Fr. Frank Majka, SJ – The Bridge

Jesus’ Words

At the end of chapter six of the Gospel according to John, Jesus asks his apostles if they would stay with him or walk away as some people had when he’d said things they didn’t understand or couldn’t accept. Peter’s answer was unambiguous. He said, “Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of life.”

The disciples had lived with Jesus, heard him challenge the hypocrisy of the Pharisees and other religious leaders, seen him perform miracles and listened to him talk about his Father. They had learned to trust Jesus because his words had filled them with life, hope and courage. No wonder Peter said, “Lord, to whom else can we go?”

Today many voices tell us to seek wealth above all, turn to violence to solve our problems, ignore caring for the earth, be concerned only about ourselves and forget about the poor. Some of us may be tempted to listen to these words, but they do not bring life or peace; Jesus’ words do.

Admittedly, we may not always understand his words. They may appear mysterious or seem impossible to accept. The apostles had the same problem, for Mark’s gospel says that Jesus was sometimes exasperated by their inability to grasp what he was telling them. Nevertheless, they remained with him, listening to his words and understanding them as best they could. We’d do well to ask God for the same grace.

Five Little Words

It’s pretty simple. Five loaves of bread and a few fish won’t feed thousands of people, unless, of course, God gets involved. Several weeks ago, the gospel reading for Sunday showed what can happen then.

After Jesus had spent the better part of a day teaching a large crowd of people, it became clear that they needed something to eat. The apostles told Jesus there was no food except for a few loaves of bread and some fish, adding “What is that among so many?” But Jesus told them to give him what they had. When they did, he blessed the bread and fish and started handing them out. Miraculously, after all the people had eaten their fill, twelve baskets full of food remained.

One obvious lesson from this story is that God will not let his followers starve. But another lesson was suggested to me over forty years ago when a friend printed his ordination memorial cards. Instead of the normal verse from the Bible or a religious picture, it bore these five words: What You Have Is Enough. Since then, whenever a new school semester begins or I’m given a new apostolic assignment or I face an unexpected personal challenge and feel inadequate to the task, I remember these words and the miracle of the loaves and fish.

The apostles knew they would never be able to feed several thousand people with the meager resources at their disposal, and they were right. Similarly, we may be right in thinking that, left to ourselves, we don’t have the resources for things we want to do or others need us to do. But if, like the apostles, we bring what we have to Christ, he can bless that and, miraculously, the little we have can become enough. In fact, even more than enough.

Corpus Christi 2015

These few weeks at the end of the Easter season and the beginning of Ordinary time are full of significant feasts: the Ascension, Pentecost, the Trinity and, this coming Sunday, the feast of Corpus Christi, which focuses our attention on the Body and Blood of Christ.

We Catholics hear the phrases “the Body of Christ” and “the Blood of Christ” every time the Bread and Cup are presented to us at Mass; our response “Amen” is our declaration that we believe that we are truly receiving the Body and Blood of the Lord, given sacramentally to heal, strengthen, and sanctify us.

But when we receive the Body and Blood of Christ we are also asking that we ourselves may become the Body and Blood of Christ in the world. For, as St. Augustine wrote, though almost everything we eat is changed into our bodies, in the case of the Eucharist, we are changed into Christ’s.

Moreover, Jesus described his body and blood as being handed over for us, so if we become his body and blood in this world through our communion with him, we should orient our lives and actions to the welfare of others, as Christ’s were. Otherwise our receiving of his Body and Blood risks being an empty action.

So, at the feast of Corpus Christi, we are encouraged to appreciate the gift of Christ’s Body and Blood and to live as Christ did, who offered himself for us and for everyone. “Amen!” indeed.

Making Room

A few years ago an article in the New Yorker magazine reported that the space requirement of a New York subway car was 2.3 square feet per person, standing or sitting.

In normal living, though, we certainly need more space than that. We need space to lie down, walk around, stretch out, run, play sports, even just go for a walk. We need space if we are to be physically, mentally, emotionally, even spiritually fit.

Perhaps that’s why it makes sense that the Hebrew word often translated as “salvation” is related to the concept of room. Though some English Bibles have Psalm 4 read, “When I was in distress, you saved me,” the same verse can just as well be rendered, “When I was in a tight spot, you gave me room.”

You might want to ask yourself in what ways you may be feeling trapped. Maybe it’s thinking about the past that keeps you hemmed in. Maybe it’s fear of the future. Maybe it’s worry about a loved one that seems to take up every waking moment and makes it impossible to think about anything else.

Maybe you can change things so you don’t feel so trapped, but maybe you need God to give you the space and freedom you can’t give yourself. But could it be that one way to have more room in your own life is to let others have more room in theirs?

Not So Fast

At the time of Jesus’ ascension to heaven, he took his disciples outside Jerusalem to a nearby hill, where he left them with one instruction: Go back into the city and wait for the Holy Spirit. If I’d been there I’m sure I would have wanted to know more, like where in the city should we wait? how long would we be waiting? how should we spend the time?

They say that patience is a virtue; but if you are like me, most of the time you prefer “doing” to “waiting.” So, when it comes to faith, we might think that we should do be out doing something to help others, make the world better or take the message of Jesus into our surroundings.

But Shakespeare’s Hamlet says, “the readiness is all.” And getting ready can mean waiting. For, just as there is usually an engagement period between the proposal and the wedding, a recuperation period between the surgery and the recovery, months between planting the seeds and harvesting the crop, the disciples needed time before they began to go out to preach.

They needed time to let everything sink in and time to become more at home with each other now that Jesus had gone. Above all, they needed to accept that the decision about when to go out preaching the Good News wasn’t theirs to make but belonged the Holy Spirit. Their task was to wait for the Spirit to give the word and send them out.

As a Jesuit it helps me to remember that though Ignatius Loyola wanted his followers to be eager to do great things for God, he also wanted them to devote years to spiritual and intellectual formation and be guided by God’s Spirit, not just their own eagerness.

Certainly there may be occasions when there’s no time to lose. But it’s also true that often we have more time than we think and waiting time needn’t be wasted time.