Brian’s Reflection: Wednesday, Aug 5, 2009

"Very truly, I tell you, you are looking for me, not because
you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves.
Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that
endures for eternal life.

- The Gospel called “John”


I delight in the fact that the Eucharistic “meal” is so ….. scanty! Or, at least the sacramental Body and Blood of the Christ part; in reality, the “meal” is the whole Eucharistic celebration from beginning to end, from the time the people gather until they go away and everything in between. In a way this mirrors Life. Life is, at minimum, everything that happens between birth and death. Some things nourish us more than others.

Anyway: I like the scantiness of a bit of bread and a sip of wine because it reminds us of Jesus’ words: “Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures for eternal life.” There is a parallel saying elsewhere: We “do not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God”. In other words, we can stuff the physical body all we want with the most glorious of food and drink creations, but unless we feed the mind and heart and spirit and mystery of “being human”, we remain only a blob of flesh, not a Human Being.

As I enter my “retirement”, I am beginning to see that this is a stage when the physical body should be fed less and the rest of being Human more. Much more! My rather overweight body is a Sign to me – at least that is how I am taking it! I am feeding the mind, heart, and spirit more. Dennis is helping me with the expansion of Love. Books and thoughtful visual stuff with expansion of thinking and pondering and learning. Nature (and other things) with my “place in the Universe”. I think my years in the Order of the Holy Cross was a graceful gift of preparation. I learned from the daily Eucharist and the monastic lifestyle about the tools we all eventually need to merge with the Christ within us.

I hope many of you have found the same path, whatever your religious (or non-religious) Journey has been.

Brian+