The living bread

 Nineteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time Year B - 8th August 2021

Gospel John 6: 41–51

The Jews were complaining to each other about Jesus, because he had said, ‘I am the bread that came down from heaven.’

‘Surely this is Jesus son of Joseph,’ they said. ‘We know his father and mother. How can he now say, “I have come down from heaven”?’ Jesus said in reply, ‘Stop complaining to each other.

‘No one can come to me unless they are drawn by the Father who sent me, and I will raise them up on the last day. It is written in the prophets: They will all be taught by God, and to hear the teaching of the Father, and learn from it, is to come to me. Not that anyone has seen the Father, except the one who comes from God: He has seen the Father.

I tell you most solemnly, everybody who believes has eternal life.

I am the bread of life. Your forebears ate the manna in the desert and they are dead; but this is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that someone may eat it and not die. I am the living bread which has come down from heaven. Anyone who eats this bread will live for ever, and the bread that I shall give is my flesh, for the life of the world.’

Anyone who eats this bread will live for ever

Gospel Reflection from St Beuno's Outreach

I freely come to prayer. I allow myself to be found by God ... aware that I am responding to the Father’s invitation who draws me into relationship with Jesus. I come to rest in my own way.

When I am ready, I slowly read this rich, yet demanding, text a few times. Can I allow ‘the teaching of the Father’ to find a home deeper within me? I ponder Jesus’s profound revelation, and try to absorb it.

As I meditate on the passage, can I hear Jesus calling me to come to him for sustenance and strength ...? I pray to rely on him and his spiritual nourishment, rather than on my own strength.

Perhaps I equate my human frailty and vulnerability with failure, as Elijah did in today’s First Reading ... or like the Jews, maybe I feel like complaining?

What questions does all this stir within me on my own journey of life and faith?

I remain in contemplative silence as long as I need, while I consider Jesus’s words.

I share whatever arises with my life-giving Lord.

Our Father ...

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