Bishop Barron's Corpus Christi homily connecting the manna of Exodus to the Eucharist
A Sunday sermon by Bishop Robert Barron exploring four theological parallels between the biblical manna and the Catholic Eucharist.
Summary
Structured around four typological connections between the manna given to the Israelites in the desert and the Eucharist as understood in Catholic teaching, this Corpus Christi homily opens by crediting Father Andrew Marshall, a Scottish priest whose dissertation on manna and the Eucharist in the church fathers informed it. Drawing primarily from the Book of Exodus and the sixth chapter of John's Gospel, Bishop Barron argues that the Eucharist is not a symbolic gesture but a real, substantial presence of Christ — a claim he grounds in Jesus's deliberate refusal to explain his language about eating his flesh in merely symbolic terms. The homily concludes with the observation that, just as manna ceased when Israel entered the promised land, the Eucharist will give way in heaven when believers encounter God face to face.
Key Takeaways
FULL TRANSCRIPT
Introduction and the connection to Father Andrew Marshall
Bishop Barron: Peace be with you. Friends, welcome to this great Feast Day of Corpus Christi. I want to tell you a quick story before I get started.
Just the other day, Father Andrew Marshall, who is a priest from Scotland, was visiting me about a particular project. In the course of our conversation, he mentioned that he had done his studies over in Rome and that we had some mutual friends there. I asked him what he had written on, and he said he had written on the whole idea of the Eucharist and manna in the church fathers. I said, "That is the strangest thing, because this very morning I was preparing for this homily." The readings for Corpus Christi have reading one about the manna in the desert, which is then correlated to the Eucharist in the New Testament. So I asked if he could send me that dissertation. He did — he sent it electronically. I didn't read every word of it, but I read the section precisely on this topic. I want to give Father Andrew some credit for some of the things I'm going to share with you today about manna and the Eucharist.
That approach is typical, by the way, of the church fathers. They will look at something in the Old Testament and see it as a type — a kind of anticipation, a symbolic anticipation, of something in the New Testament. Or they will see the New Testament as a distant echo of something that was sounded in the Old Testament. A prime example of that is the manna in the desert described in the Book of Exodus and the Eucharist, the bread from heaven that Jesus gives us.
I want to explore, really briefly, just four dimensions of this relationship. I think they are all interesting.
First connection: Sustenance for a long journey
Here is the first connection between manna and the Eucharist. They are both meant to be sustenance for a long journey.
Why was the manna given? The Israelites escaped from Egypt and were making their way, in that circuitous manner, from Egypt to the promised land. It takes forty years. They are wandering in the desert, far away from what they knew in Egypt. In fact, they are longing, as they say, for the flesh pots of Egypt — at least there they had enough to eat, whereas here they are in the desert. And so the Lord sends them bread from heaven. This mysterious substance appears, this manna — so called, by the way, because manhoo in Hebrew carries the sense of "What is that?" So they call it manna, and it sustains them on their long, perilous journey through the desert.
What is the Eucharist? The same thing. It is food for a long journey — our journey now out of sin, and then through the difficulties, obstacles, and dangers of this life, on our way to fulfillment in heaven. What do we need? Sustenance. Spiritual food. In an unhealthy way, we are fed by our sin — we hope to find some kind of sustenance there — but we have turned from that. We are not going back to the flesh pots of Egypt. We are journeying toward heaven, and on the way, what sustains us? The manna. The bread from heaven. The Eucharist.
I want to take this in almost a literal way — and I do not mean it physicalistically — but we need it. The Eucharist is not a nice decorative dimension of the spiritual life. No. It is essential to making our way to heaven. Think of eating the body and drinking the blood of Christ as sustaining the Christ-life in us. If you say, "I have come to the Lord and received his life through the sacrament of baptism, but now I never feed that life — I don't go to the Eucharist, I don't feed, I stay away from the source and summit of the Christian life" — should you be surprised that the Christ-life withers up in you? Sustenance.
Second connection: Bread from heaven
The second thing: both manna and the Eucharist are understood as bread from heaven.
Think of the manna first. Manna was not growing naturally in the Sinai desert. It is not something they simply came upon in the ordinary course of things. No. They begged for sustenance, and as a miracle, as a grace, this mysterious food was given to them. It was from heaven, not from earth.
The Eucharist, now, par excellence — in an even more radical way — is bread from heaven. In the Our Father, it is translated as "daily bread," but the phrase used in the Greek is ton arton ton epiousion. Usia means substance; epiousion means super-substantial. It is a strange, unique expression found only in the New Testament. What is this super-substantial bread? Not ordinary bread, obviously — and not merely ordinary bread with a symbolic charge or resonance. Nothing as banal as that. This is super-substantial bread. Bread that has come from heaven. It is not merely of the earth.
The Gospel for today is taken from that magnificent sixth chapter of John, which is the best New Testament reflection on the Eucharist. Jesus speaks of this bread from heaven, which is his flesh for the life of the world. The people object: "How could this man give us his flesh to eat?" He is given every opportunity to explain this language symbolically, and he does not. Instead, he says, "Unless you gnaw on the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, there is no life in you" — purposely using the word that describes the way animals eat. What is he emphasizing? The reality of his presence. Yes, under sacramental signs indeed, but the real, true, and substantial presence of Jesus in this bread that has come from heaven.
Link it to the first theme: this is why it sustains us. If it is just ordinary bread, of course it will not sustain you spiritually. It is just bread with a symbolic charge — it might give you a certain illumination, perhaps. But if you want to be strengthened for heaven, if you want to be supernaturalized, you need super-substantial bread. Manna came from heaven, and in an even more radical way, the Eucharist comes from heaven.
Third connection: The Ark of the Covenant and the tabernacle
Here is a third connection that I find really intriguing, and I am speaking now very much as a Catholic.
Remember in the Book of Exodus, the Israelites are given instructions to build the Ark of the Covenant. Read it — it is wonderful. There are detailed instructions about what the ark should look like, how it is made, how big it is, and so on. What was placed inside the ark, this most sacred vessel? The remnants of the Ten Commandments — Moses broke them against Mount Sinai, and so the pieces went in there. Also, the staff of Aaron, the first great priestly figure. But what is the third thing in the Ark of the Covenant? Manna. They took some of the manna and put it in the ark to remind them of this bread from heaven that sustained them on their journey, and they kept it. The Ark of the Covenant — before it was lost around the time of Jeremiah — was the center of Israelite life. It was at the heart of the temple. Their worship was focused upon it.
Is there something like the Ark of the Covenant in the Catholic setting? You bet. You go into a Catholic church — it is a place where we gather to pray, yes, a place where we sing hymns, yes, all of that — but why is a Catholic church a sacred place? Not because of any of that. It is a sacred place because it is the Domus Dei, the house of the Lord. Because in the Catholic church there resides the Eucharist, the real presence of Jesus. And where do we keep it? We keep it in a version of the Ark of the Covenant: the tabernacle in a Catholic church, which becomes the focal point of our prayer and adoration, hearkening back to the Ark of the Covenant.
I remember when I was in Los Angeles as an auxiliary bishop, we had a retreat every year at what we called the House of Prayer for Priests, a lovely place in LA. It had a smaller chapel. I used to love to pray there because the tabernacle was built just like the Ark of the Covenant, and it was a favorite place of mine to go and pray. It is exactly this connection.
Yes, we consume the Eucharist at Mass — that is the point of it. But we also, as the Israelites kept a bit of the manna, keep the Eucharist in the tabernacle. I cannot tell you how many times in parishes and dioceses the spiritual life is renewed when the people adore the Blessed Sacrament — when first a few, then more, then many, then an army begins to adore the Blessed Sacrament. Parishes and dioceses come back to life. The Ark of the Covenant held the manna, and now it holds the Eucharist.
Fourth connection: Food for the journey, not for the destination
Here is a final connection between manna and the Eucharist. Manna was appreciated by ancient Israel as bread for the journey, not food for the destination.
As the Israelites were journeying through the desert and were hungry, they were given manna to eat. But it was always understood — and indeed confirmed — that when they got to the promised land flowing with milk and honey, they would not need the manna anymore. And so as Israel passes across the Jordan, goes around Jericho, and enters into the promised land, we are told the manna ceased.
Here is the connection. The Eucharist is Jesus really, truly, and substantially present — but under sacramental signs. Do we see him, to use Thomas Aquinas's language, in his proper species, his proper appearance, in the Eucharist? No. We see him according to a sacramental species. We see him veiled. Real, true, and substantial, yes indeed, but sacramentally veiled. That is the food we eat as we are on the way.
Will the Eucharist give way? Yes. Will there be the Eucharist in heaven? No. Not because it is no good, but because we are then ushered into the promised land of heaven, where we commune with the Lord face to face, where we see him in his proper species, where we have left the desert and that long journey through it and have come to the promised land — the place flowing with milk and honey, the place of heaven. In heaven, the sacramental signs give way because the reality appears.
It is a bit like this: I cannot look at the sun directly, but I can see it reflected in the light of the moon. I can spend all night contemplating the moon. But once I am in the presence of the sun and am able, with elevated eyes, to see it, I do not need to look at the moon. And so the Eucharist gives way in heaven, just as the manna gave way once they reached the promised land.
Let these sink in. That is the beauty of these typological images — they allow us to meditate upon different dimensions of this great mystery. Perhaps revisit the text about manna in the Book of Exodus, and then read John Chapter Six, and see these beautiful connections and resonances. God bless you.