+ Our first reading today is one of the most dramatic in all of scripture: it is the stoning of St. Stephen by overzealous Jewish religious leaders, while Saul, who later becomes St. Paul looks on and does nothing to help him. There is nothing saintly about this Saul right now, but this makes his conversion later on all the more amazing and noteworthy. It gives hope to us all, that God can take a person like Saul, who had his spiritual radar tuned to the wrong channel, and retune the radar so that he receives the message of God loudly and clearly and even sets out on a new mission to proclaim the message to the entire known world. God can take us, with our permission, at any age, and redirect our efforts entirely for his benefit. This is good news!
In the gospel passage, Jesus tells the crowds who are looking for a sign like that of manna given by God to Moses in the desert that what they need to be looking for is a sign that is deeper and wider than that simple sign so long ago: they need to be looking for the real bread from heaven that is himself for the life of the world. Hungering and thirsting after him, who is Bread of Life, True Manna from Heaven, will sustain them both in this life and the next!
May we today go to Jesus the bread of life, eat, and never be spiritually hungry again!
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