This Sunday’s Readings:
2 Kings 4:42–44
Psalm 145:10–11, 15–16, 17–18 (℟ see 16)
Ephesians 4:1–6
John 6:1–15
TODAY WE SHIFT TO JOHN’S GOSPEL FOR A SERIES OF SUNDAY REFLECTIONS ON THE BREAD OF LIFE. We will hear these passages as eucharistic, leading us perhaps to focus primarily on Communion. However, John is always inviting us, in the words of the Dameans, to “look beyond the bread you eat… beyond the cup you drink.” We should expect this from the Gospel in which the Last Supper has neither bread nor wine but only a basin and a towel.
John’s Christological question is not “What is the bread of life?” but “Who is Jesus?” Over the next five Sundays (with a Marian solemnity interjecting on the fourth), Jesus’s identity will gradually be revealed: from “the Prophet” to “the bread of life” then “the living bread that came down from heaven” to finally “the Son of Man ascending” back to the Father.
Today’s miraculous feeding ends with the crowd wanting to make Jesus a king who provides for their physical need, like the prophet Moses did in the desert. Aren’t we tempted to do that too sometimes? “If I just pray hard enough, God will provide.” “If I believe, there will be a cure.” Jesus can certainly do all this, but he is more than the miracles we desire. Like the crowd, do we follow Jesus because of signs? Or does our faith go deeper?
–Diana Macalintal
Suggested Music
GIA Hymnal Suggestions
WLP Resource Suggestions
Choral Suggestions:
All Who Hunger
Words by Sylvia Dunstan / Music by Bob Moore
G-9539 · SATB, piano
We Are One
Chris de Silva
G-7060 · SATB, solo, assembly, piano, guitar, opt. instruments
MYSTAGOGY MOMENT:
“Take the gospel to the world”
Receiving and giving. Food and fed. Those pairs of words can almost sound like opposites, or, at the very least, different realities and roles. In the Eucharist, though, we become what we receive. We are fed by Jesus’ body and blood and thus we become food for the world. We become one in body and one in spirit with all those we encounter, united by Christ. How will our true belief in the Real Presence be made manifest this week as we “take the gospel to the world” and answer God’s call to end division and choose compassion in all we do?
–Jennifer Odegard
Great Is Thy Faithfulness
Arranged by Nathan Carter
G-5590 · SATB, alto solo, piano, opt. instruments
Within the Reign of God
Marty Haugen
G-4963 · SATB, cantor, assembly, keyboard, guitar, C instrument
People of Hunger
Tony Alonso
G-5604 · SATB, cantor, assembly, keyboard, guitar, opt. flute
More choral suggestions for the Seventeenth Sunday in Ordinary Time…
A New Passover Paul Nienaber, SJ, & Jonathan Kohrs Two-part mixed choir, C instrument, keyboard 008924
All Who Enter Here John Angotti & Daniel Houze SATB, cantor, assembly, guitar, keyboard 007953
Bread Broken and Given Trevor Thomson & Pasquale Talarico SATB, cantor, assembly, guitar, keyboard 008064
Bread to Share Marty Haugen SATB, cantor, assembly. piano, guitar G-4279
Dos Cantos para las Procesiones/Two Processional Songs Pedro Rubalcava Two- or three-part choir, cantor, descant, assembly, opt guitar, opt keyboard 012531
Great Is Thy Faithfulness William Runyan, arr. Paul Caldwell and Sean Ivory SATB, Children’s Choir, piano G-6097
Gusten y Vean/Taste and See: Salmo 34(33) Pedro Rubalcava Cantor, SATB, assembly, guitar, keyboard 012608
I Am the Bread of Life Tom Kaczmarek Three-part choir, cantor, assembly, 2 C instruments, guitar, keyboard 008360
O Living Bread from Heaven Arr. Gary Matheny SB, organ G-2960
Pan del Cielo/Bread of Heaven Eleazar Cortés, arr. Jeffrey Honoré & Peter Kolar Two-part choir, cantor, assembly, opt. marimba, guitar, keyboard 012643
The Hand of the Lord Feeds Us Steven R. Janco SATB, cantor, assembly, flute, guitar, keyboard 005246
