The 15th Friday in Ordinary Time
(Exodus 11: 10-12, 14, Matthew 12: 1-8)
“This day shall be a memorial feast for you, which all your generations shall celebrate” (Ex. 11:14). When we gather for the breaking of the bread, we share in the once-for-all sacrifice of Christ on the Cross because he is the “same yesterday, and today and forever” (Heb. 13:8). Like our older brothers in the faith, we find ourselves in bondage and in looking for an escape route. Like his father, Christ continues to seek and set free those who are in bondage. What an awesome blessing! Every time we gather to celebrate the Eucharist, Christ breaks open the Father’s Word to us and feeds us with the Body and Blood of the Lamb that was slain for our salvation. The Living Word of God confronts and challenges the modern world. Christ, the Lamb that was slain, but is now risen from the dead presents himself to a fallen world as the only answer to all our questions and problems. He who is faithful even when we are not (CF. 2 Tim. 2:13) promised to be with us until the end of time (CF. Mat. 28:20).
I would like to share with you Eugene Peterson’s rendering of a familiar passage from the First Letter to the Corinthians. “I assume I’m addressing believers now who are mature. You can draw your own conclusions: When we drink the cup of blessing, aren’t we taking into ourselves the blood, the very life, of Christ? And isn’t it the same with the loaf of bread we break and eat? Don’t we take into ourselves the body, the very life, of Christ? Because there is one loaf, our many-ness becomes one-ness—Christ doesn’t become fragmented in us. Rather, we become unified in him. We don’t reduce Christ to what we are; he raises us to what he is” (1. Cor 10: 15-18, The Message). The Lord Jesus Christ remains unchanged, but we are changed by him. This is beautifully expressed in the Byzantine Liturgy as the priest breaks the bread. “Broken and distributed is the Lamb of God; broken but never divided; ever eaten, yet never consumed, but sanctifying those who partake thereof” (St John Chrysostom).
Every time we gather around the Table of the: Lord, we remember the past, the night of the Last Supper, and the day of the Crucifixion. We also look forward with hope to that day when God will give us definitive and lasting freedom. Having been drawn into communion with Christ who became bread blessed and broken for the life of the world, we are called to become bread blessed and broken for the building up of the Body of Christ. Having been sealed with the blood of Christ that was poured out on the wood of the cross, we are called to pour ourselves out in the service of others. Pope Benedict wrote in his first encyclical, “Eucharistic communion includes the reality both of being loved and of loving others in turn”, therefore, “A Eucharist which does not pass over into the concrete practice of love is intrinsically fragmented” (Deu Caritas Est, # 14). May the Lord Jesus, who loved us to the end, who gave us the sacrament of His love in the Eucharist, strengthen us to love one another as He has loved us so that one day we will share in His banquet of love with the saints for all eternity!
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