From: Mark 6:34-44

First Miracles of the Loaves

[34] As he (Jesus) landed he saw a great throng, and he had compassion on
them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd; and he began to teach
them many things. [35] And when it grew late, his disciples came to him and
said, “This is a lonely place, and the hour is now late; [36] send them away, to
go into the country and villages round about and buy themselves something to
eat.” [37] But he answered them, “You give them something to eat.” And they
said to him, “Shall we go and buy two hundred denarii worth of bread, and give
it to them to eat?” [38] And he said to them, “How many loaves have you? Go
and see.” And when they had found out, they said, “Five, and two fish.” [39]
Then he commanded them all to sit down by companies upon the green grass.
[40] So they sat down in groups, by hundreds and by fifties. [41] And taking the
five loaves and the two fish he looked up to heaven, and blessed, and broke the
loaves, and gave them to the disciples to set before the people; and he divided
the two fish among them all. [42] And they all ate and were satisfied. [43] And
they took up twelve baskets full of broken pieces and of the fish. [44] And those
who ate the loaves were five thousand men.

*********************************************************************************************
Commentary:

34. Our Lord had planned a period of rest, for himself and his disciples, from
the pressures of the apostolate (Mk 6:31-32). And he has to change his plans
because so many people come, eager to hear him speak. Not only is he not an-
noyed with them: he feels compassion on seeing their spiritual need. “My peo-
ple are destroyed for lack of knowledge” (Hos 4:6). They need instruction and
our Lord wants to meet this need by preaching to them. “Jesus is moved by hun-
ger and sorrow, but what moves him most is ignorance” (St. J. Escriva, “Christ
Is Passing By”, 109).

37. A denarius was what an artisan earned for a normal day’s work. The disci-
ples must, therefore, have thought it little less than impossible to fulfill the Mas-
ter’s command, because they would not have had this much money.

41. This miracle is a figure of the Holy Eucharist: Christ performed it shortly be-
fore promising that sacrament (cf. Jn 6:1ff), and the Fathers have always so in-
terpreted it. In this miracle Jesus shows his supernatural power and his love for
men — the same power and love as make it possible for Christ’s one and only
body to be present in the eucharistic species to nourish the faithful down the
centuries. In the words of the sequence composed by St Thomas Aquinas for
the Mass of Corpus Christi : “Sumit unus, sumunt mille, quantum isti, tantum
ille, nec sumptus consumitur” (Be one or be a thousand fed, they eat alike that
living bread which, still received, ne’er wastes away).

This gesture of our Lord-looking up to heaven — is recalled in the Roman canon
of the Mass : “Et elevatis oculis in caelum, ad Te Deum Patrem suum omnipo-
tentem”(and looking up to heaven, to you, his almighty Father). At this point in
the Mass we are preparing to be present at a miracle greater than that of the
multiplication of the loaves — the changing of bread into his own body, offered
as food for men.

42. Christ wanted the left-overs to be collected (cf. Jn 6:12) to teach us not to
waste things God gives us, and also to have them as a tangible proof of the
miracle.

The collecting of the left-overs is a way of showing us the value of little things
done out of love for God — orderliness, cleanliness, finishing things completely.
It also reminds the sensitive believer of the extreme care that must be taken of
the eucharistic species. Also, the generous scale of the miracle is an expres-
sion of the largesse of the messianic times. The Fathers recall that Moses dis-
tributed the manna for each to eat as much as he needed but some left part of
it for the next day and it bred worms (Ex 16:16-20). Elijah gave the widow just
enough to meet her needs (1 Kings 17:13-16). Jesus, on the other hand, gives
generously and abundantly.

*********************************************************************************************
Source: “The Navarre Bible: Text and Commentaries”. Biblical text from the
Revised Standard Version and New Vulgate. Commentaries by members of
the Faculty of Theology, University of Navarre, Spain.

Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland, and
by Scepter Publishers in the United States.

Readings at Mass

First reading

1 John 3:22-4:6 ©

Whatever we ask God,

we shall receive,

because we keep his commandments

and live the kind of life that he wants.

His commandments are these:

that we believe in the name of his Son Jesus Christ

and that we love one another

as he told us to.

Whoever keeps his commandments

lives in God and God lives in him.

We know that he lives in us

by the Spirit that he has given us.

It is not every spirit, my dear people, that you can trust;

test them, to see if they come from God,

there are many false prophets, now, in the world.

You can tell the spirits that come from God by this:

every spirit which acknowledges that Jesus the Christ has come in the flesh

is from God;

but any spirit which will not say this of Jesus

is not from God,

but is the spirit of Antichrist,

whose coming you were warned about.

Well, now he is here, in the world.

Children,

you have already overcome these false prophets,

because you are from God and you have in you

one who is greater than anyone in this world;

as for them, they are of the world,

and so they speak the language of the world

and the world listens to them.

But we are children of God,

and those who know God listen to us;

those who are not of God refuse to listen to us.

This is how we can tell

the spirit of truth from the spirit of falsehood.

Psalm

Psalm 2:7-8,10-11 ©

I will give you the nations for your heritage.

The Lord said to me: ‘You are my Son.

It is I who have begotten you this day.

Ask and I shall bequeath you the nations,

put the ends of the earth in your possession.

I will give you the nations for your heritage.

Now, O kings, understand,

take warning, rulers of the earth;

serve the Lord with awe

and trembling, pay him your homage.

I will give you the nations for your heritage.

Gospel Acclamation

Mt4:16

Alleluia, alleluia!

The people that lived in darkness

has seen a great light;

on those who dwell in the land and shadow of death

a light has dawned.

Alleluia!

Or	cf.Mt4:23

Alleluia, alleluia!

Jesus proclaimed the Good News of the kingdom

and cured all kinds of diseases among the people.

Alleluia!

Or	Lk4:17

Alleluia, alleluia!

The Lord has sent me to bring the good news to the poor,

to proclaim liberty to captives.

Alleluia!

Or	Lk7:16

Alleluia, alleluia!

A great prophet has appeared among us;

God has visited his people.

Alleluia!

Or	cf.1Tim3:16

Alleluia, alleluia!

Glory to you, O Christ,

proclaimed to the pagans;

glory to you, O Christ,

believed in by the world.

Alleluia!

Gospel

Hearing that John had been arrested, Jesus went back to Galilee, and leaving Nazareth he went and settled in Capernaum, a lakeside town on the borders of Zebulun and Naphtali. In this way the prophecy of Isaiah was to be fulfilled:

‘Land of Zebulun! Land of Naphtali!

Way of the sea on the far side of Jordan,

Galilee of the nations!

The people that lived in darkness has seen a great light;

on those who dwell in the land and shadow of death

a light has dawned.’

From that moment Jesus began his preaching with the message, ‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is close at hand.’

He went round the whole of Galilee teaching in their synagogues, proclaiming the Good News of the kingdom and curing all kinds of diseases and sickness among the people. His fame spread throughout Syria, and those who were suffering from diseases and painful complaints of one kind or another, the possessed, epileptics, the paralysed, were all brought to him, and he cured them. Large crowds followed him, coming from Galilee, the Decapolis, Jerusalem, Judaea and Transjordania.