Today's Readings
First Reading
Isaiah 55:1–3
Ho, everyone who thirsts,
come to the waters;
and you that have no money,
come, buy and eat!
Come, buy wine and milk
without money and without price. Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread,
and your labor for that which does not satisfy?
Listen carefully to me, and eat what is good,
and delight yourselves in rich food. Incline your ear, and come to me;
listen, so that you may live.
I will make with you an everlasting covenant,
my steadfast, sure love for David.
Responsorial Psalm
Psalm 145:8–9; 15–16; 17–18
The Lord is gracious and merciful,
slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. The Lord is good to all,
and his compassion is over all that he has made. The eyes of all look to you,
and you give them their food in due season. You open your hand,
satisfying the desire of every living thing. The Lord is just in all his ways,
and kind in all his doings. The Lord is near to all who call on him,
to all who call on him in truth.
Second Reading
Romans 8:35; 37–39
Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will hardship, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Gospel
Matt 14:13–21
Now when Jesus heard this, he withdrew from there in a boat to a deserted place by himself. But when the crowds heard it, they followed him on foot from the towns. When he went ashore, he saw a great crowd; and he had compassion for them and cured their sick. When it was evening, the disciples came to him and said, “This is a deserted place, and the hour is now late; send the crowds away so that they may go into the villages and buy food for themselves.” Jesus said to them, “They need not go away; you give them something to eat.” They replied, “We have nothing here but five loaves and two fish.” And he said, “Bring them here to me.” Then he ordered the crowds to sit down on the grass. Taking the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven, and blessed and broke the loaves, and gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the crowds. And all ate and were filled; and they took up what was left over of the broken pieces, twelve baskets full. And those who ate were about five thousand men, besides women and children.
Daily Reflection
By Bishop Robert Barron
Friends, in today’s Gospel, we see Jesus’s miracle of feeding the five thousand. Jesus went up on a mountain and sat down with his disciples. In Scripture, mountains are places of encounter, where God comes down and men and women go up.
The disciples want to dismiss the hungry crowd, but Jesus says, “There is no need for them to go away; give them some food yourselves.” Jesus is interested not only in instructing the crowds but in feeding them as well. The disciples bring forth a poor pittance—five barley loaves and two fish—and observe that this is woefully inadequate for so many. But Jesus presses forward, taking, giving thanks, and having the disciples distribute the bread. And everyone is fed.
A significant theological principle is in play here: God has no need vis-à-vis the world that he has made. Precisely because he stands to gain nothing from the world, whatever is given to him breaks against the rock of the divine self-sufficiency and redounds to the benefit of the giver. From this principle follows as a corollary what St. John Paul II called the law of the gift—namely, that one’s being increases in the measure that one gives oneself away.
Bishop Robert Barron
Founder, Word on Fire
Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Catholic Edition, copyright © 1989, 1993 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.