While we never literally experienced the exodus, traveling 40 years in the desert, freed from slavery, fed manna in search of the Promised Land, we are on an exodus ourselves. At baptism, we were figuratively freed from the slavery of sin, invited to embark on a journey to the Promised Land, namely eternal life with God. Along the way, we too would be fed a food unknown to many, namely the body and blood of Christ, the son of God.
To the outsider, what Jesus has to say in today’s gospel makes little sense, especially to those, like his Jewish listeners, who would take his words literally. “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?” He sounds so cannibalistic!
But Jesus isn’t speaking literally. He tells us, “Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me and I in him…Whoever eats this bread will live forever.” Notice, he made no attempt to soften what he said or correct any potential misunderstandings although he knew that many of his disciples, appalled by his words, would abandon him in protest. His listeners knew this was not another parable, nor was this a slip of the tongue for he repeated his message four more times in this short dialogue.
Undoubtedly, Jesus had given much thought to what he would say at the Last Supper, anticipating that these words would be repeated throughout the world for the rest of time. He didn’t say, “This bread symbolizes my body.” No, Jesus was clear. In no uncertain terms, he said, “The bread I will give is my flesh for the life of the world.”
At any given moment, somewhere in this great world of ours, a believer is offering the Eucharist to another believer while saying, “The body of Christ,” and the one receiving the Eucharist responds, “Amen.” Within that short exchange lies a profound mystery that has been witnessed for nearly 2000 years.
So what is your reaction when you hear the words, “Body of Christ?” Do you believe that the consecrated host held up as those words are spoken is no longer bread but is now the body of Christ? This belief, so central to our worship, is called real presence. We recognize the now consecrated bread as his flesh.
There is a fair amount of literature from the days of the early church which shows that everyone who wrote anything about the Eucharist believed in the real presence of Christ in the elements of Holy Communion. Nor was this belief taken lightly for many were persecuted and martyred for believing in this mystery.
Most of us received communion for the first time as a young child. We weren’t inhibited by the need for any explanation of this mystery. We accepted the truth put forth by those whom we trusted who told us that bread and wine, consecrated by a priest, became the body and blood of Jesus Christ. How readily we remain drawn to this article of faith depends on our willingness to ponder that mystery. Many who did not continue to deepen their understanding of this mystery left the table of the Lord. Their belief in the real presence eventually withered like a dried plant.
Only through eyes of faith can we recognize the real presence of Jesus Christ on the altar. While I cannot fully explain the mystery, I can offer this insight from Saint Augustine. When we eat ordinary food, we transform the food into us, but when we eat the bread of life, the food transforms us into him.
According to Socrates, one of the great philosophers of ancient times, wisdom begins in ignorance. In other words, we have to acknowledge how little we know. The same is true for faith. We have to keep in mind that we are on a faith journey, each step potentially bringing us closer to God. Augustine and Socrates are both speaking of conversion as an ongoing experience, a life long process, not a one time event.
Real presence is a tough concept for many people to accept yet I suspect that those who don’t are limiting what God can do in human terms. Had Jesus not risen from the dead, I imagine the words of the Last Supper would not have been taken literally, but when the disciples witnessed the risen Lord, they discovered that God can and does do more than we will ever fully realize. If God can raise his son from the dead, why couldn’t God transform our gifts of bread and wine into the body and blood of his son, even though what we see still appears to be bread and wine?
As some of you know, I gave up meat for lent, endeavoring to be a vegetarian at least when cooking for myself. Little did I know that because I wasn’t eating a sufficient amount of protein, I was slowly malnourishing my body. Last week at Priest Days, the health coach spoke of vital amino acids, available only from proteins, as being vital to one’s physical health. A well balanced diet is called that for good reason.
Likewise, one needs a well balanced “spiritual” diet if we are to draw close to God. We find God in countless ways through nature, prayer, acts of love, spiritual reading, a faith community, and as Paul pointed out, participation in the body of Christ, which comes from partaking of the Eucharist. God provides us with much needed nourishment which we cannot do ourselves.
The Eucharist, like any meal, invites intimacy. As you receive communion today, respond with conviction and enthusiasm as a testimony that you do believe that what you are receiving is the Christ, the living bread, whose death on the cross enables us to remain free from sin and experience God’s love and forgiveness. On your journey through the desert of life toward the Promised Land, think of the Eucharist as God’s chance to feed you and sustain you.