There is a symmetry of sorts in today’s first reading (Genesis 3:9-24) and the Gospel. A dispersal in the Genesis story and a gathering together of thousands of people in the Gospel account. Both stories focus on eating.

For Adam and Eve, it is a secretive, clandestine eating of the forbidden fruit. The disobedience of God’s express command leads to expulsion from the garden of Eden and the introduction of pain – the pain of childbirth for Eve and the burden of toil for Adam, and conflict – Adam and Eve blame each other for succumbing to the serpent’s temptation.

By contrast, in the Gospel, Jesus has compassion for the multitudes who, hungry for his teaching, have gathered around him and followed him for days but have nothing to eat. He fears for their ability to return home without fainting from hunger. He provides for them with an unimaginable amplitude, multiplying seven loaves and a few small fish into sufficient food to feed the entire assembly and sufficient leftovers to fill seven baskets.

The Gospel references God’s provision for his people through Moses during the Exodus. ‘How can one feed these people with bread here in the desert’. (Mark 8:4) The Christian also sees the foretelling of the miracle of the last supper. It also reminds us of the suffering of the Passion which awaits Jesus – a suffering that reverses the consequences of that first sin. Through his death and resurrection Jesus reverses the consequences of the sin of Adam and Eve and gathers all creation unto himself.

In providing for our physical and spiritual hunger, Jesus invites us to share in a divine humanity more sublime even than the original creation.

by Clara Geoghegan