Hunger for Him
Adapted from a sermon by Fr Daniel Fanous
In this gospel, the church chooses for us a passage where Christ says, “I am the bread of life. He who comes to Me shall never hunger, and he who believes in Me shall never thirst.” John 6: 35
Then as it continues in the Gospel, we hear that Christ says to them that “My life is in you.”
“If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever; and the bread that I shall give is My flesh, which I shall give for the life of the world.” John 6: 51
I’ve always found it fascinating that this gospel is read on the second Sunday of the Holy 50 days of resurrection.After Easter, after the feast of the resurrection, we celebrate 50 days of joy. In these 50 days of joy, the Church selects for us Gospels that generally revolve around the theme of ‘Christ like life’, where He says, “I am the door, I am the bread of life, I am the way, I am the truth, I am the life, I am the light of the world.”
I’ve always found it fascinating that in this particular Gospel, “I am the bread of life,” is the second Gospel. It’s as though the church is reminding us of two things.
Christ gave Himself for the life of the world. We should never forget, never dissociate. Never take that dimension away from the resurrection. Secondly, although He was crucified and resurrected, He is always with us through His body in His blood on the Altar. Although He has, in a sense, left this world, He’s never left this world even unto the end of the ages. He’s with us in His present through His body and blood on the Altar.
So these two things that Christ gave Himself for the life of the world, and that yet He remains with us through His Body and Blood, I think these are the reasons why the Church selects this Gospel, that He is the bread of life, that whoever feeds on, whoever has His life in will be transformed by the life.
St. Ignatius of Antioch was the bishop of Antioch, they led him in a procession before they killed him. on his way to be martyred, in the second century, wrote to the church in Rome.
He wrote to the Romans and said this:
“Do not talk about Jesus Christ while you desire the world. Do not let envy dwell among you. I take no pleasure in corruptible food or the pleasures of this life. I want the bread of God which is the flesh of Christ, who is at the seat of David. And for drink, I want His blood, which is incorruptible love.”
The early church knew deeply that they shared in the life of Christ, that He was in them. This happened and ultimately, when they partook in the Eucharist, when they shared His Body and Blood. In the Eucharist, they no longer had a physical hunger that was to be satisfied, but rather, Christ’s life was in them, transforming them.
St Cyril of Alexandria commenting on this passage in John 6 says: “in effect, Jesus is saying, I am the bread of life, not bodily bread, which merely eliminates the physical suffering brought on by hunger, but rather that bread that refashions the entire living being to eternal life. The human being who had been created for eternal life is now given power over death. The Eucharist, the presence of Christ in the body in blood on the altar, is not there to satisfy our physical hunger. It’s there to refashion us, to transform us, to remake us, so that we would be worthy of eternal life. So that we could be a dwelling place for Christ.”
The early church held on to this belief with a radical understanding that they couldn’t live without the body and the blood of Christ, that He was present among them in His body in His blood. Yet, if you observe even in St John’s Gospel, not all who heard Christ’s words hunger for that bread. Not all who heard that word hungered for Him. In fact, if you observe it says, even many of his disciples were disturbed, by what He was saying. How could somebody eat His flesh and drink his blood? How could His life be communicated in His flesh in his blood? Some were so disturbed that Christ even said to them, this is a hard thing who can understand it. He looked at His own disciples, as many people started to leave Him and said to them, “Do you also want to go away?”
Even His own disciples didn’t hunger. Some of his disciples did not hunger for Christ. St. Augustine says, “they were far from being fit for that heavenly bread, and they didn’t know how to hunger for it.” For this bread requires the hunger of the inner person. They didn’t hunger for him. They didn’t hunger for His presence.
This is what all of us, especially now, during this current crisis, need to have very firmly in our hearts. Do we hunger for the presence of Christ? Everyone across this Earth now is to a certain extent separated from the Altar. Separated from the Eucharist. Yet the Eucharist, the presence of Christ, His Body and Blood, needs now to be yearned for more than anything else. We need to hunger for it. It’s not a ritual. It’s not a remembrance. It’s where we stand face-to-face to Christ in His presence. Even though me may now only be able to commune infrequently, let this yearning, this hungering that is growing within us become a joyful experience of yearning for Christ.
It is not something we should be sad about. It is something we should be joyful about, because we know we will eventually be reunited. Let our desires of our heart grow, knowing that He never leaves us, but that we need to learn to hunger for Him.