To the Lord Betake You

Eighteenth Sunday of the Year A

Isaiah 55:1-3
Psalm 144: 8-9, 15-16, 17-18
Romans 8: 35, 37-39
Matthew 14: 13-21

Yearning for God

Have you ever felt the discomfort of an inner emptiness? Have you experienced a hunger gnawing at the very fibers of your soul, or suffered the stirrings of a desire that nothing earthly seems able to satisfy? If you have experienced these things, you are blessed indeed. "Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for holiness, for they shall be satisfied" (Mt 5:6). Hunger for holiness is hunger for God himself. Hunger for union with God is what makes us uniquely human. The fulfillment of that hunger makes us divine.

Three Ways of Coping

Deep within each of us is an emptiness that God alone can fill. As long as this capacity for God remains empty, we experience it as a kind of throbbing pain, a hunger that nothing earthly can satisfy. People cope with this inward hunger in one of three ways. The first way is denial; the second, substitution; the third is the way of the saints: flight toward God. Isaiah says, "To the Lord betake you, while He may yet be found" (Is 55:6).

Not Enough

Those who belong to the first category deny that they have a spiritual component. They would limit their human reality to the satisfaction of their animal and rational needs. Comfort and reason circumscribe their notion of happiness. Such persons take pains to stifle any spiritual stirring within. They attempt to live as if a home, a family, food on the table, good health and the means to live comfortably are enough to be happy.

It is possible to have all of the above and yet be profoundly unhappy and incomplete. The visibility of the Church makes such people uncomfortable precisely because it suggests that there is more to human life than what is visible between the womb and the tomb. People who deny their spiritual hunger are never really happy. They are often stalked by depression and various other psychological and emotional ailments. Such complaints can be the soul's way of crying out for attention, of saying, "Feed me, feed me with God." When an individual risks opening his emptiness to God, he begins to experience a wholeness and a happiness that surpasses all that he could have imagined or dreamed.

Spiritual But Not Religious

Those who belong to the second category recognize the inner spiritual hunger but want to fill it on their own terms rather than on God's. One often hears them quote such timeworn old chestnuts as, "I am a religious person, but I do not go to church," or "I am in favor of spirituality, but reject religion." Such people are an easy prey for cults and false spiritual teaching. They dismiss the piety of their immigrant grandparents as superstitious, yet buy into the deceptions of the present age. They read all sorts of books on the way to successful living, on meditation, self-healing, dream interpretation, inner peace and personal fulfillment. In spite of all this, they remain hungry for something more. Their nibbling at the trendy "spiritualities" of contemporary culture leaves them empty and unsatisfied. This is the soul's way of crying out for God, of seeking the nourishment given by the hand of the Lord and by no other.

Hunger for Holiness

Those who belong to the third category, having heard the Gospel, put their faith in Our Lord Jesus Christ. True believers hear the word of the Lord in Isaiah's prophecy and take it to heart: "What, always spending, and no bread to eat, always toiling, and nevera full belly? Do but listen, here you shall find content; here are dainties shall ravish your hearts. To my summons give heed and hearing; so your spirits shall revive" (Is 55:2-3). Holiness begins when one recognizes the hunger within as the soul's cry Godward. Such a hunger can be satisfied only on God's terms.

Eucharistic Fulfillment

God has revealed himself in Jesus Christ. The Eucharistic Heart of Jesus is the wellspring of the love for which we all hunger. The emptiness within is a yearning for a love stronger than death, an unconditional love, a faithful and all-powerful love, a merciful love that cannot fail, nor disappoint, nor deceive. In the Most Holy Eucharist that everlasting love is communicated to us. In every Holy Mass, the Father opens His hand to fill with His blessing all that lives (cf. Ps 144:16).

Mother Church

Our Lord nourishes us and cares for all our needs through his Bride, the Church. Mother Church feeds us with the pure spiritual milk of Gods living Word. She is the servant of the Divine Hospitality, setting before us the adorable Body and Precious Blood of Christ offered in the Holy Sacrifice. Each day she prepares a table laden with the choicest food and drink; it is ours "without money and without price" (Is 55:1).

Only in the Holy Catholic Church are all the spiritual needs of the human person correctly diagnosed and adequately addressed. A man is fully alive only when his spiritual hungers are recognized, and when his inward emptiness is filled by God in Christ, acting through His Church, and in her sacraments.

Converted by the Eucharist

Years ago, while at the Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C., I met a young Presbyterian graduate student. She attended services in her church in Georgetown each Sunday and taught Sunday School there. On weekdays, however, she would slip into the local Catholic Church and attend daily Mass. She was drawn closer and closer to the altar, attracted to the Blessed Sacrament as to a magnet. I had the joy of receiving her into full communion with the Catholic Church.

The Tragedy of Fallen-Away Catholics

In the light of such conversions, it is tragic to see so-called "cradle Catholics" suffering the torments of a hunger that the Most Holy Eucharist can fully satisfy. It is even more tragic to see fallen-away Catholics who have so anesthetized their souls as to no longer feel the hunger pangs that are God's way of letting them know how much they need Him. Once baptized into the Catholic Church one cannot really leave her; one can only disobey her. Those who leave the Catholic Church will suffer from a gnawing deprivation of the true Body and Blood of Christ. The taste of eternity is something the soul cannot forget.

And Monasteries?

What would be the role of a monastery in relation to all of this? A monastery is made up of those who, having left all things, set their hearts on the One Thing Necessary. The essential witness of a monastery is a witness to the Most Holy Eucharist. Today's Alleluia Verse says as much: "Man cannot live by bread only; there is life for him in all the words that proceed from the mouth of God" (Mt 4:4b). A monastery draws life from every word of Christ but, most of all, from the words he pronounced at the Mystical Supper in the Upper Room: "This is my Body which is given for you. . . . This is the chalice of my Blood. . . . Do this in memory of me."

The Instrumentum Laboris that was prepared in view of the Synod on the Eucharist challenged monasteries to be models of Eucharistic faith and practice:

Because of the change of the bread and wine into the Body and Blood of Christ, the Church always approaches this mystery--the essence of the Liturgy--with fear and trembling, and likewise, with great trust. Reverence towards the mystery of the Eucharist and awareness of its sublime character are much needed today. . . . Much will depend, however, on having places which can serve as models, places where the Eucharist is truly believed and properly celebrated, places where people can personally experience what the Sacrament is--the only authentic response to a person's every need in the search for life's meaning.

There you have the particular vocation of a monastery -- or of a Eucharistic Cenacle.

Approach With the Fear of God

Today, Our Divine Lord looks into our hearts. He sees some who are in denial of their spiritual hunger; He sees other who would attempt to still its pangs with various substitutes; and He sees still others who believe, who recognize their inner emptiness for what it is -- a sign that the human heart was created by God for God, and that God alone can fill what he has created for Himself. Be fed by the hand of the Lord in the Holy and Life-giving Mysteries of the Altar! Approach with the fear of God and with faith to receive the Sacred Body of the Lord and to drink of the Chalice of his Precious Blood. According to the word of today's Gospel: "All ate and had enough" (Mt 14:20).