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Our Daily, Everlasting Bread
Carl E. Olson
Have you ever heard of the TANSTAAFL Principle? It’s
better known as the "There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch" principle. Its
central premise is that everything worthwhile has a cost. There is a price for
everything; there are no free meals or free rides.
One of the great paradoxes of the Christian faith is that God’s grace is a free
gift, but accepting it costs us everything. We cannot earn God’s love, but that
love most certainly comes with a price. "For you have been bought with a price,"
Paul wrote to the Corinthians, "therefore glorify God in your body." This
important truth is at the heart of Lent, a time of counting the cost and
glorifying God through our actions. We should be counting the cost of
discipleship, of taking up the cross of Christ, and of dying to ourselves. We
should be glorifying God by praying, fasting, and turning away from sin.
Looking at these actions through the lens of fourth petition of the Our
Father–"Give us this day our daily bread"–brings a deeper appreciation of the
costs and benefits of being a Christian. We can also see how the practical
concerns and challenges of this earthly life relate to the matters of eternal
life.
For the Christian, the earthly and heavenly are distinct, but intimately
related. This is the clear message of the Incarnation, from which the sacraments
flow. God did not become man to merely save our souls, but also our bodies. Our
citizenship is in heaven, but we are not angels or ghosts. We are an astounding,
mysterious combination of both flesh and spirit.
Therefore, on the physical level the request in the Our Father for daily bread
is very concrete, even practical. We need to eat in order to live. As children
of our heavenly Father, we trust in Him for the basic necessities of life: food,
clothing, and shelter. Our fasting and giving during Lent remind us that these
essentials should never be taken for granted and that there are many who do not
possess them.
The petition for daily bread is our prayer that all men and women will have
meals to eat, clothing to wear, and homes to live in. Every moment of every day
is a gift from God–taking this for granted eventually leads to ingratitude,
which can lead to callousness and arrogance.
But just as Lent points us to our eternal destination through temporal, material
means, the Lord’s Prayer also points us towards heavenly glory by way of earthly
paths. The entire prayer is eschatological in nature–that is, it directs towards
The End (the eschaton) and teaches us to think and pray as pilgrims on earth
travelling towards heaven. And so our daily bread is not just ordinary food, but
the Bread of Life and the food of immortality: the Eucharist.
The Greek word, epiousios, used for "daily" in the petition "give us this
day our daily bread" has puzzled and fascinated scholars for centuries. It is a
rare word that possesses several levels of meaning. On one hand it refers to the
here and "now"–today’s bread. It can also refer to the "bread needed to live."
And it also can mean "bread for the coming day," a reference to a future
heavenly life.
The petition is a recognition that God provides food for our bodies and our
spirits, that He meets us where we are at and provides the grace and sustenance
to get where He wants to us go. " He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood has
eternal life," Jesus declared, "and I will raise him up on the last day."
The destination on that last day is His Kingdom, which is why the great Eastern
Orthodox theologian Alexander Schmemann has described the Eucharist as "the
sacrament of the kingdom of God." The sacraments, Schemann explains, are
eschatological in nature for they are "oriented toward the kingdom which is to
come." They provide grace–the very life of God–without which we cannot have
communion with Him, or enter into the Beatific Vision. It’s heady stuff, but the
basic principle is simple: God provides us with the food for the journey. And
while that food is a free gift, it does have a cost.
Part of the cost is the "eschatological tension" that we examined in earlier
reflections. This tension is the result of our unique physical-spiritual
make-up. We are on earth, but meant for heaven. We are spiritual and material.
We are sinful and saved. We are dying but filled with new life.
Thankfully, the Son became man so that this tension could be addressed and
resolved. Because the Son became man, men are now able to be sons of God.
Because the divine became flesh, we who are flesh can now, Peter states, become
"partakers of the divine nature."
The primary means by which we are prepared for heaven and the fullness of the
Kingdom is the Eucharist. This can be seen in the various ways the Eucharist is
described. The Catechism of the Catholic Church describes it as the
"pledge of glory" (CCC 1419) and "an anticipation of the heavenly glory" (CCC
1402). It is a true banquet; the Fathers of the Second Vatican Council taught
that the Eucharist is "a meal of brotherly solidarity and a foretaste of the
heavenly banquet" (Gaudium et Spes, 38).
In his encyclical, "On the Eucharist in Its Relationship To the Church," Pope
John Paul II provides this beautiful picture: "The Eucharist is truly a glimpse
of heaven appearing on earth. It is a glorious ray of the heavenly Jerusalem
which pierces the clouds of our history and lights up our journey."
Lent is a mini-version of that lifelong journey. It aids us in comprehending the
bigger picture by helping us get a grip on the pieces that make up that picture.
These pieces include growth in patience, holiness, love, and self-control and
the removal of selfishness, anger, lust, and bitterness. The daily bread of the
Eucharist gives us the nourishment for growth and the strength to reject sin. It
isn’t a free meal, but it is a meal of freedom. "There is no surer pledge or
dearer sign of this great hope in the new heavens and new earth ‘in which
righteousness dwells,’ than the Eucharist," declares the Catechism. "
Every time this mystery is celebrated, ‘the work of our redemption is carried
on’ and we ‘break the one bread that provides the medicine of immortality, the
antidote for death, and the food that makes us live for ever in Jesus Christ’"
(CCC 1405).
(This article was originally published in the
March 21, 2004 edition of
Our Sunday
Visitor newspaper.)
Carl E. Olson is the editor of
IgnatiusInsight.com.
He is the co-author of
The Da Vinci Hoax: Exposing the Errors in The Da Vinci
Code and author of
Will Catholics Be "Left Behind"?
He resides in a top secret location in the Northwest somewhere between Portland,
Oregon and Sacramento, California. Visit his personal web site at
www.carl-olson.com .