The disciples recognised Jesus at the breaking of bread; a beautiful parallel to the bread of life discourse in John's Gospel; when we eat his flesh and drink his blood, He gives us his life and helps us grow as members of His body.
In my first year of Seminary in Rome, there were two little boys whose parents came to our Sunday Masses, who received their First Holy Communion in our college chapel. At that Mass, the priest reminded them of that old saying you are what you eat. If you were to eat only Mars bars, he said, you’d end up looking like a great big Mars bar, and everyone who saw you would point and say “there goes Mr Mars Bar.” He explained to them that the Eucharist, communion, is a lot like that; the more we eat His body the more like Him we become.
When Jesus first said to the crowds “I am the bread of life” and told them “Whoever eats of this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.” They didn’t understand, they thought he had to be speaking in metaphors, but he doubles down on his point, in fact he doubles down on this point 6 times, telling them:
Very truly, I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood have eternal life, and I will raise them up on the last day; for my flesh is true food and my blood is true drink. Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me, and I in them. Just as the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever eats me will live because of me.
John 6:53-58
This is a startling teaching, the people who heard him began to doubt and walk away. John’s Gospel recounts that “many of his disciples turned back and no longer went about with him” on account of this teaching. Jesus even asks the twelve Apostles, the most trusted followers, the men he was going to entrust with leading his Church “Do you also wish to go away?” This teaching was non-negotiable, Jesus was clear even to the twelve: accept this or go. If you want to be like me, you must eat my flesh and drink my blood. With Jesus, we really are what we eat.
Today’s Gospel, from Saint Luke, shows us two of Jesus’ disciples on the road to Emmaus; it is all about the encounter with the risen Jesus. He comes to them, as they are walking away, and explains the prophets and the law to them. He reveals himself in the Old Testament. He explains how it points towards his Passion, his death, and his glorification. And yet, the disciples do not recognise Him, in person, until the breaking of bread. What we witness in today’s first reading is the first celebration of the Mass, by Christ himself, opening up the treasury of the scriptures, explaining how the Old Testament prophesises and prepares the world for Him. Then, having heard about Christ in the Scriptures, they encounter Him, definitively, in the breaking of bread. Their hearts burn within them and they rush back to tell the disciples the good news about what they have seen! That Jesus is risen. That death has lost its sting!
They recognised Him in the breaking of bread. There is a bond here, between Luke and John’s Gospels; that Jesus calls himself the bread of life and instructs us to take and eat. That in the last supper Jesus offers bread and wine, saying this is my body, this is my blood, take it and eat, take it and drink, do this in memory of me. That on the road to Emmaus, two of his disciples recognised Him not by His words but by the breaking of bread which made their hearts burn. Jesus points us to the truth the Church has always professed; that He is truly present to us in the Eucharist; that eating this bread is to eat the body of Christ as He instructed.
In the late Middle Ages, various Protestant sects denied this teaching in one way or another. They said it was only a representation, or they said it was only a memorial, or they said it was a metaphor, or they said Jesus was only present because of an act of faith and not because of the words of consecration spoken by a priest. The Church repudiated every one of these false teachings, by teaching infallibly at the Council of Trent that every crumb of the host, and every drop of consecrated wine, however small, contains in it the entire Christ; body, blood, soul, and divinity. The Bishops at Trent made it clear, in the same terms that Jesus did in John’s Gospel, that this teaching was non-negotiable; whoever denied this (they said) anathema sit; let them be anathema, let them be cast out, they can have nothing to do with us. We believe that Jesus is present in this Mass and every Mass. (Cfr. Council of Trent, Thirteenth Session, Decree on the Most Holy Eucharist)
Why then do we say ‘Amen’ when we receive communion? The priest presents us with the host and says “the body of Christ” and we say “Amen” – which means “let it be.” Why do we do this, if the host is already the body of Christ? It comes back to the priest I mentioned at the beginning, and his little maxim; you are what you eat. That priest had given a simplified version of Saint Augustine’s Easter homily for the newly baptised, who were about to receive their own First Communion, Augustine instructed his listeners that they were to “eat what you are, and become what you eat.” (Cfr. Augustine, Sermon 272)
When we say “Amen” to the host, we are not saying “let this bread be the body of Christ” we are saying “let this body of Christ make me into the body of Christ” – we are saying let this Communion re-make me. As Baptised believers we are part of the body of Christ, but by receiving the Eucharist worthily, in a state of grace, we become more fully the body of Christ. Jesus offered himself to the Father on the Cross, He now offers himself to us as food for our souls, that we may be like Him. Let us rejoice, and let our “Amen” ring out loudly as we ask the Lord to bind us more closely to Him. Let us ask Him to re-make us into true images of Himself; his holiness, his goodness, his love. At this Mass and every Mass; eat what you are, and become what you eat.
Comments