We spend so much of our lives looking for things; things that will satisfy our curiosity, our longing, our incompleteness. We look for things because we have an insatiable craving to know and to become more than what we are or have now. And we will not stop this search until we are satisfied.
In my short time as a priest, I have been privileged to share with people some of their deepest spiritual experiences. From praying the Mass with them, to hearing their confessions, to giving them the Anointing of the sick, to presiding at their funerals.
These things – this sacramental life that I am honored to live – has allowed me to see the craving of the human soul for experiences beyond who we are. And it has made me realize how blessed we are, as a Church, to have the gifts of God’s Grace in such tangible ways as the Sacraments. It also makes me realize how lonely our lives can be, even when we may have these gifts available to us.
This reminds me of a book I’ve been reading lately. It is entitled “The Restless Heart: Finding Our Spiritual Home in Times of Loneliness” by Ronald Rolheiser. In the book, Rolheiser discusses the natural inclination to loneliness for human beings. In fact, at the very beginning of the book, he goes so far as to say that “to be human is to be lonely.”[1]
We are, by our natures not only inclined to seek more, but indeed designed to be more than who we are. And we are never satisfied with even the most generous, or extravagant, or fulfilling thing we happen to come across.
To make things more complicate, though, we have a tendency to hold on to the things that only partially satisfy us, fearful of losing the little bit of respite they provide. We baulk at St. Paul’s words today to “put away the old self of [our] former way of life, corrupted through deceitful desires” (see Eph. 4) – desires that promise to satisfy this longing in our hearts when, in reality, they were only made to point to what can truly satisfy.
We are afraid to let go of the “devils we know” because when we are presented with a “renewal of the spirit” through the gift of Grace, we initially only recognize it as “the devil we don’t know” – a variable “mana” – a “what is it” (see first reading). We come to see our slavery to this world and its sinful trappings in the way that the Israelites saw Egypt in our first reading when they told Moses: “Would that we had died at the LORD’s hand in the land of Egypt, as we sat by our fleshpots and ate our fill of bread!”
We do not see that the “fleshpots” of this limited existence have no correlation to the gifts our Lord wishes to bestow upon us. There is no comparing God’s infinite grace to the finite realities this world has to offer.
We seek for “full disclosure” – wishing to have control over the situation at least to that degree. And for many of us, the signs and miracles we witness in the Sacraments are not enough precisely because they do not “lift the veil” of our human senses. They’re not meant to – they are meant to unite us to the reality of God, not simply unveil Him to us – but that is small consolation in a world of instant gratification, unfettered desire, and broken promises.
Going back to Rolheiser’s book, he talks about a foreign film he once saw entitled “Face to Face.” At one point in the movie, one of the characters reflects upon this state in which we all find ourselves. He says:
“Just once I would like to cut through all the veils and barriers, mirrors and fantasies, shadows and unrealities which separate us from each other and feel something as real as I am. Just once I would like to see face to face. Then life would be meaningful.”[2]
My brothers and sisters, this unmistakable desire for meaning that each of us crave at our core – the truth that we are meant for more; that we are made for a reality we cannot comprehend – leaves us yearning for a type of nourishment of the soul that endures.
Yet, as we reflect on the Gospel for today, we can see that we must use the experiences provided for us by our Lord to search beyond those same experiences. We cannot be content to follow the example of those who followed after Jesus searching for infinite meaning in the finite. They had heard of this man who did signs and miracles, and so they wanted to have him perform these same signs for them. Finite, limited signs that only spoke of the temporary relief from the pain of loneliness. They wanted to have the “food that endures for eternal life”; they wanted to have the ability to “accomplish the works of God”; they wanted to “see and believe” the transformation in their lives – But they wanted these things on their own terms – terms that, if they were honest with themselves, they knew had not power to satisfy.
That was the problem – for them and for us. How often do we think that it is up to us to accomplish God’s works? How often do we place our confidence, or lack of it, upon our abilities, our personal “food that perishes?” We make God’s ability to work signs and wonders in our lives contingent upon our personal “Moses’” of human weakness rather than upon the divine strength of our personal Christ.
When will we learn to ask for the reality of Christ’s eternal banquet instead of content ourselves with the moldy and insufficient imitations we try to muster? Until then, our loneliness – our pining for the infinite – will never be satisfied.
We come looking for something because our desire to be filled is real and true. Let us allow Christ to answer our questions, to satisfy our longings, and to complete what is still under construction in our souls. Let us cry out at the top of our lungs: “Sir, give us this bread – Your bread: You. And give it to us always!!!” Then, and only then, will our searching be over. Then will we have broken through “the mirrors and riddles, the shadows and fantasies, the facades and unrealities that separate us from each other and from [our] God.”(See Rolheiser, pg. 108) Then we will be dining on the true Bread from Heaven – Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen.
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