Homily

For five consecutive Sundays (from the seventeenth to the twenty-first), the Sunday liturgy interrupts the ongoing reading of Mark’s Gospel to make space for a reading of the entire sixth chapter of John’s Gospel. The reason for this insertion lies in the desire to deepen the theme of "bread" being developed in the reading of Mark’s Gospel. The Gospel opens with a narrative of the multiplication of the bread, one of the most illuminating Gospel passages about the mystery of Jesus as nourishment for our lives. This is the sixth time that that story is recounted in the Gospels (the other five accounts occur in the Synoptic Gospels). The Gospels’ insistence upon recounting this story indicates the weight of the impact it had on the first Christian communities. It was certainly among the "signs" that most clearly communicated the sense of Jesus’ mission among men and women.
John’s narrative opens with the familiar scene of the crowds who gather around Jesus. Surrounded by his disciples, Jesus ascends a mountain and seats himself as is the custom of every teacher and looks out upon the crowds, "When he looked up and saw a large crowd coming towards him." We could say that it is not for the Lord to either remain below or to remain on high, distant from people. Jesus does not settle for self-directed contemplation or with his immediate work. He came upon this earth and became like us in every way. But he ascends the mountain to be just a little bit higher; he needs to encounter God, and from there he can see men and women better. Only by having God in his heart (and this is what is meant by his ascension up the mountain) and by welcoming his compassion, is it possible to look at the people with new eyes, intuit their questions and understand their needs.
By reading this Gospel passage we can perceive that the people were staying with Jesus because of "the signs that he had done." Much of the time they were so completely captivated by his words that they had even forgotten to eat (how different from we who often tend to hurry through the things of God). And, in fact, it was he, not the disciples, who noticed that the people were hungry and needed bread. Jesus calls Philip (who was from Bethsaida and therefore knew the area) and asked him, "Where are we to buy bread for these people to eat?" After making a quick calculation, Philip responds that it would be nearly impossible to find an adequate amount of money to purchase a sufficient quantity of bread for all the people. In effect, Jesus’ request was completely unrealistic. Andrew, present to the exchange between Jesus and Philip, gathers some information and enters into the conversation to inform them that he had just found a boy with five barley loaves and two fish. But, with sad realism, adds, "But what are they among so many people?" To him, as it did to the rest of the disciples, the discussion seemed over. The disciples’ correctness, realism, and practicality and concreteness appear convincing. The only thing to do, as another narrative recounts, is to send everyone away quickly. Everyone should eat at home. And it would have not been anyone’s fault if anyone was left to fast. Do we still not say today, "ad impossibilia nemo tenetur" (Trans: no one should do impossible things)? But also it is written, "What is impossible for mortals is possible for God" (Lk 18:27). God’s power defeats our resignation. And the scriptures are full of miracles. The story taken from the cycle of Elisha, who succeeded the prophet Elijah in the 9th century before Christ, tells us of the miracle of the multiplication of loaves performed by the Lord’s mercy. Here, too, the story speaks of just a few barley loaves, insufficient for feeding a hundred people. In front of the uncertainty of a man who had only 20 loaves, the prophet insists, "Give it to the people and let them eat, for thus says the Lord, ‘They shall eat and have some left.’" And it happened just in that way. The memory of this passage from scripture would have certainly helped the disciples’ little faith so that they would have asked Jesus to intervene. Mary’s attitude was very different from theirs when she asked Jesus to intercede at the wedding at Cana so that the young newlyweds would not see their wedding ruined. The disciples, however, as so often happens to us, put their trust more in their sense of realism and natural wisdom than in the naivety and strength of God’s Word.
Jesus, who trusts completely in the Father, knows very well that "all is possible to God." Furthermore, he is not one to send anyone away, even if they do not dare to ask for what they need. He reads into our hearts and anticipates our questions, giving us that which we need. Besides, it is (or it ought to be) like this for every good father and mother in a family. And God is always good, both to his obedient children as with his disobedient ones. He does not resist the needs of his children. Without even the disciples necessarily understanding, even contrary to logic, Jesus orders the disciples to have the crowds sit down on the grass. "The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures," Psalm 23 sings, almost anticipating this splendid scene. When they are all seated, he takes the bread and, after having given thanks to God, distributes it to everyone. Different from the Synoptic Gospels, in which the disciples are given the task of handing out the bread, here Jesus himself takes and distributes the bread. Without a doubt, the evangelist wants to underline the direct, personal rapport that exists between the shepherd and his sheep. Here, too, the responsorial psalm comes to sustain our prayer: "The eyes of all look to you, and you give them their food in due season. You open your hand, satisfying the desire of every living thing"(Ps 145:15-16).
However, Jesus cannot perform miracles out of nothing. He needs those five barley loaves (barley was the bread of the poor, for it was not the best bread nor the most flavourful). And it is with these poor loaves of bread that he fed five thousand people sitting on the grass. What little we have (the little love and compassion we have, the few material possessions we own, the little free time we have) is enough to overcome hunger, both the hunger of the heart and of the body. The problem is putting that "little" we have in the Lord’s hands, and not to turn it over in our hands to hold on to it for ourselves.
The evangelist notes that, after having eaten, the crowd admired Jesus for what he had done for them and wanted to proclaim him king. But once again, he draws away back up the mountain; he did not want to devalue the urgency of their hunger for a never-ending bread, that is, the need for an affectionate and lasting relationship with the Lord. And with Jesus on the mountain, we can continue to pray, "Give us this day our daily bread!"