Food
If you get to know me for very long you’ll learn that my favorite food is a Chipotle Burrito! It’s the best! There are some people who will try to tell you that it’s the same as Qdoba, but it’s just not. Unfortunately, we don’t have a Chipotle restaurant in Mt. Pleasant – though, there are two in Lansing – road trip!

The Food that Perishes
As good as Chipotle is (and let me tell ya!), I’m always hungry for more. I’m even hungry for Chipotle right after I’ve eater Chipotle – kinda like bacon in that way! [Whoa…stop the presses…what if they made Chipotle with bacon? Nope, even then I’d just want more.] That’s the problem with our appetites for earthly things: we’re never satisfied.

The Food that Endures
In today’s Gospel the people follow Jesus because, hey, He’s the guy that gives free bread! And they want more! They’re not satisfied: He has already multiplied the loaves and fishes and still they ask: What sign can you do, that we may see and believe in you? What can you do?

Jesus isn’t excited about being used: Amen, amen, I say to you, you are looking for me not because you saw signs but because you ate the loaves and were filled. Do not work for food that perishes but for the food that endures for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you.

Do you Want Fries with That? Changing your Mind on What to Order
Jesus knows that there’s nothing earthly He can give them that will satisfy their hearts: everything will pass away. Jesus warns them: Do no work for the food that perishes. St. Paul says something similar in his Epistle to the Ephesians: you must no longer live as the Gentiles do…put away the old self of your former way of life, corrupted through deceitful desires…and put on the new self.

What do you WANT? – The Food that Satisfies
In response to, what can you do, Jesus tells them about the bread that comes down from heaven and they are HUNGRY for it: Sir, give us this bread always. We’ve never heard of this! Please, keep giving us this bread: they still don’t get it because if they did they would know that they wouldn’t need it all the time. Jesus explains it to them: I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me will never hunger, and whoever believes in me will never thirst.

Stop living like the Gentiles do…in the futility of their minds. There’s a new way: Jesus wants to satisfy our true hunger, but in order to do that we need to stop filling ourselves with the old bread: the stuff that doesn’t really satisfy anyway.

Clean the Cupboards for the Feast
What “bread” or “food” is in your house that you “eat” that you try to use to satisfy the hunger that only God can satisfy? You have to let it go in order to really feel that hunger that only Jesus can satisfy. It’s like when you’re really full from eating: even the best food doesn’t look very good. Once we clean those cupboards we can finally start to feed the deep hunger in our hearts for communion with Jesus: body, blood, soul and divinity in the Holy Eucharist! Yes, Lord, give us THIS bread, always!