“Do you want to go away too?” asked Jesus

This weekend we reach the end of St John’s account of Jesus’ teaching on the Eucharist.  Jesus offers His disciples – and us – a hard teaching which requires both faith and trust in Him.  He told His followers they should eat His Flesh and drink His Blood to enter eternal life.  For some, this was too much, so they left Him.  We too are called to believe in and to trust in Jesus rather than simply relying on our own abilities to make sense of the world.  We are invited to encounter spiritual realities, to experience things beyond the material ones that surround us each day.  We can question if God is one, how is He Father, Son and Holy Spirit? We can ask how can Jesus be fully God and fully man? Equally we can ponder how can bread and wine become His Body and Blood?  To answer all these questions we simply need to reflect on the many wonders and opportunities God offers us and to trust and believe in Him.  For in receiving the gift of the Eucharist we encounter the reality of God’s love.  Yes, we can be tempted to trust in material things, but we are also moved by the spiritual and the voice of faith within us allows us to profess with St Peter:

…Lord, I will not leave You because “You have the message of eternal life!”