Jesus took the loaves... and looking up to heaven, he said the blessing, broke them , and gave them to (his) disciples

Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Mark 6:34-44.
When he disembarked and saw the vast crowd, his heart was moved with pity for them, for they were like sheep without a shepherd; and he began to teach them many things.
By now it was already late and his disciples approached him and said, "This is a deserted place and it is already very late.
Dismiss them so that they can go to the surrounding farms and villages and buy themselves something to eat."
He said to them in reply, "Give them some food yourselves." But they said to him, "Are we to buy two hundred days' wages worth of food and give it to them to eat?"
He asked them, "How many loaves do you have? Go and see." And when they had found out they said, "Five loaves and two fish."
So he gave orders to have them sit down in groups on the green grass.
The people took their places in rows by hundreds and by fifties.
Then, taking the five loaves and the two fish and looking up to heaven, he said the blessing, broke the loaves, and gave them to (his) disciples to set before the people; he also divided the two fish among them all.
They all ate and were satisfied.
And they picked up twelve wicker baskets full of fragments and what was left of the fish.
Those who ate (of the loaves) were five thousand men.


Commentary of the day : Pope Benedict XVI
"Jesus took the loaves... and looking up to heaven, he said the blessing, broke them , and gave them to (his) disciples"

"Without Sunday we cannot live" - takes us back to the year 304, when the Emperor Diocletian forbade Christians, on pain of death, from possessing the Scriptures, from gathering on Sundays to celebrate the Eucharist and from building places in which to hold their assemblies. In Abitene, a small village in present-day Tunisia, 49 Christians were taken by surprise one Sunday while they were celebrating the Eucharist... They were arrested and taken to be interrogated... There they replied to the charges: "Sine dominico non possumus": that is, we cannot live without joining together on Sunday to celebrate the Eucharist. We would lack the strength to face our daily problems and not to succumb.

In taking flesh, the Son of God could become Bread and thus be the nourishment of his people, of us, journeying on in this world towards the promised land of Heaven. We need this Bread to face the fatigue and weariness of our journey. Sunday, the Lord's Day, is a favourable opportunity to draw strength from him, the Lord of life. The Sunday precept is not, therefore, an externally imposed duty, a burden on our shoulders. On the contrary, taking part in the Celebration, being nourished by the Eucharistic Bread and experiencing the communion of their brothers and sisters in Christ is a need for Christians, it is a joy; Christians can thus replenish the energy they need to continue on the journey we must make every week.