Hi everyone and welcome back to the podcast.

If you go to mass today, you'll hear from Mark chapter 6 versus 34 to 44.

And this is the famous feeding of the 5,000 Mark's version of that.

So let's start by reading the passage.

As Jesus stepped ashore, he saw a large crowd and he took pity on them because they were like sheep without a shepherd.

And he set himself to teach them at some length.

By now it was getting very late and his disciples came up to him and said,

This is a lonely place and it is getting very late.

So send them away and they can go to the farms and villages round about to buy themselves something to eat.

He replied, give them something to eat yourselves.

They answered, are we to go and spend 200 dinari on bread for them to eat?

How many loaves have you? he asked. Go and see. And when they had found out, they said to him, five and two fish. Then he ordered them to get all the people together in groups on the green grass, and they sat down on the ground in squares of hundreds and 50s. Then he took the five loaves and the two fish,

raised his eyes to heaven and said the blessing. Then he broke the loaves and handed them to his disciples to distribute among the people. He also shared out the two fish among them all.

They all ate as much as they wanted.

They collected 12 baskets fulls of scraps of bread and pieces of fish.

Those who had eaten the loaves numbered 5,000 men. Okay, so this is the famous feeding of the 5,000 men.

Okay, so this is the famous feeding of the 5,000, a miracle that almost everyone knows about.

It's the only miracle that's recorded in all four gospels.

So all four of the gospel authors, despite having different styles and purposes, they all see this as a really important event.

Possibly because all four of the gospel authors would see the Eucharist as really important,

and this is a miracle that specifically foreshadows the Eucharist.

So verse 34 at the start here, Jesus steps ashore.

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