February 8, 2011. Homily, Saturday, February 12, 2011

Mk 8:1-10

In those days when there was again a great crowd without anything to eat, he called his disciples and said to them, ‘I have compassion for the crowd, because they have been with me now for three days and have nothing to eat. If I send them away hungry to their homes, they will faint on the way—and some of them have come from a great distance.’ His disciples replied, ‘How can one feed these people with bread here in the desert?’ He asked them, ‘How many loaves do you have?’ They said, ‘Seven.’ Then he ordered the crowd to sit down on the ground; and he took the seven loaves, and after giving thanks he broke them and gave them to his disciples to distribute; and they distributed them to the crowd. They had also a few small fish; and after blessing them, he ordered that these too should be distributed. They ate and were filled; and they took up the broken pieces left over, seven baskets full. Now there were about four thousand people. And he sent them away. And immediately he got into the boat with his disciples and went to the district of Dalmanutha.

All four gospels include the story of the multiplication of the loaves and the fishes. Mark's Gospel has two versions of which this is the second. The first is at Mk. 6:34-44. John's gospel, fourth and last chronologically, includes it as one of the seven miracles in his Book of Signs (water into wine at the wedding feast of Cana, the curing at a distance of the son of the royal official, the curing on the sabbath of the man ill for 38 years at the pool at the Sheep Gate in Jerusalem, the feeding of the multitude with five barley loaves and two fish, Jesus walks on the sea, the curing of the man blind from birth, the raising of Lazarus from the dead). John's gospel does not include the breaking of the bread and the consecration of the wine at the Last Supper but does have Jesus give thanks for the bread before he feeds the multitude. Matthew 14:19 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. Mark 6:17 two hundred denarii [a denarius was a day's wages]. Luke 10:12-17. John has the barley loaves. All agree to the deserted place, to the teaching of Jesus before the miracle, to the 5,000 men, to the 12 baskets of fragments, the synoptic gospels that he looked up to heaven, blessed and broke the bread, and gave it to the disciples to distribute. And the synoptic gospels each have Jesus consecrating and distributing the bread and wine at the Last Supper.