If only we could replicate this miracle on a massive scale world hunger would be gone in a flash!<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\u2018The existence of suffering in the world is an argument against the existence of a compassionate God as preached by the Christian faith\u2019<\/em> – I\u2019ve heard this kind of argument publicly repeated by various celebrities many times. It\u2019s hard to argue with that, isn\u2019t it? If God were really forgiving, compassionate, sympathetic to our fate, He would have rid the world of everything that makes our lives miserable. There are two fundamental flaws in such reasoning.<\/p>\n The first one is that people have different tastes, needs and expectations. What is nice, pleasant, or good to one, can be a real pain in the neck to the other. Every now and again my neighbours have an outdoor party in their back garden. I guess it\u2019s a joyful and happy gathering of the family and their friends. From my point of view, it\u2019s a noisy event that makes working in the parish house or nightly rest very hard. But if I had it my way (peace and quiet) they would be unhappy, unable to enjoy themselves in their own garden. So, even if God directly intervened, whose side should He take?<\/p>\n The second fundamental flaw in the idea of a suffering-free world as a proof of God\u2019s love is that we wouldn\u2019t notice. We are extremely good and quick at getting used to good things and consequently, we take them for granted. We become complacent and crave more because \u2018the sky is the limit\u2019. We only realise how good our lives are when we are deprived of those little comforts and conveniences. The ongoing pandemic stopped many in their tracks and made them think again. We realised our inter-dependence. Those who had been scornfully labelled as low-skilled workers turned out to be vital in getting us through. Suffering – in its broadest sense – can be a great instrument for humanity and individually for each one of us. How? Today\u2019s gospel can teach us a thing or two.<\/p>\n Jesus \u2018took pity on [a large crowd that had followed Him] and healed their sick.\u2019<\/em> That\u2019s Jesus\u2019 reaction to the suffering He saw. His disciples advise him to send the crowd away so \u2018they can go to the villages to buy themselves some food.\u2019<\/em> Do they do so because they care for the wellbeing of the crowd? Jesus\u2019 response is very specific: \u2018Give them something to eat yourselves.\u2019<\/em> He doesn’t tell them to arrange food delivery, to call local takeaways. You \u2018give them something to eat yourselves.\u2019<\/em> Their answer is a classic: \u2018All we have with us is five loaves and two fish.\u2019<\/em> In other words, half a loaf of bread per person; enough for us but too little to share it with others. \u2018Bring them here to me\u2019<\/em> is Jesus\u2019 response. So they do. Now listen carefully to what\u2019s happening next: \u2018[Jesus] took the five loaves and the two fish […] and said the blessing. And breaking the loaves he handed them to his disciples, who [then] gave them to the crowds.\u2019<\/em> They give Jesus all they have and then they get it all back, broken into pieces. They could have kept it for themselves – with Jesus\u2019 blessing it will be tastier than before – but they don\u2019t; they share it with others. Jesus performs the miracle with and through His disciples. He doesn\u2019t pass them by but includes them.<\/p>\n In this country we have four pandemics; the Covid-19 is the most obvious. The other three are no less devastating and have been with us for much longer: the obesity crisis, the food waste crisis and families who go hungry. If only we could replicate the miracle from today\u2019s gospel on a massive scale the hunger would be gone in a flash! Well, the good news is that we can replicate this miracle. The first step is to bring to Jesus all you have, including your fear of insufficiency. He will bless it and return it to you, broken into pieces, ready to share. \u2018They all ate as much as they wanted, and they collected the scraps remaining, twelve baskets full.\u2019<\/em> The leftovers of charitable practical love, ready to make another meal. The end to suffering in the world starts in our hearts, yours and mine.<\/p>\n Image by Couleur<\/a> from Pixabay<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" If only we could replicate this miracle on a massive scale world hunger would be gone in a flash!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11691,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11689","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sermon","category-year-a"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tad.scot\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11689","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tad.scot\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tad.scot\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tad.scot\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tad.scot\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11689"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/tad.scot\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11689\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tad.scot\/index.php?rest_route=\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tad.scot\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11689"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tad.scot\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11689"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tad.scot\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11689"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n