There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish; but what good are these for so many?
John 6:1-13
What
really happened that afternoon a long time ago when a young boy’s five
loaves and two fish were shared with five thousand and all went home fed, with
plenty left over? Something so wonderful happened that day that the story of it
has come down to us in all four gospels. It is one of our most regular readings
throughout the year. What really happened?
Maybe
it was a literal miracle
of multiplication. Maybe those five loaves and two fish were
miraculously and instantly turned into hundreds of loaves and hundreds of fish
by Jesus by simply waving his hands over them. That’s how many of us have
always understood it.
Maybe
it was just a spiritual miracle like we do every Sunday here in the
Eucharist. Maybe everybody came forward to receive a crumb and a pinch from the
five loaves and two fish from those in charge of its distribution (like you do
from Eucharistic ministers) and everybody went home spiritually fed that day.
However,
there is still another explanation, one that is a little less
mysterious, another explanation that is a little more ordinary, but miraculous
nonetheless. Let’s lay aside our traditional understanding and prejudices
for a moment and take a closer look at the details of this story for a possible
better understanding of what actually happened.
It
is highly doubtful that a crowd that big would have left on a nine-mile hike
without making preparation – a few maybe, but certainly not five thousand
people. There are two reasons I can
think of that would have prevented them from not being prepared. (1)
There were no stores and restaurants lining the roads back then like we have
today. (2) Jews were very particular about their food. It had to be kosher. No
Jew would think of leaving home without his bottle-shaped basket with its truss
of hay for sleeping and its kosher food for eating.
Probably
what happened was that people kept what they had hidden from such a hungry
crowd, lest there not be enough for themselves. It was only when Jesus took the
young boy’s five barley loaves and two sardines, blessed them and broke them
and began to pass them around that a willingness to share was triggered in the
crowd. When this example of sharing spread through the crowd, people pulled out
what they had and began to share it. As a result, everybody had their fill and
there was a lot left over. I favor this explanation for several reasons
First,
we need to remember that one of the things that Jesus rejected when it was
offered to him by the devil when he was in the desert discerning the direction of
his ministry was magically producing bread to feed hungry people. The devil
suggested that Jesus turn rocks into bread. Jesus could, not doubt, have done
that but he rejected it. Rather, he knew that if people would just change their
minds about shortages and share the resources of the world, there would be no
need for such “rocks into bread” magic.
Second,
if it were just about Jesus’ power to miraculously produce bread and fish from
thin air, then we might be amazed and even admire the power that Jesus had, but
we could not pull off such events ourselves. No, this is a miracle alright, but
it is a miracle of sharing. It is something we can do even today. The best
example I can think of is a church potluck dinner. I have seen this miracle
take place hundreds of times at those potluck dinners. Families arrive, each
with their bowl of beans or their basket of fried chicken or their carton of
potato salad or their bag of buns or their lemon pie or their pot of green
beans --- on and on! They put all those little bowls and baskets of food on a
long table. The pastor says a blessing over all of it. People line up and fill
their plates. When it is all over, everybody is stuffed and there is usually
plenty left over to take to the shut-ins.
We
are used to calling this miracle the “multiplication of the loaves” even though
the story never mentions the word “multiplication” in referring to the loaves.
I believe it should more accurately be called the “miracle of sharing.” If we
do, we don’t have to stop at admiring it as a historical event from years ago,
we can repeat it today!
This
miracle actually goes on downstairs almost every day. Various businesses donate
their surplus, left over, day old or slightly damaged food items to our kitchen
– food that would otherwise be thrown away. A crew of volunteers take them and
turn them into meals for hundreds of street people. If you have ever witnessed
it up close, you realize that it is a little miracle being worked right in
front of you.
At
the risk of talking about it too much, many of you know that I had been
volunteering down in the Caribbean missions in my retirement until COVID and a
volcano eruption put a stop to me. I was seeing this miracle repeat itself
right in front of my eyes. I witnessed how much good can come from people
sharing “just five loaves and two fish.”
Over
a five-year period, we sent down three 40’ shipping container of surplus
medical supplies collected by a local organization of volunteers called S.O. S.
– Supplies Over Seas. They came from our regional hospitals – items that would
have gone into the landfill because of our laws and rules about expiration
dates and cross contamination. S.O.S.
has tons of it in their warehouse over on Arlington Avenue near Saint Frances of
Rome. They give it away for free, but charge processing costs and transportation
by truck, train and ship to poor areas of the world. Typically, poor countries
get close to a half-million dollars worth of perfectly usable medical supplies
for a pittance.
One
of the other things I was doing was to try help the school children and
orphans. In fact, we had computer camps for very poor kids for two summers.
They were using the re-conditioned and used computers that we collected. A
public school “kids’ computer teacher” from here in Louisville went down there both
summers. That little country does not have a welfare system like ours so people
either do without or depend on people willing to help them. I was also focused
on two orphanages run by two aging Carmelite Sisters. Toward the end, I had
expanded to help the kids in the Catholic schools on the main island.
One
of the needs I discovered was a need for school supplies – even down to pencils
and pens. Businesses down there do not give away free pens like they do here,
so to have a pen they need to spend a couple of dollars. Even the Bishop’s
Pastoral Centre always had a pen shortage when I was down there. One day, I
noticed that I had used pens in almost every drawer in my house. I noticed that
hundreds of them are left on the tables after the priest retreats I led across
the US and Canada. I decided to clear out my own desk drawers, my kitchen
drawers and my nightstands. I started gathering them up from the tables after
my priest retreats. Then a couple of weeks later, I got the bright idea that I
would announce a “used ball point pen drive” on my blog. The first responder
was a woman in Elizabethtown who found 32 laying around her house. I got a box
of used pens from North Carolina. A big box of them with business logos was sent from Florida. I got over 200 of them from a Cathedral attender and his
sons. I would sometimes find a bag of them tied to my doorknob when I got home.
I witnessed a “used ball point pen” miracle.
To us they pile up in our “junk drawers,” but to the school kids down in the
islands, they became “miraculous school supplies” because a bunch of people
came forward and offered their version of “just five loaves and two small
fish.”
As
I read and re-read the story in today’s gospel, I hope and pray that this
gospel comes alive for you, and you have your own experience of the “miracle”
that comes from sharing “even a little bit.” Miracles are not triggered by magic! They are triggered
by noticing, caring and sharing!
Bookmarks.
