“The most astonishing thing about miracles is that they happen.”

"The real miracle is a man who can walk with God every day ... When a person walks with God, he finds joy in the everyday things he does. Gradually his life begins to expand.”

(Gospel text: Jn 6:1-15)

Jesus went across the Sea of Galilee.

A large crowd followed him,

because they saw the signs he was performing on the sick.

Jesus went up on the mountain,

and there he sat down with his disciples.

The Jewish feast of Passover was near.

When Jesus raised his eyes

and saw that a large crowd was coming to him,

he said to Philip,

"Where can we buy enough food for them to eat?"

He said this to test him,

because he himself knew what he was going to do.

Philip answered him,

"Two hundred days?' wages worth of food would not be enough

for each of them to have a little.'"

One of his disciples,

Andrew, the brother of Simon Peter, said to him,

"There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish;

but what good are these for so many?"

Jesus said, "Have the people recline."

Now there was a great deal of grass in that place.

So the men reclined, about five thousand in number.

Then Jesus took the loaves, gave thanks,

and distributed them to those who were reclining,

and also as much of the fish as they wanted.

When they had had their fill, he said to his disciples,

"Gather the fragments left over,

so that nothing will be wasted."

So they collected them,

and filled twelve wicker baskets with fragments

from the five barley loaves

that had been more than they could eat.

When the people saw the sign he had done, they said,

"This is truly the Prophet, the one who is to come into the world."

Since Jesus knew that they were going to come and carry him off

to make him king,

he withdrew again to the mountain alone.

Many times what we have to offer seems so inadequate. We may only have a couple free hours a week. So how can we renew the Church? We may be confined to home. Our main contact with people is by email. Under these circumstances, how can we make disciples of all nations? (Mt 28:19) We have five dollars to give, but the church needs $100,000 to shelter the homeless. What good is five dollars?

We often find ourselves in the same situation as Jesus when He found Himself with five loaves, two fish, and fifteen to twenty thousand people to feed. Perhaps we don't need food multiplied as much as time, energy, and money multiplied. We need Jesus' multiplication miracle daily to change our inadequacy into His sufficiency. Jesus works this miracle daily in the Mass. Because of this, the early Church called the Mass "breaking of the bread." When Jesus gave us the Holy Eucharist, our little lives are multiplied to transform the world.

Believe in miracles – Be a miracle for others!