Father Tim Lemlin
So the next day the manager tells the waitress to give him four slices of bread. "How was your meal, sir?" the manager asks.
"It was good, but you could give a little more bread," comes the reply.
So the next day the manager tells the waitress to give him eight slices of bread. "How was your meal today, sir?" the manager asks.
"Good, but you could give a little more bread," comes the reply.
So . . . the next day the manager tells the waitress to give him a whole loaf of bread with his soup. "How was your meal, sir?" the manager asks, when he comes to pay.
"It was good, but you could give just a little more bread," comes the reply once again.
The manager is now obsessed with seeing this customer say that he is satisfied with his meal, so he goes to the bakery, and orders a six-foot-long loaf of bread. When the man comes in as usual the next day, the waitress and the manager cut the loaf in half, butter the entire length of each half, and lay it out along the counter, right next to his bowl of soup. The old man sits down, and devours both his bowl of soup, and both halves of the six-foot-long loaf of bread. The manager now thinks he will get the answer he is looking for, and when the old man comes up to pay for his meal, the manager asks in the usual way: "How was your meal TODAY, sir?"
The old man replies: "It was good as usual, but I see you are back to giving only two slices of bread!"
Are we ever satisfied? The people who chase after Jesus in our gospel reading today from John want more. They have been fed, but they want more from Jesus. The children of Israel "grumbled against Moses and Aaron." It is not enough that Moses has freed them from being slaves of the Egyptians, they want more. They want to be as comfortable as they now remember they were when they could feed their bellies with meat and bread. (It isn't unusual to remember life as being much better than it really was.) When they receive bread, they want meat to eat. When they get both, they complain that their diet is always the same. Then they complain that they are thirsty. Then they complain that they have been in the desert too long. Then they complain that they want to be more like the people that they meet periodically. They always want more. They are never satisfied.
A friend of mine recently said jokingly, "I used to want to receive a 100 million dollars. Today, you can buy a house for a 100 million dollars. Now I want to receive a billion dollars."
I know that when I do entertain the fantasy of winning the lottery (usually the fantasy comes along when I haven't bought a ticket), I have all these plans in which charities, friends and family members will benefit from my winnings. Then, I run out of money, so obviously the amount that I win has to be larger. Are we ever satisfied?
Like the elderly man and manager of our opening story we tend to get into a game with each other. My satisfaction is dependent upon my ability to satisfy you. Yet, I am never satisfied, so you can never be satisfied.
When we receive happiness exclusively from external things and people, the answer to this question is, "We are never satisfied." We always want more.
The path to God also involves the feeling of dissatisfaction. Most often, however, the dissatisfaction that we feel is because we have momentarily have been satisfied by God's touch and now we feel empty and alone. Ironically, the more aware we become of these encounters the more we want and the more satisfied we become. Maybe this is because when we are touched by God we experience happiness both externally and internally.
Silence seems to be the primary way that we can begin to become aware of the patterns in our lives. I encourage you to take moments of silence. Drive to work or the store or to school without the radio, or CD player turned on. Take a goal-less walk in the woods. Take a moment when you first rise, or before you retire, to be silent. Silence can be frightening at first, but it truly is our friend. It helps us see the patterns of our lives and the moments when God draws near and we are satisfied.
