Sharing Meals

One

Where did Christ Eat?

Did you know there are practically no cases in the Gospel that report Jesus eating by himself? It’s remarkable. He’s always eating with other people. He eats with the disciples. He eats with the pharisees. He eats with tax collectors and sinners. He eats with the family of Mary, Martha, and Lazarus. He eats with his disciples before the night before the Passion and He eats with His disciples after the Resurrection. Sometimes He’s the host, like at the miracle of the loaves and fishes. Sometimes He’s the guest. Sometimes He invites Himself, like with Levi. Sometimes He tells other people whom to invite: like when He says to invite those who can’t afford to invite you back.

But we hear so much in the Gospel about Jesus at table, surely there must be an important takeaway from that. What is it?

Two

Christ comes to us in the essentially human

In Jesus Christ, God decided to assume human nature. He decided to take on what is essentially human. And He took on the human essence so He could come to us in the essentially human. He assumed our common humanity so that He could come to us in what is common to humanity.

What does that mean? It means that Jesus wants to make ordinary, everyday human things the places where He can make us holy and lead us to heaven. He came to earth through a family, because we are meant to be sanctified through the family. Most of His life was spent in work and obscurity, because we are meant to be sanctified in work and obscurity. He had friends, He suffered, He died, because we are meant to be sanctified through friendship, through suffering, through death.

Do you see? It’s the stuff that happens to everyone, the typical human stuff, that becomes the place where we are made holy. And maybe the most typical, human thing there is that thing that we all do, usually multiple times a day: eat. And normally, we eat with other people. That is a key way Christ wants us to be sanctified.

Three

Lose the essentially human – lose the opportunity for grace

Now here’s a really important principle: if Jesus comes to us what is essentially human, it follows that when we abandon what is essentially human, we are losing a pathway to God. 

So, as we said, the family is a basic part of being human but the family has become attacked and neglected in our society. Which means one of the key paths to God is being cut off. People also value honest, humble work less. They’d rather be trying to increase their social media following than put in a day’s work in some meaningful but unsensational job. Which means another key path to God is being cut off. 

And now we’re in a really strange place, culturally speaking, where more and more people are eating on the go or eating by themselves. Even when people do share a meal, they often don’t really share it. They sit on opposite sides of the table and look at their phones. 

In other words, that incredibly basic act of sitting down to break bread with someone else is starting to disappear. Sitting down and breaking bread with someone else, which is where Jesus focused an awful lot of His ministry, is disappearing or has disappeared from many lives. Which means people are cutting a key path to God out of their lives. And that is not a good thing. 

Four

Meals together are good – they’re not magical

By the way, essentially human things aren’t usually magical or endearing. They don’t always play like insurance commercials, with people laughing in slow motion with piano music playing in the background. Meals together are human. That means they’re real. That means they’re flawed and often difficult. 

And Jesus’ meals were no different. At some of Jesus’ meals He got into arguments with the other people there. At some of Jesus’ meals there were really awkward moments. At some of Jesus’ meals there were people who didn’t like each other. At at least one of Jesus’ meals there was a family squabble. Those were Jesus’ meals. We shouldn’t expect our meals to always go more smoothly than his did.

And yet Jesus was committed to sharing meals with others. It was part of his work of salvation. So why would we not follow His example?

Five

Will you invite Christ to your table?

It was part of Christ’s work to eat in company with others. That was part of universally human thing that He had come to sanctify and use to bring people into communion with God and with each other. 

That work continued in the Church. The book of Acts tells us that the first Christians were “devoted” to “breaking bread in their homes.” Of course, we continue to break bread in the All-Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, where the whole Church comes together in the universal salvific meal. But do we continue to break bread with one another in our homes? Is that part of Christ’s work, and the Church’s work, continuing in us?

If not, then something essentially human is missing in our faith. And there will be a path to God from which we have shut ourselves off.

So recommit to eating with others, so that Christ can join you, and make what is essentially and universally human in you a point at which you meet the Lord.