Thomas J. Gumbleton Auxiliary Bishop of the Archdiocese of Detroit, Michigan * This week's readings ** 2 Kings 4:42-44 Now a man came from Baal-shalishah, and brought the man of God bread of the first fruits, twenty loaves of barley and fresh ears of grain in his sack. And he said, "Give them to the people that they may eat." His attendant said, "What, will I set this before a hundred men?" But he said, "Give them to the people that they may eat, for thus says the LORD, 'They shall eat and have some left over.'" So he set it before them, and they ate and had some left over, according to the word of the LORD. Ephesians 4:1-6 Therefore I, the prisoner of the Lord, implore you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, showing tolerance for one another in love, being diligent to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body and one Spirit, just as also you were called in one hope of your calling; one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all who is over all and through all and in all. John 6:1-15 After these things Jesus went away to the other side of the Sea of Galilee (or Tiberias). A large crowd followed Him, because they saw the signs which He was performing on those who were sick. Then Jesus went up on the mountain, and there He sat down with His disciples. Now the Passover, the feast of the Jews, was near. Therefore Jesus, lifting up His eyes and seeing that a large crowd was coming to Him, said to Philip, "Where are we to buy bread, so that these may eat?" This He was saying to test him, for He Himself knew what He was intending to do. Philip answered Him, "Two hundred denarii worth of bread is not sufficient for them, for everyone to receive a little." One of His disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, said to Him, "There is a lad here who has five barley loaves and two fish, but what are these for so many people?" Jesus said, "Have the people sit down." Now there was much grass in the place So the men sat down, in number about five thousand. Jesus then took the loaves, and having given thanks, He distributed to those who were seated; likewise also of the fish as much as they wanted. When they were filled, He said to His disciples, "Gather up the leftover fragments so that nothing will be lost." So they gathered them up, and filled twelve baskets with fragments from the five barley loaves which were left over by those who had eaten. Therefore when the people saw the sign which He had performed, they said, "This is truly the Prophet who is to come into the world." So Jesus, perceiving that they were intending to come and take Him by force to make Him king, withdrew again to the mountain by Himself alone.   * A longtime national and international activist in the peace movement, Bishop Gumbleton is a founding member of Pax Christi USA and an outspoken critic of the sanctions against Iraq. He has appeared on numerous radio and television programs, and has published numerous articles and reports. * Scripture texts in this work are in modified form from the American Standard Version of the Bible and are available as part of the public domain. For your convenience, the Scripture texts, as they appear in the Lectionary for Mass for Use in the Dioceses of the United States, second typical edition, Copyright ©1998, 1997, 1970 Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, Washington, D.C., may be found at the website of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCC). http://www.usccb.org/nab/ **The Web link to Pax Christi is provided as a service to our readers.

The temptation of course on a day like this is to say we should skip the homily and just go on with the Mass, but as I suggested before, just pretend you are sitting on the shore of the lake and there is a nice breeze coming, because it’s really important to try to listen deeply today to God’s Word. To start with, I’m asking you a question. Do you think that that little boy was the only one among those 5,000 people who had some bread in his pocket? What do you think? He would be the only one? Well, think about it, and I’ll come back to it in a minute, but before, we really need to try to understand what is happening in this Gospel lesson.

Dear Reader of Peace Pulpit, We need your help. We are pleased to make available -- at no charge -- Peace Pulpit. But we cannot do all we need to do without your financial assistance. Please take a moment to consider contributing to the Friends of NCR campaign. National Catholic Reporter is a nonprofit organization. Contributions are tax-deductible in the United States. Contributions may be sent to: National Catholic Reporter 115 E. Armour Blvd. Kansas City, MO   64111 USA Make checks out to: NCR If you wish, you may print a form for submitting your donation. You may also use this form for credit card donations. Print a Contribution Form OR Donate Now Online

It’s not just a story about a great miracle that Jesus performed. In fact, this is one of the incidents in the Gospels that is repeated, actually six times -- two times in Matthew and Mark and one time in Luke and John, so six all together. It was a very important event, but not about what happened, but about who Jesus is. That’s what we discover if we listen deeply to this message today.

Probably as you’re listening it’s difficult to pick things like this up, but first of all notice that Jesus is presented as a prophet. The people who read this Gospel when it was first written would have seen that right away. Jesus went up on the hill and sat down. That would remind them of Moses who sat down on the hill of Sinai and presented the Torah to the people. Jesus was the successor of Moses. And then what he did with the bread and the fish, they would have remembered that story about a person like Elisha. He was a great prophet in the Jewish tradition, a fantastic prophet that was remembered by everybody. He had worked that great miracle of feeding 100 people with 20 loaves of bread. Well, look at Jesus. Not a 100 people with 20 loaves of bread, but thousands of people with five loaves. Surely he surpasses Elisha, Elijah, Moses. He is really, as the people say at the end of the Gospel, the one who is to come. This is our Messiah. And so that’s the first thing to remember or to think about as we listen to this Gospel.

But then also, notice how Jesus makes it so clear that what he’s doing in this event is anticipating the Last Supper. Just as Elisha was a sign that pointed to Jesus, Jesus does this feeding on the hill and makes it a sign pointing to the Holy Eucharist. He took the bread, he blessed it, he broke it, he gave it to the people. That’s exactly what he did at the Last Supper. The same words. Obviously when John is putting all this down in the Gospel, he wants us to realize that what was happening there was a sign of the Holy Eucharist, the Last Supper. We won’t pursue this further, but we know that the banquet of the Last Supper is a sign of the everlasting banquet in heaven.

The Last Supper was the moment when Jesus poured out himself in love for us. The bread, the wine, are gifts given that become the body and blood of Jesus poured out in love for us, given for us. In fact, in John’s Gospel, this is the closest we come to an account of the Holy Eucharist. We don’t have the Last Supper described in John’s Gospel with an account of the Eucharist. But what does happen in John’s Gospel, at the beginning of that Last Supper, the first Eucharist, was Jesus getting down on his hands and knees, washing the feet of his disciples, symbolizing, because he says, “What I have done, I command you to do. Serve one another. Pour out yourself in love for one another.”

So this incident on that hillside of the lake isn’t just about a miracle, it’s about Jesus. But then, as always, it is about all of us who say we follow Jesus.

Join the Conversation Have you ever read something in Bishop Gumbleton’s homily that you wanted to comment on? Do you wonder how other people react to the messages of the bishop’s weekly reflections? Beginning this week NCR is introducing new interactive and participatory Web technology that will allow a community of people to read and respond to the bishop’s homilies and read others’ comments as well. It is contained in a new Web site, we call the NCRcafe.org. Please accept this invitation to explore it. To add your comments, you must register. In the next few weeks, the traditional format that you see on this page will be replaced with the new site.

The beginning of that passage from Paul’s letter to the Ephesians that we read today, “I, the prisoner of Jesus, invite you to live the vocation you have received. Follow Jesus.” OK then, how do we do that? As we listen to this Gospel lesson, we think about what Jesus did, but even more about who Jesus is.

That little boy, I imagine most of us said, “No, he wasn’t the only one in the crowd that had some food. Lots of people did.” But as so often happens, not many would come forward. Their attitude could easily be, “Well, I was sensible enough to bring my own, why couldn’t they? And so they should just go off and buy some for themselves.” In fact, that’s what one of the disciples in one of the other Gospels tells Jesus: “Well send them away. They can buy food for themselves.” And that might be the attitude we would have. There are not many like that little boy who come forward and say, “Look, here, this is all I have, take it. Use it for everybody.” But we should be like that. Every one of us.

In the world in which we live, and I’m sure you know this, a few of us have so much. We have so much in our pockets and in our bank accounts and what have you. We have so much in a world where so many have so little -- the majority. But what’s our attitude? Sometimes it might be very much like some of the people of that Gospel account: “Well, let people go work for themselves. They should be able to make it if I can make it.” It’s not true. The majority can’t.

This week, I don’t know how many of us would have seen this headline or paid attention to it. On Tuesday of this week in the newspaper there was a headline that said: “Trade talks fail over the impasse on farm tariffs, five year effort collapses, subsides at issue.” Now maybe to most of us that doesn’t make much sense. But you know what that means? That means that many more hundreds of millions of people are going to be pushed further into poverty because we, the rich countries -- the United States, France, and some of the other group of eight, subsidize our farmers so we undersell the farmers in poor countries and then we charge tariffs for their goods that they try to ship to here. So we force them off their land and they can’t make it; they become hungry, poor people.

Now you might say, “There’s nothing I can do about that.” Well we can certainly call our representatives in the Congress and the Senate and say, “That’s wrong!” Or we can make an effort to make sure that what we purchase is fair trade items. There is such a thing as people organizing in poor countries to get a fair benefit for what they produce, and fair trade products are sold in our country, but we have to look around and we have to be interested, we have to care. We have to be that little boy and say, “I’ll do what I can.”

Another quick example, and this is one that’s close to us, because we have our twin parish in Haiti, but just recently I read this summary of “Haiti At A Glance.” Seventy-five to 80 percent of Haiti’s 8.3 million people live on less that $2.00 a day. Seventy-five to 80 percent! But if you look more deeply, the poorest half of the country survives on average on $0.44 a day. The purchasing power of the U.S. dollar -- $0.44 a day. They’re desperately poor; they’re our brothers and sisters in our twin parish, and throughout Haiti. Half of the population has no access to safe drinking water. Life expectancy at birth is between 49 and 51 years. Children who die at 5 years or less -- 12 percent of the children in Haiti. Twelve out of every 100 kids die before age 5. Now on a hot day like this, and it’s very hot in Haiti, only 10 percent of the population has electricity. No air conditioning for sure, if they can even afford it. In a 10,667 square mile territory, only 380 miles of paved road, most in terrible condition. Only 45 percent of adults are employed -- two-thirds of them in informal jobs. These are people who are desperately poor.

What can we do about that? Well, we could reach into our pockets and some of us will next Sunday when we celebrate Haiti Sunday, we raise money for our sister parish in Haiti. We can give, and we should give abundantly. Like that little boy -- take everything and give it away. Or we could also call up our Congressperson because right now in the congress there’s a bill, the Haiti Debt Cancellation Resolution. It’s House Resolution 888. And it’s a resolution that would take Haiti’s massive debt burden of $1.4 billion, which is unpayable by this tiny country, most of which is an unjust debt; it came during the 30 year period of the Duvalier dictators that we put in place and that we supported during that whole 30 years. That’s when that debt was accumulated. Now the poor people of Haiti have to try to pay it off. Whatever national income they get, a huge amount of it goes to the World Bank, goes to the International Monetary Fund, goes to corporations and banks in the rich countries of the world. This resolution would eliminate that debt and give the people of Haiti a chance. How much effort would it be for any one of us to call up our Congressperson? Be a cosponsor of House Resolution 888. Relieve the people of Haiti of their debt.

These are the kinds of things that we must do as we listen to today’s Scriptures. Again, remember that little boy was not alone. Lots of people had resources, but they weren’t willing to use them. We are like that sometimes. We want to say, “Well, go help yourself. Go buy food for yourself. Get yourself out of your debts, out of your poverty. Or we might give just a little bit. That little boy gave everything, all that he had. Let that be our model. Jesus gives himself totally to us in this Eucharist. Let that be our model. As he said, “What I have done is an example for you that you must follow.” Again, Paul says, “We are the disciples of Jesus,” and he urges us, “Live up to the vocation that you have received. Be humble, kind, generous and reach out to one another in love.” We must reach out to our brothers and sisters in love if we truly have understood what our Liturgy of the Word speaks to us today.