On Wednesday evening, as we celebrate a time of Eucharistic Adoration, we get global and celebrate the freedom God gives through gifts filled with love.
“When they had sung the hymn they went out to the mount of olives.”
I love olives. Although I never ate them as a child. They weren’t on our table. We didn’t eat ‘global’ food. The only global food that made its ways onto our table was a Vesta curry as we watched our Dad eat his way through heat and rehydrated powder with reconstituted meat. Pot Noodles brought the Asian to our plate although we never thought it to be a global food. After all, Pot Noodles are made in Wales.
Food connects us. And so I’m back in Butetown and the global picnic I shared with the little Giant of Africa I introduced on Monday. He’s still there. Picking litter.
It’s difficult to say “No, thank you”to the families who want you to taste their food. They’re eager to share. And if you say no they take it personally. They feel demoralised that you have rejected their hospitality, their need to feed you with their generosity, their offering of gifts.
A few years ago, when drug dealing on our streets was bad there was a Muslim family that seemed to take the brunt. One night, a man in a balaclava and armed with a knife threatened the Dad. He approached him and told him to be quiet and not go to the police. The Dad tried to move home with his family, to somewhere a bit safer. Although, in the end, he rode the storm and has now, years later, had opened his own restaurant just a few streets away from his home.
At the time, I called at at his house, tentatively approached him and his family, equipped with tickets we had bought for a family musical in the Wales Millennium Centre. “I don’t know if you can accept these,” I said “but we’d like to give them to you”. A few weeks later he turned up at my front door with a plateful of food. It was the first time I began to value the exchange of gifts.
I’d given him something. He needed to return the gift. And so it goes on. Gift after gift. Thank you after thank you.
I’m in London with a group of Year 6 pupils. I’m given sweets by one of the teachers to distribute to the group in my care. Each child wants more than the other. One looks up at me, as if butter wouldn’t melt. “Remember when my dad gave you free food,” he said as if it was some kind of bargaining tool. Yes, I did. You don’t forget the gifts. The exchange. The food I received at my doorstep. Kindness exchanged for kindness.
So what’s this evening about? It’s about food. It’s about a gift. It’s about exchanging gifts.
“Remember when my dad gave you free food?”
He said it because he wanted something. But don’t we all do that? We bargain and exchange. We return generosity with generosity. Express our thanks with gifts, our love with a gesture.
In the Eucharist, we have this beautiful exchange of gifts. We give to God from all that we have been given. And he gives it back to us. Transforms it. The gift of himself which then transforms us, and so it goes on.
After a visit to Pope Paul VI, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Michael Ramsey was stood with him on the steps of the basilica in Rome. The Pope took off the episcopal ring that had been given to him when he was Bishop of Milan and gave it to Ramsey who was visibly moved. Afterwards he said, “I felt as though he was giving me a piece of himself.”
In giving a gift, we give of ourselves.
This is food from heaven. But it’s not foreign food. It’s familiar food. Although, sometimes, we may be a bit over familiar with the food presented to us. We take it for granted, don’t give it a thought. So, this moment is intended to strengthen our gratitude, deepen our sense of awe and wonder, alert us to the beautiful gift of Christ.
Jesus wants us to have this food. He wants to share it with us. He’s eager to share it with us. And it’s free.
“Remember when my Dad gave you free food?”
The Israelites certainly remembered the moment when God gave them free food in their desert wanderings. Faced with starvation, they despaired, and God delivered. It saved them. Each time they celebrated the Passover, they were back on the watery path through the sea, back on the dry ground of the desert, back to freedom and their wilderness wandering.
So, with us. In the Eucharist, we receive all the saving benefits of Christ’s death and resurrection. It saves us. We’re back in the room, the upper room, back at the olive groves of Gethsemane, back at the foot of the cross, back at the empty tomb.
God has delivered. He gives us the gift of himself.
“Remember when my dad gave you free food?”
Enter the Mystery 
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