GIVE US THIS DAY OUR DAILY BREAD

FEAST OF THE EUCHARIST - Jn 6:51-58

In “Our Father”, the prayer that supersedes all others, because in it we pray with Jesus’ own words, we ask:

Give us this day our daily bread.

There is another possible translation: 

Give us this day our bread for tomorrow.

And this makes it clear that we are not just asking for food to keep us alive in this passing world. In the end, we must remember that “man does not live on bread alone”, as the first reading reminds us (Dt 8:3). We need bread, that is we need food to keep us alive, and God took care of that, while the people of Israel wandered in the desert. 

As we pray: Give us this day our daily bread, we must remember that are many people starving in the world, who are not able to find their daily bread. And this starvation is degrading to the point that there are whole populations starving to death. And this happens while multitudes of other people suffer from obesity due to over eating. They have much more than their daily bread, and throw their surplus to waste.

However, we need much more than food for our bellies; we need to be fed by the word that comes from the mouth of God, a word that is liberating, because it is a word of peace, life and salvation. So we pray to have this day our bread for tomorrow, or the bread that is a guarantee of life, received to the full. We need today this bread that takes us beyond the present and gives us the strength to walk towards the tomorrow of fulfilment lived in God.

The daily bread, which is also the bread for tomorrow, is Jesus Christ himself, who said: “I am the living bread!” (Jn 6:51). And Jesus gives himself to us as the living bread in the Eucharist. This bread, which is the bread of live, is the body and the blood of Jesus Christ, as he said: “the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh” (Jn 6:51). And this is the bread that we pray for, whenever we pray “Our Father”.

This bread - the body and the blood of Jesus - is to be shared, as all of us sit at the table of the Lord, so that all of us may become one in Jesus Christ.

The celebration of the Eucharist demands sharing and building of the community, a community which is the body of Christ. As Jesus shares his body and blood with us, and by doing so, gives us life, so must we share, building up a community in which each one is ready to give and to die so that the others may have their share in life. A true celebration of the Eucharist has a social and even political dimension, and if we are true to ourselves and true to Christ, there should be no starvation in the world, because the rich stop being rich, sharing with the ones who are starving.

“Give us this day our daily bread, that is our bread for tomorrow”, so that we may have the strength and the courage to walk together towards the Father’s house, where we will enjoy life to the full.