Constantine becoming his follower and making his message the official doctrine of the Roman Empire. They did not have the advantage of two thousand years of theology, reflection or extremely learned men and women writing about him. They did not have the advantage of seeing “Jesus Christ, Superstar”  and witnessing the effect his words would have on most of the world.

What they saw was a poor, very ordinary, carpenter, with little education and no training in the Law of Moses. His dress, his speech, his friends were, at best, very ordinary, and some of them were poor and with very doubtful morals!

Yes, they were prejudiced and proud, but before we rush to condemn perhaps we should pause and reflect.

How frequently, for example, do we look at environmental activists who sometimes break the law, forcing us, they say, to look at the damage we are doing to our planet before it is too late, and condemn them with terms like ‘social terrorists’ and ‘extremists’?  And how frequently I have listened to politicians and others say that “they agree with what these people are saying, and have sympathy for their message but they don’t like the way they are doing things.”

Is that not a bit like those listening to Jesus: they acknowledged the truth of what he was saying and they liked the message but…… who is he to lecture us?

And how often I have heard very well-intentioned people say, “We are abhorred when we hear of men, women and children dying at sea as they try to find somewhere safe for their children to grow up. We know they should have somewhere safe to live … but not in my country, or close to my neighbourhood or on my street!”

At the time of Jesus the Jewish authorities thought they were protecting the integrity of the Law of Moses from some unknown ‘miracle-worker’ who dared to call them hypocrites and often broke the Law of Moses himself. They were living in dangerous times and had a responsibility to maintain a peaceful relationship with Rome and prevent any danger of outright rebellion. They saw the ‘big picture’ and played with the ‘big boys’! Yes indeed, better for one man to die than risk a revolution and the destruction of everything!

Now, two thousand years later, we see the short-sightedness of their views and we observe their pride and selfish desire to hold on the power and wealth.

It might be wise to learn from history; to pause and look at the world our grandchildren and great grand-children will inhabit. We are witnessing, in every part of our world, the new and dangerous extremes in our climate. Droughts and floods, rising global temperature, destructive fires, mud-slides, unexpected storms, extremes in heat and cold are now part of every person’s experience no matter where we live.

Scientists, Religious leaders and World Organisations warn that we face a crisis and that we must act before it is too late. Activists disrupt our sporting events with orange powder, or they block our streets or chain themselves to bridges and trains, and we smile benignly if we are not directly affected, or we are outraged if we are delayed, miss an appointment or are late home. Governments, Global Corporations and those who see the ‘big picture’ lecture us on the financial and economic implications of change. Shrewd politicians, with an eye to re-election, tailor their views to those of their constituents.

In another two thousand years how will history view us and our times? None of us know the answer to that question with any certitude but it behoves us to at least ask it.

In this reflection I have purposely chosen not to enter into the intricacies of John’s Gospel or his use of imagery and symbolism to present his themes. Apart from anything else, what we read today is just a tiny part of a much larger discourse by John. It is rich but complex and really needs to be viewed as a single teaching rather than be broken up into distinct weekly installments.

Our Gospel next week concludes this section of John’s Gospel and moves more directly to a reflection on Eucharist which is just hinted-at in this week’s Gospel.

I would love to say that next week all will be made clear, but sadly, I can’t!!

Many thanks,

Brian.

Anyone who eats this bread will live for ever

At this the Jews there began to grumble about him because he said, “I am the bread that came down from heaven.”  They said, “Is this not Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How can he now say, ‘I came down from heaven’?” 

 “Stop grumbling among yourselves,” Jesus answered.  “No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws them, and I will raise them up at the last day.  It is written in the Prophets: ‘They will all be taught by God.’  Everyone who has heard the Father and learned from him comes to me. No one has seen the Father except the one who is from God; only he has seen the Father. 

Very truly I tell you, the one who believes has eternal life.  I am the bread of life.  Your ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness, yet they died.  But here is the bread that comes down from heaven, which anyone may eat and not die.  

I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats this bread will live forever. This bread is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.”