Homily for the Twentieth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year B

The Real Presence: Where The Rubber Meets The Road

Rev. Marcel Divine Emeka Okwara, CSsR

Homily for the Twenty-First Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year B

Church of St. Bridget of Minneapolis, MN

Sunday, August 25, 2024

Today we come to the end of the extraordinary sixth Chapter of John’s Gospel. For five straight weeks, we have been reading and reflecting on the Eucharistic discourse of John. In last week’s Gospel, Jesus told his listeners, “Amen, amen, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life within you” (John 6:53). This sets the stage for what we see in today’s Gospel, which is, by the way, the final act, the culmination and the climax of the entire discourse. Today we hear, “many of his disciples who were listening said, “This is a hard saying; who can accept it?” (John 6:60). Notice who is speaking. They are not a neutral audience; they are not enemies of Jesus. These are his disciples, people who are following him about and listening to him. Yet, they found his speech extremely shocking and too hard to accept. Knowing their utter consternation, Jesus does not say, “Hey, I am only speaking symbolically.” Instead he says, “Does this shock you?” (John 6:61). If I were there, my response would be a loud YES! When Protestant Christians read John chapter 6, they understand it in a more or less symbolic way. But the question they have refused to attend to is this: if Jesus were speaking merely in a symbolic way and the people knew it to be so, why would they be so shocked and threatened to leave? And we have instances where Jesus speaks symbolically. When he refers to himself as the true vine, as a good shepherd, as the door and even compares himself to a mother hen, no one fumed because it was clear he was speaking in a metaphorical way. But in the Bread of Life of Discourse they knew he was speaking in a shockingly realistic way. That was why they were murmuring, quarreling and threatening to leave. 

Once again, Jesus has the opportunity to clarify his language, to tell his disciples that he was speaking metaphorically, instead he says, “There are some of you who do not believe” (John 6:64). He is not trying to make it easy for them; he is recognizing the fact that there are some of them who do not believe. This is where the rubber meets the road. This is the standing or falling moment. This is where we have to make up our minds. Do you accept this teaching of Jesus or not? From the very beginning the Catholic Church has always insisted upon the Real Presence of Jesus in the Eucharist. We didn’t invent it. It is not a product of the medieval era. Rather, it goes all the way back to this sixth chapter of John. Now, as if to rob be all in, Jesus says, “What if you were to see the Son of Man ascending to where he was before? It is the Spirit that gives life, while the flesh is of no avail” (John 6:62-63). Jesus is human and also divine. While his humanity comes from the earth, his divinity comes from the higher realm. Jesus is God. And what God says is. God’s speech is not descriptive like ours, his speech is rather creative. God makes things through his intelligible speech. From the Book of Genesis we hear, “God says, ‘Let there be light and there was light.” “Let the dry land appear” and so it happens. When God speaks, things happen. Speaking through prophet Isaiah God says, “Just as the rain and the snow come down from heaven and do not return without watering the earth, so my word does not go forth from me in vain but rather accomplishes what it set out to do” (Isaiah 55:10-11). Jesus is not one prophet among the many, but the very incarnation of Yahweh. John says, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word became flesh in Jesus” (John 1:1). That’s why what Jesus says is. To the paralyzed man Jesus says, “My son, your sins are forgiven” (Mark 2:5). When he said that, the scribes correctly questioned, “Why does this man speak that way…Who but God alone can forgive sins?” But what Jesus says is. To the little girl of 12, Jesus says, “Talitha Koum” which means “Little girl, get up” (Mark 5:41). And she got up! To the dead brother of Mary and Martha Jesus says, “Lazarus come out” (John 11:43), and he came forth because what God says is. Then the night before he died, Jesus took the Passover bread and said, “This is my Body.” After that he takes the Passover cup and says, “This is the chalice of my Blood.” You can say those words and mean them in a metaphorical way. But when Jesus says them what he says is. Why? Because he came from heaven; he is not one figure among the many, but God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God. People who first heard him understood what was at stake too, and that was why they kicked and balked at what Jesus was saying. 

Having taken in all he said, we hear one of the saddest lines in the New Testament: “As a result of this, many of his disciples returned to their former way of life and no longer accompanied him” (John 6:66). Jesus’ enemies opposed him in every direction, but these people who left him in great numbers and never followed him again are his followers, his disciples. They just couldn’t accept this particular teaching. Then in one of the most dramatic and frightening moments in the New Testament, Jesus turns to his inner circle, the Twelve Apostles and says to them, “Do you also want to leave?” (John 6:67). Then Peter, the impetuous one speaks as he often does for the Twelve, “Master, to whom shall we go? You have the words of everlasting life” (John 6:68). Peter is saying something we should all pay attention to: “You have the words of everlasting life,” It is by those words, those eternal words that the Eucharistic change is effected. In Caesarea Philippi, Peter confessed the messiahship of Jesus, he confessed the divinity of Jesus. Now, he is confessing Jesus’ power to effect the Eucharistic change. Praise the good Lord that the Twelve did not leave. If they had left, the whole project of salvation could have collapsed. In 2007 when I was preparing for my priestly ordination, I started to think of words in the Bible that best describe my journey, and I would use those words for my ordination postcard. Among the many words in the Bible that appeal to me, it came down to these two: My zeal to your house O God burns in me like a fire,” (John 2:17) therefore, “Lord, to whom shall we go to since you have the words of eternal life” (John 6:68). By using the words of Peter, I state that I am in complete agreement with Peter. Wholeheartedly I believe that Jesus’ words are the words of eternal life, and it is those his eternal words that change bread and wine into his Body and Blood. So, are you with the Eucharistic Jesus or not? Do you accept this teaching or not? If Jesus asks you the question: “Do you also want to leave?” I hope your answer will be the same as Peter’s: “Lord to whom shall we go?”

God bless you!