Hello, I’m Jeff Cavins and today we’re looking at the readings for the 18th Sunday in ordinary time. There’s one chapter in the Gospel of John that a lot of people look at when they want to talk about the Eucharist. As Catholics, we believe that the Eucharist, what looks like bread and wine, is actually the body of Christ and the blood of Christ. It tastes like bread, it tastes like wine, but we believe that it’s actually the body and blood. Not all people believe it, but we do believe that, and that’s what the early church taught.
Some way, somehow, through the words of institution – that is, “this is my body, this is my blood” – said by the priest in Mass, the bread and the wine indeed become the body and blood of Jesus Christ. We call this transubstantiation. Not all groups believe that; some believe in consubstantiation, that Jesus is somehow with the bread and somehow with the wine. Other denominations will actually teach that it’s just a symbol, but I want to show you here today that it’s not just a symbol, but it is actually the body and blood of Jesus. Jesus talks about “unless you eat my body and drink my blood, you have no life in you.” We’re not talking about symbols here; we’re talking about reality.
Now, when I had children that were very young, they oftentimes would want to eat cotton candy or they want to go out and get pizza and they want to get popcorn. If you leave kids to themselves, we’ll say five, ten dollars and say get yourself something to eat, you know what they’re gonna go after. But you also know what you’re gonna say to your kids: you’re gonna say eat your vegetables and eat your fruits and so forth. That’s because you know what is best for them. They may not exactly like that, but it is best for them.
In the spiritual life, when it comes to the Eucharist, there has to be a point where we believe with all of our hearts that the Good Shepherd, Jesus Christ, knows exactly what we need in our lives. We are hunger expiry, and just like physically you go to the refrigerator and you open it up and you look for something to eat at eleven o’clock at night, you survey the back of the frigerator, the left and the right door, and you shut it knowing there’s nothing in here. This evening you go back and you watch TV, and minutes later you come back to the fridge and you check it once again, knowing there in the last minutes nobody has put anything in there.
There’s a hunger that you have spiritually speaking that’s the same as well. People go from church to church looking for some experience or something that’s gonna fulfill that hunger deep inside. My friend, it is the Eucharist. It is the body and blood, soul and divinity of Jesus that is the only thing that is going to satisfy that deep hunger and give you that diet – yeah, I mean diet – of the body and blood of Christ that you need. You need that grace.
You see, the church teaches us that the Eucharist is the very center of our faith and it is the greatest source of grace in your life. You don’t need just a good time or have your emotions lifted up for a few minutes. What you need is deep feeding in your soul, and that’s what the Eucharist is about.
It says in John: “So when the people saw that Jesus was not there, nor his disciples, they themselves got into the boats and went to Capernaum seeking Jesus. When they found him on the other side of the sea, they said to him, ‘Rabbi, when did you come here?’ And Jesus answered them, ‘Truly, truly, I say to you, you seek me not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves. Do not labor for the food which perishes, but for the food which endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to you; for on him has God the Father set his seal.'” And then they said to him, “What must we do to be doing the works of God?” And Jesus answered them, “This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent.” And so they said to him, “Then what sign do you do, that we may see and believe you? What work do you perform? Our fathers ate the manna in the wilderness; as it is written, ‘He gave them bread from heaven to eat.'” In fact, that’s the first reading this week from Exodus.
Jesus then said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven; my Father gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is that which comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.” They said to him, “Lord, give us this bread always.” And Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life; he who comes to me shall never hunger, and he who believes in me shall never thirst.”
Now I encourage you to read all of chapter 6 of John, and you’ll see that over and over Jesus instructs his disciples to eat this bread that he’s offering them, which is his body. And later in the chapter, you’ll even see people departing from Jesus because they say this is too hard of a statement. And he doesn’t correct them, he doesn’t stop them and say, “Hey guys, it’s just metaphor, metaphor, come on back.” They leave, and then Jesus looks at the disciples and said, “Are you gonna leave too?” Peter says, “Where are we to go? You have the words of everlasting life.”
Those words, the words of institution said by the priest – “This is my body, this is my blood” – what happens on that altar will feed your soul and it will give you what you are searching for. You must have faith and you must trust the Good Shepherd to feed you.
Source: Jeff Cavins, Ascension Press. The Catholic Eucharist in the Bible. Aired: August 2, 2018.
Saint Thomas the Apostle Catholic Church 