They were like sheep without a shepherd

8 JANUARY (Mk 6,34-44)

If the Church wants to be the sacrament of God to give new vigor to his mercy, she must put every effort to study how Jesus Christ was the true, the only, the authentic, effective universal sacrament of mercy of Jesus Christ. The Church is perpetually from the Lord Jesus in the same way that the Lord Jesus is from the Father. If she is separated from Christ, she is not the sacrament of Christ, as Christ is the sacrament of the Father; hers becomes instantly a human and no longer a divine mission.

What is the first, true, necessary work of mercy that the Church must always realize? It is only one: giving man the most necessary thing for his life. The most necessary thing is not the bread, is not the water and is not a dress. This most necessary thing is God, the true God, the Heavenly Father. Man is without the Father. He wanders in a land of misery and spiritual solitude. There is dignity for pigs and there is no dignity for him. It is the Father, He alone, who gives dignity to his children and the Church must lead to the Father all his scattered children. If this work is not done, the others are useless.

The multiplication of the loaves in a desert is a sign of the return of the Father among his flock. The father is also material bread and water, for his people. But he is bread and water when he is in the midst of his people, when the people listen to him and are about to obey his every word. Jesus Christ, true presence, true sacrament of eternal life among the people, testifies and reveals the presence of the Father in the midst thereof. The plentiful bread is this powerful sign. God is again in the midst thereof. This is attested by the abundance of food. It is really worth reading a passage from the prophet Isaiah.

Yet the Lord is waiting to show you favour, and he rises to pity you; For the Lord is a God of justice: blessed are all who wait for him! O people of Zion, who dwell in Jerusalem, no more will you weep; He will be gracious to you when you cry out, as soon as he hears he will answer you. The Lord will give you the bread you need and the water for which you thirst. No longer will your Teacher hide himself, but with your own eyes you shall see your Teacher, While from behind, a voice shall sound in your ears: “This is the way; walk in it,” when you would turn to the right or to the left. And you shall consider unclean your silver-plated idols and your gold-covered images; You shall throw them away like filthy rags to which you say, “Begone!” He will give rain for the seed that you sow in the ground, And the wheat that the soil produces will be rich and abundant. On that day your cattle will graze in spacious meadows; The oxen and the asses that till the ground will eat silage tossed to them with shovel and pitchfork (Is 30,18-24).

Jesus sees a crowd without the Father, without his truth, he sees it lacking the most necessary thing. He has compassion of it because he sees those people as sheep without a shepherd, and he begins to be their shepherd. Now the pastor has a primary obligation to the sheep: the one of leading them to true and excellent pastures. An excellent pasture of every sheep is the Heavenly Father. Until each sheep does not feed on the Father, its life will always be misery and extreme poverty. Nothing else feeds the sheep. Only the life of Father feeds them. The Father is eternal life and has given all of himself to Christ. Christ leads the sheep by feeding them on eternal life, truth, justice, hope and peace.

When he disembarked and saw the vast crowd, his heart was moved with pity for them, for they were like sheep without a shepherd; and he began to teach them many things. By now it was already late and his disciples approached him and said, “This is a deserted place and it is already very late. Dismiss them so that they can go to the surrounding farms and villages and buy themselves something to eat.” He said to them in reply, “Give them some food yourselves.” But they said to him, “Are we to buy two hundred days’ wages worth of food and give it to them to eat?” He asked them, “How many loaves do you have? Go and see.” And when they had found out they said, “Five loaves and two fish.” So he gave orders to have them sit down in groups on the green grass. The people took their places in rows by hundreds and by fifties. Then, taking the five loaves and the two fish and looking up to heaven, he said the blessing, broke the loaves, and gave them to (his) disciples to set before the people; he also divided the two fish among them all. They all ate and were satisfied. And they picked up twelve wicker baskets full of fragments and what was left of the fish. Those who ate (of the loaves) were five thousand men.

Virgin Mary, Mother of the Redemption, Angels and Saints make us the sacrament of Jesus.