Saturday of the Fifth Week in Ordinary Time

Lectionary: 334​

Then, taking the seven loaves he gave thanks, broke them, and gave them to his disciples to distribute,

and they distributed them to the crowd.

This gospel story of Jesus feeding four thousand people with a few loaves of bread and a couple of fish must remind us of the Eucharist. Saint Mark gives us the four part formula we still use in our Mass: 1) he took the bread; 2) he blessed it; 3) he broke it, and 4) he gave it to his disciples. These four parts correspond to the Offertory, the Eucharistic Prayer, the Fraction and Distribution of the Eucharist. On a Saturday, with our traditional references to the Virgin Mother, we can suppose Jesus learned this four part formula from his mother. It was the tradition she and her generation had received since ancient times.

In our time, when one of every three meals is taken in a restaurant, we should reflect on the civilizing effect of Jesus' action. Despite the desperate circumstance of "seven loaves and a few fish" to feed four thousand people, we do not imagine a panicked rush when the food was distributed. Later, when the story reappears in the sixth chapter, we learn that, "he gave orders to have them sit down in groups on the green grass The people took their places in rows by hundreds and by fifties." Calm prevailed as they watched Jesus and waited upon the ministry of his disciples.

When human beings feed we should do it with ceremony. We are not cattle or savage animals that eat without awareness of the blessing of food and our need for it. When they eat they do so because their instincts tell them they must. They need no more ceremony than that. We eat with the realization that eating forestalls starvation and death.

But with our complex ability to think, we bring more than that existential desperation to our feeding. We have our cultural expectations of food (American, French, German, Italian, etc) each one representing a tradition with roots in antiquity. We have our nutritional concerns and habitual preferences. (I know people who won't eat vegetables despite innumerable recommendations from recognized authorities.) We have table etiquette and customs, including placement at the table and place settings. If someone were suddenly teleported from a table in the United States to a table in Asia he might not know what to eat or how! There is nothing simple about human feeding.

So, there in the wilderness, Jesus fed four thousand people with a few loaves and some fish. They had to notice how dependent they were on his mercy even as they found their places under his authority. We can imagine they were tempted to rush at the food. Even cultured people in tuxedos and high heels can get testy when the food is delayed, and when the doors are finally opened to the dining room they struggle to do it with decorum. This mob in the desert had no such pretensions. Only their respect for Jesus' authority could restrain them. Apparently it did for, "They all ate and were satisfied."

Of course, this meal also had its traditions as the four thousand must have known. They remembered the Lord had led their ancestors into the Sinai wilderness where they survived by God's mercy for forty years. The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob provided manna, quail and water for their survival as they left it. Nor had they suffered the loss of essentials like clothing and sandals. More recently, only five centuries before, the prophets had described that desert sojourn like a honeymoon.

This day with Jesus augured a new beginning, a new marriage of God and his people, of Jesus and his church. We celebrate this wedding feast with every Mass, and take particular delight in his company.