People are hungry. The crowd in today’s Gospel is hungry: for basic sustenance, of course. But more than that, they long to know that life is more than mere survival. Could Jesus provide that sign that living is indeed more than sustaining life?
Jesus’ answer is clear. Life moves from survival to full meaning in the very person of Jesus, who becomes everlasting bread for all our hungers. Good news set against the morning news where a quick glance of lead stories has one wonder why higher truth, beauty, and transcendence evades a world on the way. Good news set against my nightly Examen and its litany of trivial fears and petty grips.
As people of faith, Easter unfolds in this truth, set within life as it is. Easter yet again reminds us of the triumph of the cross. Beyond the apparent scape of life lies a much deeper and more beautiful love that is fully expressed in the self-giving God named Jesus, bread for a hungry world.
—Matthew Couture, Provincial Assistant for Secondary and Pre-Secondary Education, Chicago-Detroit Province and Wisconsin Province