Good Food to You

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bread alone, food, Israelites, Jesus, manna, Matthew, Numbers, psalm 81, The Awakening Tales, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, the spiritual center, wisdom

Everything in today’s readings speaks of food. The Israelites in the desert grumble because instead of fish or meat to eat they have the manna sent from heaven. (NM 11:4-15). Jesus feeds a huge crowd with five loaves and two fish. (MT 14:13-21) Psalm 81 ends with the promise: I myself will feed you from the finest wheat. I will satisfy your longing for earth’s sweetest food, with honey I so carefully extracted from the rock. But it is the verse before the gospel that brings it all together with the lesson I will carry with me through the day. One does not live on bread alone, it says, but on every word that comes forth from the mouth of God. (MT 4:4).

There is a lovely story* familiar to many of our friends and the people who come to our home, the Spiritual Center, for retreats or workshops. Set in a beautiful glen, inhabited by animals and a wise, kindly Wizard, it tells of the day a human comes to the Glen. He arrives just as some of the animals are sharing breakfast at the Crystal Pool. When Fawn approaches him with a greeting of “Good food to you!” the man retorts, “Strange way to say ‘Good morning.'” Fawn replies, “Mornings are always good. It’s food I wish for you, stranger.” Then follows a wonderful exercise where the animals show the man what they mean. At the Crystal Pool, Fawn and Joyhopper, the Rabbit, stand close to the water, first look into each other’s eyes and then into the Crystal Pool saying, “Good food of sweet grass to you, Fawn” and “Good food of young carrots to you, Joyhopper.” The wind stirs the water and miraculously a bunch of young carrots and a pile of sweet grass appear in front of the animals. The man, Alan Stuck, misunderstands the miracle and thinks that he has a way to obtain treasure, going to the pool and commanding, “Jewels!” (Nothing happens.) “Gold,” he yells. (Nothing.) “Steak with all the trimmings!” (No luck.) It takes a lesson from the Indigo Wizard for Alan to understand that it is in generosity and community that one receives the food necessary to live well.

So my wish today is for “Good Food to all.” May the God of wisdom grant us all that we need to make the world a better place.

*The book, The Awakening Tales (book one of The Tales of the Indigo Wizard) is available by writing to hrtcenter12@gmail.com for more information.

Bread for the Journey

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bread and wine, communion, Corpus Christi, Israelites, Jesus, John, manna, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

This morning’s readings move through what I have learned to call “salvation history” beginning with the story of God’s gift of “manna” in the desert – the bread that sustained the Israelites as they wandered toward the Promised Land. In the Christian Scriptures, Jesus speaks of himself in John’s gospel as the “bread that has come down from heaven” that will lead us to life. We become, we are told, the true, mystical body of Christ. This is truly a mystery and in our day we are coming to see new and deeper meanings that derive from this truth. Christians speak of the “communion of the body of Christ” celebrated in the ritual of Eucharist and see that communion in the bread and wine that we share in the living memory (anamnesis) of what Jesus did at what we call “the Last Supper” before his death and resurrection. The unity of his body is becoming clearer as we join with others across the Christian spectrum for ecumenical dialog. We find that what joins us is so much more than what separates us so that while we reverence our own tradition, we embrace those all over the world whom we are coming to know as brothers and sisters. It is this sense of unity that impels us further to interfaith dialog where we find the possibility of understanding even beyond the borders of Christianity toward the hope of unity that recognizes all those who journey toward God (however we envision or name God) as our companions.

On this feast of Corpus Christi (the Body of Christ) then, let us pray for one world, a unity of hearts yearning for peace and fellowship that we trust to be possible if we will widen our hearts in the unified embrace of God.