Message of Abbot Paul - Sunday 25th July

Message from Fr Paul for Sunday, 25th July 2021

I hope that those who see me hobbling around the sanctuary won’t be worried at the sight. I was better able to camouflage the limp when we were using the nave altar during lockdown. It’s nothing serious, just a case of osteoarthritis in my left knee. I have good days and bad, as the pain seems to move around, but, at least, I’m now in the more than capable hands of my doctor, for whom I have the greatest respect and gratitude. 

Although 2021 is the Year of Mark, as his Gospel is rather short in comparison with the other three, from today and for the next few Sundays, we are reading the sixth chapter of John, the multiplication of the loaves and fish and the discourse of Jesus on the Bread of Life at Capernaum. Today’s reading consists of verses 1 to 15, the actual miracle of the feeding of the five thousand. John begins by setting the scene for us. “Jesus went off to the other side of the Sea of Galilee – or of Tiberias – and a large crowd followed him, impressed by the signs he gave by curing the sick. Jesus climbed the hillside, and sat down there with his disciples. It was shortly before the Jewish feast of Passover.” John always refers to the miracles of Jesus as signs, for each miracle points to a deeper, often hidden, meaning. John doesn’t tell us why Jesus climbed the hill and then sat down with his disciples. Was he about to teach them? How long were they proposing to remain there? The fact that they were sitting would suggest a lengthy stay. The hill mentioned we would refer to today as the Golan Heights. John alone mentions the proximity of Passover, the Jewish feast that celebrates the Exodus from Egypt. Then Jesus looks up and sees the crowds approaching. “Jesus said to Philip, ‘Where can we buy some bread for these people to eat?’ He only said this to test Philip; he himself knew exactly what he was going to do. Philip answered, ‘Two hundred denarii would only buy enough to give them a small piece each.’” Why did he ask Philip? Was he in charge of provisions? We don’t know, but we have some idea of what it would cost to give such a huge crowd just a morsel of bread to eat. “One of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, said, ‘There is a small boy here with five barley loaves and two fish; but what is that between so many?’ Jesus said to them, ‘Make the people sit down.’ There was plenty of grass there, and as many as five thousand men sat down.” We don’t know the small boy’s name and can only presume he was with his parents, but his humble offering will be enough to feed the whole crowd. Like the widow’s mite, the small boy is willing to give Jesus all he has. We’re often asked who we would like to be if we were famous. I’ve always wanted to be that small boy. That day he experienced Paradise; he saw Heaven. Jesus will have embraced him and thanked him.

“Then Jesus took the loaves, gave thanks, and gave them out to all who were sitting ready; he then did the same with the fish, giving out as much as was wanted. When they had eaten enough, he said to the disciples, ‘Pick up the pieces left over, so that nothing gets wasted.’ So they picked them up, and filled twelve hampers with scraps left over from the meal of five barley loaves.” This momentous miracle is described simply in a few words, an extraordinary understatement, if ever there was one. Jesus took the bread, gave thanks and gave it to the crowd, and the same with the fish. These words and the action that accompany them remind us of the Last Supper and the Eucharist. Not only was a vast crowd fed, but there was ample food left over and gathered into hampers for another day. As with the manna at the Exodus, nothing is to be wasted. Food is precious and must not be thrown away. “The people, seeing this sign that he had given, said, ‘This really is the prophet who is to come into the world.’ Jesus, who could see they were about to come and take him by force and make him king, escaped back to the hills by himself.” The people see in Jesus a prophet returned from the grave and a possible future king, to free them from the shackles of Roman occupation. Jesus will use this miracle, this sign of his divinity, as the basis for his discourse at Capernaum, where he will declare himself to be the living Bread come down from heaven so that those who believe and eat his flesh may have eternal life.

I’ll leave it there, as our Internet system collapsed with a brief power cut around 7.20pm. All we have now is a very weak mobile signal. We’d be better off in Albania or Nicaragua, as I know from my experience. 5G, 4G? We’re lucky to get the dregs of 3G and less in most parts of Herefordshire.