Every time we come together for Eucharist, we begin our gathering in the same way. First, we make the sign of the cross that represents the faith we share in the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. That is what draws us together as one community. Then the priest/presider will say: The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be/is with you all. In response the gathered community will say: And with you/your spirit. What are we saying?
What we are expressing is that in the community gathered at Eucharist we see the Real Presence of Christ. As Jesus tells his disciples: Where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among you (Matt 18:20). The Real Presence of Christ is not only under the form of bread and wine. It is in the assembly around us as we celebrate together, walk together, share together and commit ourselves to sharing and sacrificing for each other. We are the Real Presence of Christ for our world
In many cultures, one of the signs of support for life is bread. To have bread means that we can sustain our lives. In the Old Testament Book of Exodus, as the Israelites trekked through the desert, they faced starvation. Their confidence flagged and their faith was threatened. Had God who promised liberation, in fact led them out into the desert to starve? Discovering the manna, bread-like feeding saved both their lives and their faith in their God. Their God was a life-giving and sustaining God.
Chapter 6 of John’s Gospel is a very long discourse or sermon which begins with the wonder of Jesus feeding the crowd of followers around him with bread and fish. It was a miraculous event and the crowd who were fed were impressed by having been fed. They want more. They want another miraculous feeding. In chapter 6, Jesus calls for a faith that the fullness of life will come with the taking on of Jesus’s life: Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood lives in me and I in them (Jn. 6:56).
There is a common saying that might help us to grasp what John is expressing: We are what we eat. Very often we hear this in a very narrow and literal sense. What Jesus calls for in chapter 6 is much greater. The Table, the Eucharist, is a sharing that opens us as disciples to the very mind and spirit of Jesus. Coming to the Table means that we are open to a conversion of life and spirit. We are to become Jesus for one another. More than this, we are to leave the Table that we might bear Jesus to the world in which we live. Each eucharistic experience is not so much a personal moment for me and my faith, it is more. It is a conversion to take what we have received and become the Real Presence of Christ for our world.
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