Jesus tells those listening to him, “Whoever eats me will draw life from me”. His listeners
struggle with this and even begin to argue about what he says. Can we make sense of this?
Jesus uses the act of
everyday eating to communicate a profound truth. The very act of eating is the way that we appropriate Christ. We only eat food that we identify as sustaining and nourishing our bodies. We want what is healthy, what will help us develop and remain alert. The food we recognise as good can only nourish if it is consumed.
On the other hand, you only eat if you are hungry. If you are full of unhealthy foods, you have no room for what is good. Ask any mother about the struggle to get kids to eat healthy food after a party at which they were fed lots of sweets! The same happens with us spiritually.
If we consume “junk food”, we do not feel like nourishing food.
At the Eucharistic table, we are not promised
material fulfilment. At the beginning of chapter six of John’s Gospel, that is the mistake the people make. They are coming to Jesus for what they want physically. They have a temporal understanding of Jesus - what we might call “fundamentalistic” today.
It is Jesus alone who can sustain us and nourish us in the depth of our beings. It is Jesus who helps us to live as our authentic selves. If we really seek fulfilment and a sense of unity - opposed to emptiness - Jesus is the only food that can offer us what we desire. The very act of eating and drinking at the Eucharistic table is an act which nourishes,
but it is also an act of believing.
Jesus, in his body and blood, consumed at the Eucharist, offers us spiritual
nourishment. Jesus invites us in the very act of believing - eating his body and drinking his blood - to a changed heart and mind, an inner transformation, a hunger and thirst to do all that glorifies God, and enter into a love relationship with God.
In a love relationship with God, we find inner peace, meaning and purpose. The Eucharist is an encounter with the risen Christ, who always invites us into an intimate relationship.
Take time to reflect today on your participation and reception of the Eucharist. Do you believe that by receiving, you are being nourished and transformed? Might God invite you back to regular Eucharist and, through that, a newfound love relationship?
Reflections by Russell Pollitt SJ
