RBWords

     This past Sunday, I sat on the front lawn of our Dominican house and watched as the parish was enabled to do "drive by communion" which followed the celebration of the Eucharist in an empty chapel!  There were many cars lined up in an orderly fashion by the Knights of Columbus.  It occurred to me that this scene had within it the two principal meanings of the Bread of Life that we will encounter in this discourse.  The first of these meanings is contained in Jesus' "I AM" statement: I AM the bread of life; whoever comes to me will never hunger and whoever believes in me will never thirst."   It is this faith that brings people in their cars to "receive communion," but their faith has already united them with Christ.  This is why we include, at the end of the communion rite of the Mass during the pandemic, an "act of spiritual communion."  

     The second meaning will come to our attention on Thursday of this week.  It is the actual consumption of the physical "body and blood, soul and divinity" of Christ in the form of the consecrated host.  Those who came in their cars were able to do this, but first they had to have believed in Jesus as the one whom God has sent.  It is this first meaning that Jesus refers to in today's gospel.  The two different meanings are not to be related as one more important than the other.  They are both presented in the sixth chapter of the Gospel According to John.  The second is not possible without the first, but the second "completes" the first in a physical and sensory way.  The true purpose of hours spent in adoration is presented here.  AMEN