Gospel Reflection for Sunday the 25th of July 2021

You may have heard before that the Sunday Gospel reading follows the order of the Gospel in a 3 year cycle: there is years A, B and C. Year A is the year of Matthew, B is the year of Mark and C is the year of Luke. This is true for the Sundays in Ordinary Time. The Sundays in Ordinary Time are not the Sundays in the seasons of Advent, Christmas, Lent and Easter but are all the other ones. So especially in the period from about the end of May until the end of November, each Sunday, the Gospel reading will methodically read through the Gospel of that year.

So another thing you may have heard before is that this year of 2021 is “Year C” of the 3 year cycle. Did you know that? So the readings are taken from the Gospel of Mark in these Sundays and so week by week Mark’s Gospel is read through from Chapter 1 to chapter 13.

Now there is a reason why I am explaining all of this. It is because the thing is, Mark is shorter than the other Gospels: it doesn’t quite stretch over ALL 34 Sundays in Ordinary time. So in Year C, right in the middle of the year, from the 17^th to the 21^st Sundays in Ordinary Tome there are 4 consecutive Gospel readings from the Gospel of St John. And guess what? This Sunday is the 17^th Sunday in Ordinary Time of year C. So right now we are heading into Sunday 1 of this once-every-three-year phenomenon of 4 weeks of St John in the middle of the Summer. How exciting!

The thing about St John’s Gospel is that it is quite different from the Gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke. St John’s Gospel is sometimes represented pictorially by an eagle because its thoughts and ideas soar above, it is full of mystery and signs. It is not as earthy and practical as the other Gospels, it is more full of meaning and depth. So it is important to be aware of this when you listen to it. John intends the listener to reflect deeply on the meaning.

And so of course the reading we have this evening from the Gospel of St John is no different. This account of the feeding of 5000 people from 5 loaves and 2 fish has a lot of hidden depth. Well, obviously it is a miracle, but is that all? It is a Gospel that makes us think of the miraculous power of Jesus of course, but also there are elements to it that if we go a little deeper we can see more.

Just take this line for example “Jesus took the loaves, gave thanks and gave them out to all who were sitting ready”. Isn’t there a little echo of some other event there. Jesus takes the bread, says the blessing and then distributes it. There is even a little reference to “Passover” early on in the reading and so it is like a Passover Meal and remember the Last Supper itself was a Passover Supper. And the that Passover Meal is our foundation for our practice of the Mass.

As I said: St John’s Gospel is full of signs. And the multiplication of the bread itself is called “a sign” in this Gospel. So as we look deeply at it and see perhaps a connection between it and the Mass what meaning could it have?

It could be a sign that if we come to Jesus he will feed us or a sign that Jesus knows our needs, our real needs and he does answer them, he doesn’t send us away and that when we go to Mass and receive the Eucharist it is a real nourishment for us. It is food he wants to give us, a food that he gives us with his own hand. He wants to share a meal with us. He wants to give the Eucharist to us.

Tonight at the meeting as we sit before Jesus let us think of the sign of the Eucharist. It really is Jesus, and it is a sign that he wants to give himself to us and let our thoughts soar with St John’s to receive the deep meaning behind the mystery. This bread is God given. In this week when we go to Mass may we approach communion with a renewed understanding, let us think of how the Eucharist is God given. It is a gift from God himself a gift to satisfy our needs and help us to know that Jesus is there are he cares for us. In the prayer meeting this evening let us open ourselves to receiving him, to be fed by him. Thank you Jesus for the gift of the Eucharist, help us to appreciate it more and more!

-Fr Declan Lohan