Patrick Comerford
Easter is a 50-day season that continues until the Day of Pentecost, and this week began with the Third Sunday of Easter (Easter III, 4 May 2025).
Before today begins, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks, to reflect, to pray and to read in these ways:
1, reading today’s Gospel reading;
2, a short reflection;
3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;
4, the Collects and Post-Communion prayer of the day.
John 6: 30-35 (NRSVA):
30 So they said to him, ‘What sign are you going to give us then, so that we may see it and believe you? What work are you performing? 31 Our ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness; as it is written, “He gave them bread from heaven to eat.”’ 32 Then Jesus said to them, ‘Very truly, I tell you, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, but it is my Father who gives you the true bread from heaven. 33 For the bread of God is that which comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.’ 34 They said to him, ‘Sir, give us this bread always.’
35 Jesus said to them, ‘I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.’
Today’s Reflection:
We have read in recent days about Jesus feeding of the 5,000 and walking on the water, and we are now introduced to reading the long Bread of Life discourse (verses 22-59), spoken in the synagogue in Capernaum (John 6: 59).
The day following the feeding of the 5,000, the people go in search of Jesus, but when they go to the site of the feeding, they find he is not there either. Eventually they find Jesus and his disciples near Capernaum, Jesus’ principal base in Galilee. They ask him: ‘Rabbi, when did you come here?’ (verse 25).
Some years ago (2010), I took part in the popular television series, Who Do You Think You Are? I did some of the research on Dervla Kirwan, famous for her roles from Ballykissangel to Smother. The show is still popular, and I still get messages from America and England from friends and family who have just seen repeats.
But that question, ‘Who Do You Think You Are?’, goes much deeper than the details that programme unearths about Victorian great-grandparents.
‘Who are you?’
When most of us are asked this question in normal chit-chat, we probably first answer by our name, the name we like to be known by.
Given a second chance, even when we ask ourselves that question, we usually reply in ways that show our most important, our deepest, relationships: Mother/Daughter, Father/Son, Wife/Husband, Sister/Brother, Uncle/Aunt, Niece/Nephew, Grandparent/Grandchild …
Relationships define us, relationships shape us, relationships place us in family and society … and relationships can sometimes even destroy us, yet they still continue to define us.
That is how we see ourselves, usually, when we are asked casually, ‘Who are you?’ But there is also a third way of asking and answering that question.
In my previous roles, in media and academic life, I noticed quite often when people asked one another these questions, and exchanged cards, they spent little time looking at each other’s names on the cards, and more time figuring out their roles.
The questions that are being really asked at these receptions and conferences are not ‘Are you Patrick?’ or ‘Are you a parent/partner?’ The questions being asked, deep down, are ‘What do you do?’ and ‘Are you useful in my network?’ Can you get me more business, more sales, more votes, more media attention?
And then, there is another, perhaps fourth question, when it comes to identity: ‘Where are you from?’
‘Where am I from?’ The answer connects me with so many shared connections, friends, family members, schoolfriends, memories … why, we might even find we are related!
These are the sort of questions the crowd are asking Jesus in our Gospel readings yesterday and today:
Where are you from? (verse 24)
When did you come here? (verse 25)
What do you work at? (verse 30)
What can you do for me? (verse 30)
Why, like scriptwriters for that television series, they even recall their ancestors and what they did in the past (verse 31).
But, like those people exchanging business cards at a reception, there are few questions about relationship or relationships. They try to define him (‘rabbi’, verse 25), so they can box him in.
Instead, Jesus tries to answer them in term of relationships.
Set aside all those wonders and miracles, he tells them (verse 26). Stop playing the status-seeking game (verse 29). What is more important than all these is what is in your heart (verse 29).
He insists on speaking of himself in relationship to God the Father, who has sent him.
And then Jesus uses the first of his seven ‘I AM’ sayings in Saint John’s Gospel, ‘I am the bread of life’ (John 6: 35).
These seven ‘I AM’ sayings are traditionally listed as:
1, I am the Bread of Life (John 6: 35, 48)
2, I am the Light of the World (John 8: 12)
3, I am the gate (or the door) (John 10: 7)
4, I am the Good Shepherd (John 10: 11 and 14)
5, I am the Resurrection and the Life (John 11: 25)
6, I am the way, the truth and the life (John 14: 6)
7, I am the true vine (John 15: 1, 5)
These ‘I AM’ sayings echo the divine name revealed to Moses on Mount Sinai, ‘I AM’ (Exodus 3: 14).
If I am made in the image and likeness of God, how could I possibly say who I am in the ways Jesus says who he is?
Bread: when did I last help to feed the hungry … those who are physically and spiritually hungry?
The Light of the World … when did I last speak out against prejudice, bigotry, hatred and scaremongering, and shine a light into these dark shadows of the world?
The gate or the door … am I welcoming, hospitable, open, an advocate of pluralism, diversity and tolerance in our society?
The Good Shepherd … do I look after people, care for them, especially those people no-one else seems to think is worth bothering about?
I could go down through all seven ‘I AM’ sayings and find they are a very good checklist not just for me as a priest but for any Christian, indeed for any person.
Christ is the bread of life and the light of the world. We must also offer that light and life that Christ offers us to the world.
Would it make any difference if the Church not only preached what it believes, but worked actively to see these beliefs put into practice?
Our response to the love we receive from God – a risky outpouring that is beyond all human understanding of generosity – can only be to love. That call to love is not just to love those who are easy to love. It is a call to love those who are difficult to love too, to love all in the world … and to love beyond words. And that should be a good enough definition of who I am.
Christ is risen!
The Lord is risen indeed. Alleluia!
Today’s Prayers (Tuesday 6 May 2025):
‘Inconvenient Migration’ provides the theme this week in ‘Pray With the World Church’, the Prayer Diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel). This theme was introduced on Sunday with Reflections from Carol Miller, Church Engagement Manager, USPG.
The USPG Prayer Diary today (Tuesday 6 May 2025) invites us to pray:
God of compassion, we pray for people who support refugees along the way. May you strengthen and provide resource.
The Collect:
Almighty Father,
who in your great mercy gladdened the disciples
with the sight of the risen Lord:
give us such knowledge of his presence with us,
that we may be strengthened and sustained by his risen life
and serve you continually in righteousness and truth;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
The Post-Communion Prayer:
Living God,
your Son made himself known to his disciples
in the breaking of bread:
open the eyes of our faith,
that we may see him in all his redeeming work;
who is alive and reigns, now and for ever.
Additional Collect:
Risen Christ,
you filled your disciples with boldness and fresh hope:
strengthen us to proclaim your risen life
and fill us with your peace,
to the glory of God the Father.
Yesterday’s Reflections
Continued Tomorrow
Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org
