Today, the Gospel is the aftermath of the encounter of the two disciples on the Road to Emmaus where they, while at table, recognised Jesus at the Breaking of Bread. In these post-Resurrection experiences, they are often startled or terrified by His appearances or just plainly dumb-struck which questions what they really know of Jesus and the Resurrection.
In each and every encounter, He had to assure them that He was not a ghost but that He has come back to life and is therefore the very fulfilment of all the hopes that they had inherited from their ancestors. All those who came before them had been looking for the Messiah and Jesus was the answer to that search.
Two questions for reflection on these encounters. Firstly, what does it take for us to recognise Him? Secondly, what happens after we have recognised Him?
Food was essential or central to the interactions of Jesus with the people. He was often described as having meals with people. While He was labelled a glutton by the Pharisees, the truth is He has always shown concern for those who lack the necessities that bring joy to communal gatherings. In John’s Gospel, at the behest of His Mother, He changed water into wine to save the marrying couple of embarrassment. And on the mountain, by multiplying the loaves and fish, He made sure that the hungry crowd did not go empty stomach.
But food and drink were never for themselves. They were provided in order to enrich relationships. The context that food is primarily relational can been seen in St Paul’s Letter to the Corinthians. The early Christians were gathered around the Eucharist. And as such, there was food prior to Holy Communion. The scandal arose because the wealthy ate whilst the poor went hungry. The critique was not against consuming food. The issue was not that the rich ate but that they ate while neglecting the poor.
The providence of food and drink is in the context of the Eucharist as we see in John 6. Jesus had fed the hungry but they were still looking for more to satisfy their physical hunger. More than material satisfaction, Jesus proposed a food and a drink that would fulfil all their spiritual hunger and thirst.
Today the story continues from the encounter of the two disciples on the road to Emmaus. These two had RECOGNISED Him at the breaking of bread. The action where Bread is broken is the other name for Holy Communion, the Blessed Sacrament and the Eucharist.
The Eucharist is the primary place to recognise Jesus. Even though the rite or the manner of celebrating Mass, as we know it today, is not recorded in detail in any of the Gospels, the outline of the Eucharist was already captured by Luke’s narrative of the Road to Emmaus. The second part of the Mass which the Church terms as the Liturgy of the Eucharist is enumerated by the four actions of Jesus as He sat down with these two Disciples after their walk where He took bread, blessed it, broke it and gave it to them.
We hear this “retelling or recounting” from the Last Supper in a lyrical manner. “On the night He was betrayed, He took bread, said the blessing, broke it and gave it to His disciples saying”, is a formula which directs our attention to the Offertory (took), the Eucharistic Prayer (blessed), the Fractio Panis (broke), and the distribution of Holy Communion (gave).
Interestingly, notice the attention paid to the “taking, blessing and giving”. Frequently enough, the action of “breaking” is missed out, either because the priest does it rather nonchalantly or the congregation is too engrossed with exchanging peace with everyone to miss out a key component of RECOGNISING the Lord.
They recognised Him at the BREAKING of Bread. As the Host was broken, they remarked, “Did not our hearts burn within us as He had talked to us on the road and explained the scriptures to us?”.
This is where we join the two disciples whom, “as they recognised Him, He had vanished from their sight”. Immediately, they set off returning to Jerusalem so that they could tell the story of their encounter with Jesus on the road.
This is what should happen after we have recognised Him. The message of Easter is always about one running to another. The ladies at the tomb, upon knowing that Christ had risen, ran to tell the Apostles about His Resurrection.
The Eucharist of the Resurrection is never meant for “private” consumption. It has tremendous benefits for the soul, for the person who receives it. He is the answer to our spiritual hunger but it is never meant to stop at the personal. It has always been an interpersonal reality. When we have seen the Lord, our hearts must tell of His wonders.
This is the good news of the Resurrection. When the Jesus whom we have recognised is not made known, then it begs the question of whom we have really come to recognise. To eat Jesus is always to proclaim Him in and through our lives and if we keep quiet, the rocks will cry out. Our Cathedrals, Churches and Chapels, old and new, are rocks shouting out the Gospel of the Resurrection. Better not let these stones shame us.
