“He said to them, “Give them some food yourselves.” They replied, “Five loaves and two fish are all we have, unless we ourselves go and buy food for all these people.” (Luke 9:13)
Saint Ambrose of Milan offers the following insight on these verses from today’s Gospel Reading (Proper):
“For we read that first five thousand are fed with five loaves, then four thousand with seven loaves. So let us seek the mystery which the miracle represents. Those five thousand, like the body’s five senses, seem to have received from Christ food similar to physical food. But the four thousand are still in the body and in the world that is known to be of four elements. Seven baskets of fragments remained from the four thousand. This bread of sabbaths is no ordinary bread. It is sanctified bread. It is a bread of rest. Perhaps, if you will first eat the five loaves with the senses, I shall dare also to say you will not eat bread on earth on the third day, after eating the five loaves and the seven. You will eat eight loaves above the earth, like those who are in the heavens. As the seven loaves are loaves of rest, so the eight loaves are the loaves of the resurrection. Therefore those who are fed on the seven loaves will persevere to the third day and, perhaps, attain the whole faith and steadfastness of the future resurrection. Then there is the voice of the saints: “We will go a three days’ journey, that we may feast with the Lord our God.”” (Exposition of the Gospel of Luke, 6)
Collect
God of love,
You called Saint Katharine Drexel
to teach the message of the Gospel
and to bring the life of the Eucharist
to the Native American and
African American peoples;
by her prayers and example,
enable us to work for justice
among the poor and the oppressed,
and keep us undivided in love
in the eucharistic community of Your Church.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, Your Son
Who lives and reigns with You
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
God, for ever and ever. Amen.
You called Saint Katharine Drexel
to teach the message of the Gospel
and to bring the life of the Eucharist
to the Native American and
African American peoples;
by her prayers and example,
enable us to work for justice
among the poor and the oppressed,
and keep us undivided in love
in the eucharistic community of Your Church.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, Your Son
Who lives and reigns with You
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
God, for ever and ever. Amen.
Glory to the Father
and to the Son
and to the Holy Spirit:
as it was in the beginning,
is now, and will be forever. Amen
