(John 6:41–59)

 

The Mysticism of the Flesh from Heaven

 

Even in domestic life

(John 6:41–51)

 

    Jesus wants to turn the page. He does not intend to prop up what is muddled and no longer vital.

He is faithful to the law of change inherent in full Life, which ceaselessly seeks new arrangements – rather than stagnating in the status quo.

This (at all times) whilst the religious authorities and the regulars wish to cling to the past, to what they know, to the ordinary sense of ‘justice’, to the prevailing moral standards…

In short, when Christ’s time comes, everyone leaves. But the conflict is already written.

God does not draw people with forceful compulsion or blackmail, but with an invitation (v.44).

And sincere belief is activated starting from an initial witness within oneself (v.44).

Given his social status as a humble craftsman [a landless man], the ‘murmuring’ (vv. 41, 43) was inevitable, and echoed the very same resistance expressed by God’s people wandering in the desert.

Not only is the divine claim to be authentic Manna incomprehensible, but the very origin of Jesus is incomprehensible to a devoutly quiet, normalised mindset—one that allows itself to be swept along, devoid of enigmas.

 

The protest is irritated and radical; it favours and mimics what provides immediate security – not the original. But the Lord does not relent, otherwise He would allow us to become chronically stuck.

The need to appear, to be, to do, leaves no room for listening, for perception, for the change that awaits us: they paralyse us.

The Father acts within the depths of each person to reshape convictions, allegiances and plans.

Everything works towards ourselves, not in an unnatural way or for the sake of others – nor even for His own sake.

He acts, present in every person, in the most spontaneous way.

In this manner and at the same time, in accordance with individual principles; more respectful of inclinations, of real characteristics, and of the energies of the times as well.

This teaching (v.45) is inner: embodied by Christ in the Word that distorts nothing – implicit in His Person and story.

Thus the gift of life is linked to assimilating and becoming One with that Food. Food that does not undermine the person, but rather convinces, sustains, ferments, and guides them – in a unique way, by Name.

That Bread, when eaten, captures the flavour of an emptiness from the exterior, at the bottom of which there is no annihilation: we are introduced into redemption, brought into new life.

In conformism, life does not overcome extinction. It lacks the virtue of re-knotting the threads that define the character of the Person, nor the innate quality, the vocational essence, the propulsive capacity [Life of the Eternal].

It is the implicit ‘cultural’, ritual and banal, uninspired, insincere, which does not come alive – and guarantees not fullness but habituation.

As for us, if we have grown accustomed to it.

 

The bread of the earth sustains life but does not renew, does not regenerate us ceaselessly, nor does it open a path through death.

The Bread that re-actualises for us the ultimate gift of the Son nourishes existence with an indestructible quality that does not fade, for it is the divine Gold of our springing being.

The prophets had announced: in the last days, God would not be known by hearsay but through personal experience.

After the failure of the kings and the priestly class, men would be taught directly by the Lord.

The expression ‘Bread come down from Heaven’ designates Jesus himself in relation to the Father and [precisely] in his mission to bring Wisdom and abundant Life to mankind.

Divine Life, boundless, which pours forth immediately, to each one. Without uncertainties or interpretations veiled by the blurred vision of ‘mediators’, who would instead lead to collapse.

A Presence which, in these complex times, kindles within us too the desire to be taught by God-in-Person, guided by the inner Friend. Filled with regenerating insights, in his Spirit.

He inclines us not to heed a nature that seeks and ‘murmurs’ only for the fleeting ‘taste’ of sustenance: ‘manna in the desert’ (v.49); that is, self-interest, reputation, titles, and trivial satisfactions.

 

Rather, we rediscover authentic Life in the gift of sound intuition and inner Vision.

In the grace that enables us to accept the Call.

In the virtue that remains attentive – through active fidelity to the Vocation, by means of self-denial and upright intentions that appropriate the virtues and merits of Christ.

 

‘I am the Living Bread, the one who has come down from heaven. Whoever eats this Bread will live the Life of the Eternal One, and the bread that I will give is my flesh for the full life of the world’ (v.51).

The Spirit who internalises and actualises is the principal Subject of history, even in its brief, daily account of salvation. By becoming our own.

By evangelising us and growing in Friendship [‘taught by God’ (v.45)], the nourishing action of the Master introduces our leavened flesh into the new Life.

The Son beside us changes our ‘taste’ and makes His own the very ‘Nature’ we are familiar with.

In this way, we too, assimilated and identified with the Bread-Person who has become intimate with us, reveal totality in action, living eternity, the original Source.

 

 

To internalise and live the message:

 

How do you enter into the gift of redemption through the Eucharist?

What intentions, ‘contrary’ to the prevailing moral standards, does the Bread of Life seek to convey to you?

Have you ever felt ‘cut off from the earth’ because of your different Food from Heaven?

What opportunities to take the leap have you perhaps overlooked?

 

 

Mysticism of the Flesh and Blood

 

No triumphal march: fragments, to reconcile

(Jn 6:52-59)

 

    The Eucharistic theme conveys a fundamental message regarding the quality of the Eternal Life we can experience right here and now.

The Eternal Life is not the result of an external ‘belief’ in Jesus. Such a conviction would hold us back and cause us to lose ‘contact’.

Instead, it becomes reciprocal, evolves, and reclaims us, as in a natural energy.

Here is the raw Food and Drink: to ‘chew’ and ‘crush’ it, to ‘drink’ and even ‘gulp’ it down [verbs used in the Greek text].

Total assimilation, which becomes a lived experience – a Gift from Person to person.

The Food to be nourished by is not a seal; rather, a perpetual and summoning movement.

Not a logical, measured and consenting doctrine, but a Word-event that fully engulfs us.

And its story – with all the implications of persecution suffered, and bitterness, as well as acts of denunciation.

[This is an aspect that resonates with the so-called prayer inspired ‘in the Name of Jesus’, that is, a prayer steeped in the significance and dramatic weight of his historical story; one that neither spiritualises nor numbs us in the least, for it sets critical witnesses against established situations].

For this reason, here is the Person of Christ – in his true and full human reality, offered and broken; in his authentic teaching and as the Paschal Lamb.

Amidst wolves who have torn him to pieces.

He is the abrupt means through which the Life of the Eternal One is given and preserved.

In this sense, the Eucharist received in simple Faith is the Real Presence (not symbolic) of the Risen One.

The harshness of the vocabulary used – far from sentimental – cuts into the lives of believers with concrete, first-hand effects, neither automatic nor magical.

Faith highlights the paradigmatic nuptiality: ‘Do you wish to unite your life with mine?’: it is a privileged place – from which we feed and drink, even in its very harshness, to explain it.

It is a Current of life from the Father through the Son, assimilated within us: not devotion.

‘To have Life’ is to be united with Jesus – but not in a saccharine, sentimental, or dazzling way.

We are made fruitful and sent forth, made One with the ‘Son of Man’ [the divine measure for each of us] in the Covenant of events.

Relationship, motive, vehicle, unifying movement, anticipation, which unfold the Communion between Father and Son – without stagnation or pause.

The Covenant of a new kingdom is life in God: an inexhaustible force that introduces us into the paradoxical and wounded glory of the community of children.

The Eucharist is the Church’s point of reference, at times scattered amidst the hypnotic allure of external events.

An assembly that recognises itself; it defines what it is called to be. And it must not seek its enduring bonds elsewhere.

 

Certain passages in John offer an interesting historical testimony to the catechesis of the late first century in the communities of Asia Minor.

A fraternity in search of ancestral motivations, of the most ancient energies, which would rise above the whirlwinds of persecution and not alter the conscience in Christ.

Instruction took the form of brief questions and answers, formulated to welcome pagans, stem defections, and explore themes in depth.

Topics and impulses that distinguished the living Faith from a religiosity of the past and its perfectionist or commemorative patterns.

Stylistic elements that it was fitting to lay aside, to satisfy the hunger and thirst for fullness – gaining freedom, joy, as well as a more complete, total, indestructible being.

With polemical bluntness, Jesus insists on presenting himself as the Lamb of the true Passover.

A Lamb that, when brutally beaten, cut up, reduced to crumbs, crushed, minced, and totally absorbed, could free us from bondage and bestow the joy of ecstasy.

In this way, he led his followers along jagged yet true paths – ultimately reconnected, both to enable the authentic fulfilment of individual persons and to foster the quality of coexistence.

His proposal involved a defiant transgression of purism, legalism, and the generally devout, inward-looking culture.

In that context, the consumption of blood – considered the seat of life – was strictly forbidden.

To make the story of the total Christ one’s own – so far removed from controlled thought – was to mark a protest.

It was a rejection of symbols, norms, habits or fashions. There would be no alternative, nor any non-offensive compromise.

Not only that: it was also necessary to change the minds of those who imagined they could latch onto the archaic idea of a powerful, victorious Messiah and guarantor for their own gain (whether individual or collective).

Perhaps adaptable, flexible; at the disposal of any sort of Jesus-Empire alliance, which already held some in its spell.

In short, other ‘mannas’ or external emotional dependencies, diluted and centred on conditioning, could not even be pale shadows of the Living Food.

 

The Communion of life with the concrete Person of the Lord is only that of the Son with the Father.

By cultivating it, we dream of it and hold it there, together with our own affairs – so that they may be nourished by that same Spirit.

By allowing the motivations and the world of images linked to the Lord’s Supper to evolve, we let ourselves be led by the effective Sign.

It will guide us and even lead us precisely where we must go.

By surrendering to this memorial which gives an inner impulse, something will happen – so that the soul may take the field.

Whilst waiting to be ready, we shall learn to understand the fruitfulness and wisdom of the broken Gift-and-Response which ceaselessly brings forth further stages, still activating different resources, perhaps unknown.

Here is the Judgement of the wounded Crucified One who pours out authentic ‘life’, even when harsh; without admirable harmonies all around.

This, by taking on our flesh and blood [involving even the body and its humours], assimilates to Him the outcasts, those outside the circle of earthly thrones and opportunistic alliances.

Something jarring to the vulgar external mindset. A world of convictions that raises defences and seeks approval, recognition, achievements; mirages of success, things everyone wants.

A diminishment that does not attract enthusiastic consent, but rather repels the normal expectations of the usual choruses of glory – of the symphonies of acclamation for the whirlwind success that is readily available, yet mitigating.

 

Flesh and Blood: cast into the furrows of history.

Involved without dampening the Spirit; in a personal and intimate way. One Body, assimilated to Him and His story.

First fruits of no triumphal march: we too have become food, crumbs and fragments, to reconcile.

Otherwise, the time of the Promises cannot be fulfilled.