The Catechism in a Year (with Fr. Mike Schmitz) - Day 362: Our Daily Bread (2024)

Episode Date: December 27, 2024

Asking God for our “daily bread” is a petition for him to fill our physical and spiritual hunger. Fr. Mike breaks down this simple yet profound petition that reminds us of our reliance on God for all our needs. In this part of the Lord’s prayer, we turn to God with childlike hearts, trusting that he will nourish us with all the appropriate material goods and, above all, with the Eucharist. Today’s readings are Catechism paragraphs 2828-2837. This episode has been found to be in conformity with the Catechism by the Institute on the Catechism, under the Subcommittee on the Catechism, USCCB. For the complete reading plan, visit ascensionpress.com/ciy Please note: The Catechism of the Catholic Church contains adult themes that may not be suitable for children - parental discretion is advised.

I'm Father Mark Mary Ames with the Franciscan Friars The Renewal. My brothers and sisters at the service of becoming saints and falling in love with Jesus and Mary and the Most Holy Rosary, the team here at Ascension Press have put together the Rosary in a Year podcast. Each day we're gonna have a 10 to 15 minute episode where we're just gonna work through the basics of the rosary. Who is Jesus? How do we encounter Jesus? Who is Our Lady? What does it mean for us to be in relationship to her? We're going to go through the Hail Mary, the Our Father, each of the different mysteries. And then we're going to bring in some Saint writings on the mysteries and some sacred art that speaks on the mysteries and all of this to help enrich our prayer, to renew our prayer, to help us fall in love with Jesus and Mary and to fall in love with the Rosary again. If you want to join us on this journey, you can begin by going to assentgenpress.com

forward slash rosaryinayear to download the prayer plan and by listening and praying with us through the Rosary in a Year podcast. Alright, look forward to the journey with you. Hi, my name is Father Mike Schmitz and you're listening to the Catechism in a Year podcast where we encounter God's plan of sheer goodness for us, revealed in Scripture and passed down through the tradition of the Catholic faith. The Catechism in a Year is brought to you by Ascension. In 365 days, we'll read through the Catechism of the Catholic Church, discovering our identity in God's family as we journey together toward our heavenly home.

This is day 362. We're reading paragraphs 28-28 to 28-37. As always, I'm using the Ascension edition of the Catechism, which includes the Foundations of Faith approach, but you can follow along with any recent version of the Catechism of the Catholic Church. You can also download your own Catechism in a year reading plan by visiting ascensionpress.com slash C-I-Y. And lastly, you can click follow or subscribe on your podcast app for daily updates and

daily notifications. I know, the maybe ridiculousness of those last two little notes of you can click follow or subscribe on your podcast app for daily updates and daily notifications. I know the maybe ridiculousness of those last two little notes of you can get a reading plan or you can follow or subscribe because here we are, day 362. You guys, you're almost there. You are almost across the finish line. Amazing. We have only a couple more petitions left.

Today, we get to look at the petition, give us this day our daily bread. Oh my gosh, if there's anything, it says in paragraph 28, 28, it says, give us the trust of children who look to their father for everything is beautiful. Let's just stop there. The trust of children who look to their father

for everything is beautiful. That's amazing. And that's what we're doing here in this petition. We get to actually just simply trust our Father Give us this day our daily bread that daily bread. It can mean a lot of things One of the things I can't wait to tell you I can't wait to reveal what paragraph 28 37 says about this bread This daily bread, but it can mean so many things We don't live on bread alone, but by every word that comes forth from the mouth of God. We know that, of course. So we're asking God in this prayer for just

what we need. What we need. And so let's come before God right now and trust Him. Let's come before God now with the trust of children who look to their Father for everything because that is beautiful. So we pray in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, Amen. Father in heaven, we give you praise and thank you. Thank you so much. Please receive our thanks. Help us to grow in trust, God, Father, help us to grow in trust. Help us to be able to see every one of your blessings as blessings and even every one is your presence in the midst of us.

That our struggles are one of the ways you allow us to get close to you. And that's so hard to see. It's so hard to see. Because pain is real, struggle is real, suffering is real, death is real. But help us to see you in everything. Help us to call out to you in everything and to trust you for everything. Because the trust of children who look to their Father for everything is beautiful. And we trust you and love you. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.

Amen. It's day 362. We're reading paragraphs 28-28 to 28-37. Give us this day our daily bread. Give us. The trust of children who look to their Father for everything is beautiful. He makes His Son rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. He gives to all the living their food in due season. Jesus teaches us this petition because it glorifies our Father by acknowledging how good He is, beyond all goodness. Give us also expresses the covenant. We are His, and He is ours for our sake.

But this us also recognizes Him as the Father of all men, and we pray to Him for them all, in solidarity with their needs and sufferings. Our Bread. The Father who gives us life cannot but give us nourishment life requires, all appropriate goods and blessings, both material and spiritual. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus insists on the filial trust that cooperates with our Father's providence. He's not inviting us to idleness, but wants to relieve us from nagging worry and preoccupation. Such is the filial surrender of the children of God.

St. Cyprian wrote, To those who seek the kingdom of God and His righteousness, He has promised to give all else besides. Since everything indeed belongs to God, he who possesses God wants for nothing, if he himself is not found wanting before God. But the presence of those who hunger because they lack bread opens up another profound meaning of this petition. The drama of hunger in the world calls Christians who pray sincerely to exercise responsibility toward their brethren, both in their personal behavior and in their solidarity with the human family.

This petition of the Lord's Prayer cannot be isolated from the parables of the poor man Lazarus and of the Last Judgment. As leaven in the dough, the newness of the Kingdom should make the earth rise by the Spirit of Christ. This must be shown by the establishment of justice in personal and social, economic and international relations without ever forgetting that there are no just structures without people who want to be just. Our bread is the one loaf for the many.

In the Beatitudes, poverty is the virtue of sharing. It calls us to communicate and share both material and spiritual goods not by coercion but out of love, so that the abundance of some may remedy the needs of others. Pray and work. Pray as if everything depended on God and work as if everything depended on you. Even when we have done our work, the food we receive is still a gift from our Father. It is good to ask Him for it and to thank Him as Christian families do when saying grace at meals. It is good to ask Him for it and to thank Him as Christian families do when saying grace at meals. This petition, with the responsibility it involves,

also applies to another hunger from which men are perishing. Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. That is, by the word he speaks and the spirit he breathes forth. Christians must make every effort to proclaim the Good News to the poor. There is a famine on earth, not a famine of bread nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord. For this reason, the specifically Christian sense of this fourth petition concerns the bread of life, the word of God accepted in faith, the body of Christ received in the

Eucharist. This day is also an expression of trust taught us by the Lord, which we would never have presumed to invent, since it refers above all to His Word and to the body of His Son. This today is not only that of our mortal time, but also the today of God. Saint Ambrose stated, If you receive the bread each day, each day is today for you. If Christ is yours today, He rises for you every day. How can this be? You are my Son, today I have begotten you.

Therefore today is when Christ rises. Daily, Epiusius, occurs nowhere else in the New Testament. Taken in a temporal sense, this word is a pedagogical repetition of this day to confirm us in trust without reservation. Taken in the qualitative sense, it signifies what is necessary for life, and more broadly, every good thing sufficient for subsistence. Taken literally, epiusius, super-essential, it refers directly to the Bread of Life, the Body of Christ, the medicine of immortality without which we have no life within us.

Finally, in this connection, its heavenly meaning is evident. This day is the Day of the Lord, the day of the feast of the Kingdom anticipated in the Eucharist that it is already the foretaste of the Kingdom to come. For this reason, it is fitting for the Eucharistic liturgy to be celebrated each day. St. Augustine stated, The Eucharist is our daily bread. The power belonging to this divine food makes it a bond of union. Its effect is then understood as unity so that,

gathered into his body and made members of him, we may become what we receive. This also is our daily bread, the readings you hear each day in church and the hymns you hear and sing. All these are necessities for our pilgrimage. St. Peter Chrysologus stated, bread of heaven. Christ himself is the bread, who, sown in the virgin, raised up in the flesh, kneaded in the passion, baked in the oven of the tomb, reserved in churches, brought to altars, furnishes the faithful each day with food from heaven. All right, wow, there we have it, paragraphs 28-28 to 28-37. Oh man, I cannot wait to get back to paragraph 28-37, but let's start at

the very beginning It's a very good place to start I kept saying a bunch of times in the introduction give us we call me for our father and ask him just to ask to ask God for anything we express the trust of children who look for their father to their father for everything. That's beautiful It's so good. I love the last sentence says Jesus teaches us this petition. Why? Let's pause on that for a second. Why does Jesus teach us this petition to give us this day our daily bread? It finishes by saying Jesus teaches us this petition because it glorifies our Father by acknowledging how good he is beyond all goodness. That's incredible.

It glorifies God to ask, even if the answer is no. It glorifies God to come before him and ask. Sometimes people will short circuit their prayer and they say, I don't really want to ask God for much because I feel selfish that way. I don't want to pray for myself because it just seems like, listen, what does this say? It reminds us of this truth. Jesus teaches us this petition because it glorifies our Father by acknowledging how good He is beyond all goodness. When we ask God for anything, it is acknowledging how good He is. Think about the child who, I'm not going to ask mom and I'm not going to ask dad because, well, I don't wanna be selfish,

but the parent who loves their child loves when that child comes to them and says, hey, this is what's on my heart, this is what I need. Would you be willing to give me what I need? That is such an incredible act of love. How much would the father love when you come before him and not just pray to our father, give us this day our daily bread, but when you come before Him and not just pray the Our Father give us this day our daily bread but when you come before your Father, our

Father, and just ask for whatever it is that we need because again our bread it signifies obviously bread but even more than this. Paragraph 28-30 highlights it says the Father who gives us life cannot but give us the nourishment life requires all appropriate goods and blessings, both material and spiritual. And further, Jesus teaches in the Sermon on the Mount the filial trust that cooperates with our Father's providence. That he's asking us not to worry.

Remember, if you remember that line in Matthew chapter six verses 25 through 34. Consider the lilies of the field, they don't sow or spin, but Solomon, in all of his splendor, was not arrayed like them. the lilies of the field, they don't sow or spin, but Solomon, in all of his splendor, was not arrayed like them. That Jesus is inviting us to be free from worry.

And now in this, I like paragraph 28-30, he does continue to highlight this, that Jesus in doing this is not inviting us to idleness. He's not saying, okay, don't worry, God will just take care of you, so don't even worry about what you are to eat, what you are to wear, what you are to do or say or whatever. He's not inviting us to idleness, but he wants to relieve us from nagging worry and preoccupation, which is something that probably affects all of us. And that's when we have this filial surrender. Remember that surrender we talked about before, this surrender of placing our lives under the dominion of God and saying, God, I know. I know that I can ask and I can trust. I can ask and I can trust. But also, we recognize paragraph 2831 and following highlights the fact that if we are going

to come before our Father in heaven and ask for what we need each day, we have to recognize that there are people around us who have needs each day. And if we're going to, remember, have a heart like the Father, that's the whole, in many ways, not, I don't say the whole point, but it's a big, big point to have a heart like the Father. If we're going to have a heart like the Father, then we have to have a heart like the Father, right? Who is concerned for all the poor. And if I'm gonna come before God and say, God, please give me this day, my daily bread, give us this day, our daily bread, then I have to look around me and say, where are my fellow human beings whom God loves? Am I able to give them their daily bread?

Can God work through me in this way that they can be cared for because I have a heart like my father? That's the big question, right? Can they be cared for through me because we have hearts like our father. Now I wanna highlight maybe two or three things left, and I'm so sorry, but this is,

it's just almost too good to skip. Paragraph 2834, you know, Saint Benedict, the founder of the Benedictines. One of the Benedictine mottos is aura et labora, pray and work, and Paragraph 2834 starts with that. And then there's a quote here, which is just, it's very famous, it's attributed to Saint Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Jesuits.

He said, pray as if everything depended on God, and work as if everything depended on you. Which is so good, I just love that. Pray as if everything depended on God, with trust, in some ways even with desperation, but with ultimate trust, and work as if everything depended on you, that we still act in this world. And it's so good even when we have done our work, the food we receive is still a gift from our Father. It is good to ask him for it and to thank him as we do before every time before we eat.

We're thanking God for this gift even if yeah you worked really hard to put that food on the table. We still recognize that it is still a gift. Last two things. Here we go. This petition with this is paragraph 28 35 with the responsibility it involves also applies to another hunger from which men are perishing. Mentioned this at the very beginning. We know that we do not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. Therefore Christians must make every effort to proclaim the good news to the poor. This is what we have to do. That it the good news to the poor. This is what we have to do.

That it's good, yes, absolutely. We're not just going to say, here's the good news, we're not going to give food, right? We don't just want to say, here is the gospel without actually meeting people's needs, because Jesus commands us to take care of those who go without. He commands us to actually meet their needs. I was hungry and you fed me. I was naked and you gave me clothing. I was ill and in prison and you visited me. We need to meet the needs of the people around us, but we also have a command. We have a command to proclaim the good news to

the poor. I love this. There's a famine on earth, not a famine of bread nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord. It's from the book of the prophet Amos chapter 8. The catechism says, for this reason, the specifically Christian sense of this fourth petition concerns the bread of life. The word of God accepted in faith, the body of Christ received in the Eucharist. And that's what I wanna highlight here.

The body of Christ received in the Eucharist. This last paragraph, 2837, daily. We pray, give us this day our daily bread. So why do we repeat ourselves? this word daily is a Greek word? Epiuseus and as it says in 2837 that word epiuseus occurs nowhere else in the New Testament So what could it mean? Well first it says taken in a temporal sense This word is a pedagogical repetition of this day. So give us this day our daily bread Give us this bread the bread of this day. What would that teach us? That's pedagogical

What would that teach us? Well, it confirms us in trust without reservation So give us this day the bread of today and it makes us trust God without reservation It reminds us that we need to trust God without reservation now next it says taking in a qualitative sense It signifies what is necessary for life. More broadly, every good thing sufficient for substance. So it doesn't just mean bread, it means what I need any given day. Anything that's it signifies more than just bread, it signifies what is necessary for life. Now that's again temporal sense and then the qualitative sense. But how about literally this Greek word

epiousias. It's a Greek word that means epi is over or above, super, and ou-sias is essential. The word is super-essential, and it refers directly, give us this day our super-essential bread. That refers directly to the bread of life, the body of Christ, the medicine of immortality without which we have no life within us. The Eucharist.

Do you realize, every time you've been praying the Our Father, and you've uttered the words, give us this day our daily bread? Yes, of course, it's that trust without reservation. Yes, it means every good thing we need. But literally, you've been praying every time you pray that prayer. For the Eucharist, give us this day our super essential bread. Give us this day our super essential bread. Give us this day our Eucharist. And this is something for all of us, all of us who belong to Jesus, that we all need to realize that when Jesus gave us this prayer, yes, it means

all these things. And literally, it means give us this day the yes, it means all these things, and literally it means Give us this day the Eucharist, the super essential bread of life, the body of Christ, the medicine of immortality. So Catholics, let that prayer, yes, it means all the things, right? Everything, every good thing we need. It means the trust we have in the Lord. But it also means even praying for the Eucharist. Let that inflame your desire for the Eucharist even more and more and more. And for all my non-Catholic friends, my non-Catholic Christians who you made it here today

362 and you've been listening to the Catechism, my guess is since you've been listening to the Catechism there might be a spark, there might be something in you that says, I think the Lord is calling me to become Catholic. I think the Lord is calling me to enter into full communion with the Church. And let this maybe be the last straw. Let this be that final grain of sand that just says, okay, I'm going to collapse. I'm going to give and I'm going to surrender. You know, every single time when your parents say, I can't become Catholic, my family,

the people who taught you the Lord's Prayer. They didn't realize it, but they were teaching you to pray that one day you'd be given the Eucharist. They taught you how to pray that one day you'd receive the body of Jesus Christ in the Eucharist. That every day, since before you even knew, maybe before you even knew about the Catholic Church, someone taught you to pray the Lord's Prayer. And in that, every time you prayed it, you were praying, God, someday, someday give me the Eucharist. You've been praying for the Eucharist. I wonder if this isn't just a sign, an invitation, take the next step. Whether that means joining the Right of

Christian Initiation for adults or talking to the priest in your town or whatever that means. But if something in your heart right now is just like, okay that's it. I've been praying this every time. I've been praying the Lord's Prayer. Every time I'm praying the Lord's Prayer I've been saying, give us this day our super essential bread. Give me the Eucharist? I mean, again, this is not an invention. We have these quotes from St. Augustine and St. Peter Chrysologus.

St. Augustine, right, in writing in the, you know, the fourth, fifth, whatever it was, he says, the Eucharist is our daily bread. The Eucharist is our daily bread. The power belonging to this divine food makes it a bond of union. Its effect is then understood as unity so that gathered into his body and made members of him we may become what we receive. And also, this is also our daily bread, the readings you hear

each day in church and the hymns you hear and sing. All these are necessities for our pilgrimage. The Eucharist is our daily bread. And so my brothers and sisters in Christ, this is your prayer. My fellow Catholics, brothers and sisters in Christ, this is your prayer. Let this prayer fan that flame of love, that flame of desire for Jesus in the Eucharist to a raging inferno. That all of us might just desire Jesus more and more in the Eucharist. And let's pray for each other. I'm praying for you.

Please pray for me. My name is Father Mike. I cannot wait to see you tomorrow. God bless.