Jesus gives us his flesh to eat and his blood to drink. To eat his flesh and to drink his blood means to have life and to live forever. 

The religious leaders among the Jews murmur about Jesus after hearing him say to them, “I am the bread that has come down from heaven.” Yet he does not take back his words; rather, he confirms them. For he says, “I am the living bread that has come down from heaven.”  He also assures them that to eat this bread means to live forever.

He adds, besides, that the bread he will give is his flesh for the life of the world. And right away, those who murmur about him now quarrel among themselves and say, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?”

But it does not bother him that his words shock and scandalize them. For his words turn more shocking and scandalous still as he suggests he also gives them his blood to drink. In fact, he warns them that not to eat is flesh and drink his blood is not to have life. And never mind that the law does not allow them to eat blood. He does make it clear that his flesh is true food and his blood is true drink.

And such realistic, strange and galling words make known that to say we are of Christ is to hold his Supper. That is to say, the Eucharist is crucial in our life as Christians. We cannot fail to eat his flesh and drink his blood. Or to say it simply, we have to feed on him, on his very person.

To eat Jesus’ flesh and to drink his blood means to have life and to live forever.

For the Eucharist, for one thing, lets us overcome the danger of forgetting him and of our hearts turning cold (SV.EN XI:131). Also, as we receive him in communion, we get to know him. And we are to know him as the one who truly fulfills the law and the prophets. So, he is not just a thing with which we cannot be in communion ever; he is a person with whom we can truly be in communion.

And to be in communion with him further means to breathe in and out his life-breath. It is shared life, he dwelling in us and we in him. Just as the Father dwells in him and he in the Father. We thus make our own also, deep within us, his attitudes and his criteria for living.  And we get to grasp his will. To grasp, too, that to eat his flesh and to drink his blood, means death that brings life. It means life that leads to death.

Yes, we live by his death and we die by his life (SV.EN I:276). And the more we are one with him and full of him, the more we live by his death and die by his life. When we live and die so, then we get to taste, and train for, what it means to live forever in heaven. As one, as brothers and sisters truly loving one another.

Lord Jesus, you call us to the table you have spread so that we may eat your flesh and drink your blood:  grant that we grow in perfect love, and get to have life and live forever.

18 August 2024
20th Sunday in O.T. (B)
Prov 9, 1-6; Eph 5, 15-20; Jn 6, 51-58