Homily for Friday, 17 April 2015– Friday of the Second Week of Easter

Readings of the day: Acts 5:34-42; Psalm 27:1, 4, 13-14; John 6:1-15

Is Jesus’ feeding of the multitudes not a very familiar story to us? It is one of the few events of Jesus’ life that is recounted in all four Gospels. Today we hear John’s version of Jesus feeding of the multitudes from five loaves and two fish.

This event is familiar to us on many levels. Perhaps because Jesus’ actions here are at the core of our liturgy; our Eucharist, are we most familiar with Jesus’ taking, blessing, breaking, and distributing the loaves to the people? We hear every time we are at Mass how Jesus “took bread and, giving thanks, broke it, and gave it to his disciples.” And so the feeding of the thousands anticipates Jesus’ Last Supper with his disciples; his Passion and death; his giving of himself to us under the form of bread and wine. He took; he gave thanks; he broke; and he gave: These actions are openly Eucharistic. On this level, we are familiar with this event of Jesus feeding of the multitudes in our Gospels.

But is there another level at which we are invited to become more familiar with this event; to live this event more deeply in our own lives? On one hand, how often do we consider our talents; our gifts we have been given by God for one another’s good? How often have we, on the other hand, ever complained of a lack of expertise for some tasks, or a lack of resources or time? Can we put ourselves in the place of the Apostles Philip or Andrew in today’s Gospel?

Philip sees the great, hungry crowds and says to Jesus, “Two hundred days’ wages worth of food would not be enough for each of them to have a little.” Andrew asks “But what good are these [loaves and fish] for so many”? I do not think that here Philip or Andrew show a lack of faith. Philip and Andrew likely knew at this point that Jesus was capable of a miracle if he willed it. But the two Apostles respond to the immediate need in front of them: Too many people and not enough food.

Remarkably, Jesus does not scold Philip or Andrew but calms them by asking them to “have the people recline.” Have the people take up a communal meal posture that was familiar to anyone in Israel in Jesus’ time. Jesus multiplies the loaves and fishes, but in so doing he asks us what he asked of Philip or Andrew: What do you bring to help in this situation? What talents do you have; gifts from God that we are invited to use effectively? What is familiar to us in this situation?

Jesus does not ask us to work miracles. But in order to reach the point at which God can work a miracle, we are invited to give back to God what God has given us: Our gifts, our talents. We give to God what God gives us in this Eucharistic celebration. Is this a miracle before our eyes? Indeed, and yet even here we begin with our gift; the “work of human hands”; bread and wine; again, the familiar with which God works miracles.