18th Sunday of Ordinary Time
This time last year, the word ‘unprecedented’ seemed to be on everyone’s lips. It was the word most commonly heard on the media. At that time, it referred primarily to the drought we, in Australia, were experiencing. It then transferred to the bushfires and smoke to which we were subjected from October to February. None of us could have predicted that, within a few months, we would be in our current situation battling our way through a pandemic. Curiously, we rarely hear the word, ‘unprecedented’ now. It is as if the circumstances of the moment are too historic in character for the word, ‘unprecedented’ to do justice. The word, ‘unprecedented’ now seems to have been replaced by that of ‘uncertainty.’
We live in an age of uncertainty. The pandemic has brought us up short; it has turned us upside down. All our regular patterns of life are disrupted. We were hopeful that this may be short lived, that soon life would return to normal, albeit informed by the lessons we had learnt through March to May. We are now beginning to intuit we are in the grip of a pattern that may last for many, many months if not several years. I think we have stopped wondering what life might be like after the pandemic. We are now more immediately concerned with how we are going to live now, and how are we going to survive financially as the situation promises to continue without an end in sight. Accounts are that people’s mental well-being is under stress. We are becoming disoriented, despondent. Depression is on the rise. At such a time, it is natural to close off, and to close in, as we try to make sense of all that is happening.
In some ways, Jesus is no different. In this gospel of this Sunday we hear a story about a major loss in his life. His first mentor, John the Baptist, has been killed. Not only is this a huge personal loss for Jesus, but it also signals to him the real consequences of preaching something different. Naturally, the news of John’s death frightens Jesus, it unsettles him. He wants to be alone, to come to terms with his own loss and all that is happening. So he gets into a boat and goes to a lonely place. At this point in his life the last thing Jesus would have been wanting to see would have been a large crowd. We can only imagine his initial reaction when he sees the people. There must have been every inclination in him to get back into his boat and to avoid them. And yet in his own confusion he makes a choice to stay. At this time of immense disappointment and anxiety Jesus makes the decision to stay present to the crowd, to reach out to the people and to nurture them. What enables Jesus to do this is his own sense that there is something bigger than his own self-protection at stake here. Jesus sacrifices his own self-comfort for the sake of the Kingdom of God which is his cause and mission.
We are in a situation of widespread unease, uncertainty, of despondency. In our relationships, in our family life, in our work often enough we just do not feel like reaching out, being present to the others in the way that they are needing or asking. We too feel like getting into our own little boat and heading off into the middle of the lake where no one can reach us.
Yet, when we are able to move beyond our own selves for the sake of others, – putting our own self-concern aside because the need of others is greater than our own, then we are following in the footsteps of Jesus. It is easy to be present to others, to share with others, to reach out to others and to respond to others in their vulnerability when we are feeling well and happy and successful. But the real test of our love is when we make the decision to do this when we are not feeling like it. And when we do such, our lives have become truly Eucharistic.
This brings us to the heart of the gospel story given us this Sunday. The story of the feeding of the 5000 is one essentially about the Eucharist. We know this because the account hinges on the Eucharistic formula of taking, blessing, breaking and sharing bread. Wherever in the gospels we come across this pattern of action, we know that the writer is actually saying something about the Eucharist.
The story of the 5000 takes us to the heart of what we celebrate in Eucharist: from just a little an abundance is reaped. Our own five loaves and two fishes, our own small stumbling efforts to go beyond ourselves, to share with others from the little we have, have an effect much greater than we can imagine. Those efforts are truly blessed, and give life to others. And our own hungry hearts, themselves, become mysteriously satisfied.
Let us give to others beyond where we are comfortable. Let us celebrate the mystery of Eucharist in our lives – a mystery of abundance in the presence of so little.
