Loaves fishes and love

The texts today from the Roman Catholic Lectionary offer an example of how our satisfaction with a surface appreciation or a good story sometimes robs us of a deeper experience of wonder at things which we struggle to understand and insight which comes from our efforts to learn and live the Scriptures. Robert P. Heaney, John A. Creighton University Chair, brings insight into the passage from the First Letter of John which proclaims that God is love. This truth to identify God is a starting point. Too often we are satisfied that it is also an ending point. This description of God, Heaney points out, is the underlying of everything else in the Bible and Christianity when we look for the self giving which John describes as being in the gift of Jesus and which Friar Jude Winkler expresses is the very impetus for Creation. Friar Jude reminds us of the extent of this self giving which is God is to the death. Consider, as Heaney notes, that the Commandments of the Law are not rules to follow to gain the favour of God but behaviours which result from our living with the Love which is God. This mission of showing God in the world is Christian life. The miracle of the loaves and fishes is rich with opportunity for meditation on the mystery of how God loves humanity both at the level of our basic needs for sustenance, support and guidance and at our deep need for spiritual nourishment in our pondering the great questions around Why. Friar Jude explains many of the symbolic references in this story, which is told in all four Gospel (twice in Matthew). He links the event to the images in Psalm 23. The back story of this manifestation of Jesus relationship with the Father is in the ancient understanding of the Shepherd who provides and He leads us to repose beside still waters. The exegesis of Steve Ray on loaves and fishes for Catholic Answers Magazine is a bit confrontational but it does describe the spiritual truths which are deep in this miracle of Love. The concluding deeper story which is associated with the Letter of John, and mentioned by Heaney, is that this statement of the essence of God which we take quickly as a standalone truth is rooted in a time and situation of much dissention and discussion in the Johannine community which was splitting into factions. Loaves and fishes feed all (Jews and Gentiles from Matthew) with the perfect (five plus two) food communion with God through Jesus.