John 6: 24-35
To cross over to another shore is to seek enlightenment, understanding, diving illumination. It is to move from one level of knowledge to another. This story begins on one shore where Jesus multiplied the loaves and fishes to feed hungry people in a literal sense, a necessary act of mercy. In today's portion of the story we are on the other shore beginning a new level of understanding about Jesus and about ourselves.
The deeper hunger of the human person is within our hearts. The bread we seek is enlightenment, understanding, illumination. Jesus states that he is the bread of life. By our communion with him we come to be like him, the Enlightened One, Divine Illumination itself. Only by imitating the example of Jesus in our own lives - in giving of ourselves to others, in being the mercy of God on earth - can we become enlightened and illuminated.
It is not enough for us to simply "believe" in some abstract intellectual sense or in reciting some words. It is not even enough to receive communion, the bread of life and body of Christ. For if we do not become like the Lord Jesus in our entire life and self these have no meaning. To believe, to receive communion is a pledge to become what we believe and consume in all our daily actions. Only then will enlightenment and illumination come. Only then will that hunger be satisfied.
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