Opening the Scripture and Breaking the Bread

Dear Friend,

When it comes to choosing the Eucharistic prayer for our Sunday liturgy, you may have noticed that I often find myself drawn to the one that begins like this:

You are indeed Holy and to be glorified, O God, who love the human race

and who always walk with us on the journey of life.

Blessed indeed is your Son, present in our midst when we are gathered by his love

and when, as once for the disciples, so now for us,

He opens the Scriptures and breaks the bread. 

The prayer continues and the priest extends his hands over the bread and wine, invoking the Holy Spirit.  

In my reflection this morning it occurred to me that in this Sunday’s Gospel we find Jesus himself dramatizing these words at the sabbath meal to which he has been invited. For Jesus the table gathering is always the privileged place of encounter, that sacred meeting of minds and hearts which is the seedbed of spiritual (not just physical) transformation. Our Sunday liturgy sacramentalizes our own sabbath gathering.  

As Jesus breaks bread in Luke’s Gospel, his dinner conversation gently challenges his host and fellow guests. Without directly mentioning the Law, the Prophets, and the Writings of the Hebrew texts, he opens those scriptures (well known to the Pharisees) in order to reexamine the meaning of “honor” and “righteousness” in the present moment. His words have become our own scripture, and they raise questions for us too. How do we arrange ourselves at Sunday Mass? Whom do we invite into our homes and into our sacred home here at the Mission? Deepening our understanding and love of the Eucharist means observing carefully, like those Gospel guests, just how Jesus himself “opens the Scripture and breaks the bread.”

Gratefully,

Fr. Dan ofm, Pastor