Fr. Leo Pabayo DURING the offering of the gifts at Mass, the priest together with the faithful pray the following: “Blessed are you Lord God of all creation through your goodness we have this bread to offer, fruit of the earth and work of human hands.” The same prayer is said for the wine. This is the first part of the prayer of offering of bread and wine. The second part is when we pray that these may become our spiritual food (or “our bread of life”)... and our spiritual drink.” (The third prayer of offering is the particular prayer that is proper for the feast of the day). Every Mass goer is familiar with this first part of the offertory prayer. The world is most familiar with what this prayer is referring to because it is about work, particularly, the work of producing food. It is what greatly preoccupies man in the world of business, agriculture and industry. There are people who, day and night think of how they can produce enough food for the people to eat. This preoccupation is understandable because food and drink are the most basic physical need of man. Thus it is understandable why food production is one of the most lucrative businesses if not the most lucrative business in the world. In a sense the other businesses are but in support of this. To a great extent the growing, harvesting, processing and then selling, transporting and distribution of food are what keep people busy in the world. The first industry that man must have thought of when he began thinking of industrializing must have been the food industry. This industry naturally supplements the very first material concern of man, namely, agriculture or growing plants for food. In producing food that man works closely with God. It’s one of the first tasks that God gave man when God created him. God provided man with the seeds that he can plant,  grow and then harvest so he can have food to eat. It is however also the very first thing that man suffered from when he committed the original sin. One of the first consequences of sin was expressed by the inspired writer of the Book of Genesis thus: “17 To the man God said, 'Because you listened to the voice of your wife and ate from the tree of which I had forbidden you to eat, Accursed be the soil because of you! Painfully will you get your food from it as long as you live. “18 It yield you brambles and thistles, as you eat the produce of the land. “19 By the sweat of your face you earn your food” (Genesis 3:17-19) In offering the bread and wine at the Offertory part of the Mass we pray for the blessing of all the efforts of man to produce food. The second one that the prayer of offering expresses is the prayer that this food and drink that we offer may become our spiritual food and spiritual drink. This second part of this prayer is what Our Lord is referring to in the Gospel reading in last Sunday’s Mass (August 2, 2015). All our efforts at producing the food that we can eat ultimately do not really nourish us and really sustain our life unless at the same time this food and the efforts that we make in producing them also become for us our spiritual food and drink. Unless we are sustained in our spiritual life by Christ who is the food that comes down from heaven, the material food that we produce will not really satisfy and allay the real hunger and thirst in our life. This is because the greatest hunger in our life is spiritual hunger. It is the hunger for love of God and our love for one another. This can only be satisfied by the word of God who is Christ himself. When Christ was tempted by the devil during his long retreat in the desert, the temptation of the devil was for Christ to do a miracle and turn stone into bread. Christ’s response was, “Man does not live by bread alone but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.” His purpose for retreating in the desert was to feast on this food or bread. Christ’s reference to the word of God as bread reminds us of the beginning of the Gospel of St. John. (Last Sunday’s Gospel was also from the Gospel of St. John.)  John, referring to Our Lord says, “In the beginning was the word and the word was with God and the word was God.” John is referring to Christ as the Word of God, the Son of the Eternal Father who became man for us that he may become for us the food that comes from heaven. In last Sunday’s Gospel (John 6: 24-35) our Lord tells the people who came again to him that he is the bread that comes down from heaven. Jesus Christ is God who gives us life from the very beginning. He is the bread from heaven who ultimately satisfies all our longings and hungers in life. He is the spiritual food and drink whom we commune with whenever we celebrate Mass. If we are nourished by him with his word and with his body and blood that he gives us sacramentally then all our undertakings in the world, from the production of food and the other material and physical concerns that preoccupy us daily will also serve as spiritual food and drink that nurture the love of God and neighbor in our soul for eternal life.