A reading of the holy gospel according to Saint John. This reading today now continues what we've had for the well, about the last week, And it all comes one after the other. You had about three very extraordinary miracles of our lord. Then you have our lord's dialogue with Nicodemus about being reborn. This comes right after one after the other.
Then after talking with Nicodemus about being reborn, then our lord moves in to this matter of giving us his flesh to eat and his blood to drink. And I urge you to go back and read the these this chapter or chapters. It'll only take you minutes, but then you will get the full impact. When you talk about the Eucharist, you just can't talk about the last supper. So this continues then from yesterday's reading.
Jesus said to the crowds, no one can come to me unless the father who sent me draws him. I will raise him up on the last day. It is written in the prophets, they shall be taught by god. Everyone who has heard the father and learned from him comes to me. Think of Philip in the first reading this morning.
Not that everyone has seen the father. Only the one who is from god has seen the father. Let me firmly assure you, he who believes has eternal life. I am the bread of life. Your ancestors ate manna in the desert, but they died.
This is the bread that comes down from heaven for a man to eat and never to die. I myself am the living bread. Come down from heaven. If anyone eats this bread, he shall live forever. The bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the world.
And this is the gospel, the good news of the lord to be continued tomorrow. In the name of the father and of the son and of the holy spirit, amen. Because you see, now we'll take this up tomorrow and it'll follow right along because what what is going to be the reaction of the people? What will be the response of those nearest and closest to Jesus Christ? They're going to say, who can believe this nonsense?
This is absurd. This man telling us to eat his flesh and drink his blood. Remember, our lord was talking to Jews, and the worst crime they could be guilty of was cannibalism of eating human flesh. They had been guilty of human sacrifice, but I don't think there's any instance where they ate their human sacrifices. The the very thought of cannibalism was absolutely abhorrent to a Jew.
And yet here's Christ saying, unless you eat my flesh and drink my blood, you won't have life. I am your bread. My flesh is your food. My my blood is your drink. Now what was the reaction of his hearers to this?
And there's no question about the authenticity of these texts and all of that sort of thing or how you interpret the Greek. There's no problem here about that. Their reaction was they left him. They said the man's a lunatic. Who can believe that kind of crazy stuff, telling us to drink his blood and eat his flesh.
And then remember, this will be the Marjorie, and our lord turned to his his closest one, and he said, are you going to leave me too? You know, this thing impresses me so much, I'm almost wordless. And you know when I'm wordless, I'm I'm in a bad state. Because here you have the the to me the most important kind of an argument. What was did the hearers of Christ understand to be talking about?
Now if Christ was if Christ meant to be only figures, if he meant to talk in allegories, if he meant to simply use poetic language, then who is to blame for this horrible error that has persisted for two thousand years? Why, what kind of liar, hypocrite, you scoundrel would the man be who would intentionally perpetrate a crime like that? Yet that's your choice. So if you ask what did Christ mean by these words, what did his what did the hearers think he meant? And they not only tell you what they thought, but we know from their actions what they thought.
And they thought the man was out of his mind or whatever. At least he wasn't worth following anymore. They lost. He lost, as we say today, his credibility. But the point I want to bring out is the way this builds up.
This isn't like taking chapter three and then going to chapter 11, then going back to chapter one, and then going to Saint Luke, and then bringing in a bit of Saint Matthew, and and coming out with a beautiful document. Not at all. Saint John begins with the beginning of those first three miracles. Then he goes to this inter the conversation with Nicodemus about being reborn, and then he comes to this business of his giving his flesh to eat and his blood to drink. It's one continuous narrative in St.
John. Read it. I can't improve on it, but think about it. You'd say, well, we believe. You know, you don't have to talk to us.
We believe in the real presence. Do you? Or is it just kind of an emotional thing on the surface? Supposing someone came along and said, look, you come into this church and well, you we used to genuflect before the blessed sacrament because we said the real presence is there. Do you know there are now Catholics who do not say that?
How they get a how they conform to the council of Trent, I don't know. How they conform to the second Vatican council, I don't know. How they conform to these words of Christ, I don't know. Now when our Lord, at the Last Supper, fulfills these promises and says, this is my body, this is my blood, I don't know how this works. I can give you the metaphysics of an of based on Aristotelian's ontology.
Anybody can do that, one who can read a book. Or remember, Saint Augustine didn't have any of that. And by all odds, Saint Augustine is reputed to be, and to have been, a fairly good Catholic over there in Hippo. Remember, this Aristotelian concept of trying to give a rational ex not an explanation, but a rational exposition of how this can be in the in this matter of Christ being present in the bread and the and the wine, that's a philosophical thing. Our Lord never explained it.
All he did was to take bread and said, this is my body. He took wine and he said, this is my blood. Now what does the verb to be mean? That's what you're reduced to now. Well, it can mean all kinds of things, and especially today.
That little verb to be is a is a it's the most essential word in any in any language. But there's one thing, sure. We if you say, what did Christ mean? What did his hearers understand him to mean? Go to Saint John.
You have the answer. He may he's telling us that he is there. That you're eating his flesh and you're drinking his blood, and you better do it. If you don't, you're gonna be lost. It's your only way, your only channel to salvation.
I am the bread of life. He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood will have life in him. That's what our lord said. He didn't tell us how. It wasn't Martin Luther in the sixteenth century that that raised these questions.
These are legitimate questions. How does it happen? I don't know for sure, and Christ never told me. And remember, all I know for sure about the Eucharist is what Jesus said. Don't tell me to go to Immanuel Kant or to a Nietzsche or to an Aristotle or to a Saint Thomas Aquinas.
What does the Council of Trent, because there's the living voice of Jesus Christ speaking, what does it say? Well, it didn't canonize Aristotelian metaphysics. But it what what what the what the council trend does insist upon is the physical presence of Christ in the Eucharist. How? We don't know for sure, but he's there.
The bread is my flesh. The wine is my blood. What does the little verb to be me is? That is the question you answer when you gender play, when you say my lord and my god to almost a transparent post. In the name of the father and the son and the holy spirit.
Amen.