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- Sunday June 19: Bread is Life
[link to full email]: https://mailchi.mp/coutreach/word-of-the-week-june19
[excerpt from email]: To Practice: Simone Weil said, “The danger is not lest the soul should doubt whether there is any bread, but lest, by a lie, it should persuade itself that it is not hungry.” Ponder what feeds your soul. By the bread of the Eucharist, by the bread of everyday life? What comes to you in response to your reflection?
As I was doing Lectio on these verses, it struck me that God knows my hungers better than I do. God also knows how to satisfy them. I don’t have to figure it out. But I do have to remain attentive, mindful, intentional as I go through the day. Otherwise it’s just too easy to miss this daily feast.
Oops – my bad! Here’s the rest.
“I’m sitting at my dining room table, waiting for a batch of brownies to come out of the oven. The handsome, round oak table on which they will cool is the hub of our family life. From its sturdy center, soulful spokes of food, drink, conversation, conviviality, tradition and memory sprout, finding outward expression in our daily round.”
“Much more than eating takes place here. Newspapers are read, mail is sorted, conversations are started, homework is completed, bills are paid, cakes are iced, income tax is computed, flowers are arranged, games are played, confidences are shared, family and friends are gathered.”
I recall my studies in Theology and a course on the Sacrament of Eucharist. How the earliest celebrations were in homes. How my professor stressed the importance of the table/altar and its many purposes, symbolizing the many ways we participate and experience the ‘Bread of Life.’ For me, Eucharist is life. In Thomas Keating’s book, “Open Mind, Open Heart”, under Guidelines for Christian Life, Growth and Transformation, he describes it this way.
“Eucharist is the celebration of life: the coming together of all the material elements of the cosmos, their emergence to consciousness in human persons and the transformation of human consciousness into Divine consciousness. It is the manifestation of the Divine in and through the Christian community. We receive the Eucharist in order to become the Eucharist.”
For me, Eucharist is the dynamic expression of God’s love for all humanity, all creation, in a simple act of giving and receiving. But it springs from an act of sacrifice so profound, so monumental, at times I am moved to grateful, joyful tears and overwhelmed with awe and reverence at its implications and revelations.
I am moved to silence. I am moved to song. And then moved to service, in the ways I am called.
Sunday June 19: Bread is Life
Silence – the cornerstone of my breadmaking and bread sharing. I cannot feed God’s sheep unless I have heard how i am loved from the deep silence.
Joy – from house work to service for others, whatever I do with joy feeds my soul.
Peace – to be God’s instrument of peace feeds my soul. To bring a calm presence to tense situations, being the one who stands in the gap and sees all sides with love and compassion. Soul food.
I am so grateful the question was posed: “Ponder what feeds your soul? By the bread of the Eucharist, by the bread of everyday life?”
Eucharist, from the Greek eucharistia for “thanksgiving”. I think of fellow Christians, and others, who do not partake of the Eucharist and live a life of gratitude and thanksgiving. Eucharist can happen in many ways – through nature, art and other ways – as I believe Fr Thomas says somewhere.
What feeds my soul?, the word “communion” as in “where 2 0r 3 are gathered”; as in John 13 ” washing feet”; as in living the charism of a vowed life; as in ” Synodality walking with” our indigenous brothers and sisters, or “care of our common home, this earth, this planet; as in our Wednesday one hour Centering prayer time. Such as these feed my soul. For this I am deeply grateful.
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