“Panem et circenses.” I’m not a Latin scholar so I don’t know if I’m pronouncing that correctly. It is a line I am hearing more and more. Panem et circenses; bread and circuses. The line is attributed to Roman poet Juvenal from late in the first century. It means that in order to get public approval leaders do not have to show good public service, or appeal to morality, or have good public policies. What they really have to do is offer diversions and instant gratification. Give the general population food and entertainment and they’ll love you!
That phrase may be from almost 2000 years ago, but the fact that it endures to today shows that it is getting at something fundamental in humans. We like to be told what we want to hear. We want to be fed without hard work. We want comfort. We want entertainment. Give people that message and they’ll be happy.
Given the incredible luxuries we have in our lives today that not even the wealthiest could have dreamed of 150 years ago – think air conditioning, hot and cold running water, electricity, automobiles – you’d think we’d all be the happiest people to ever live in human history!
But, wait… no. Why?
Because people want ever more, and think they are entitled to ever more. And when they can’t get it they turn on each other and start blaming each other so as to get more.
I think that is a fair depiction of American culture, perhaps western culture, today.
I hear a lot about people in our own nation who do not have enough food, or about food deserts and food insecurity. I understand the dynamics they are getting at. And yet it is missing the point. We have a glut of food. It is cheap. It is easy. We wouldn’t have a public health crisis of obesity (and all that goes with it) otherwise! There may be poor nutrition, but there is food. It is economically possible – and not even all that expensive - for government agencies to make available to every person who wants it: milk, apples, potatoes, and walnuts. But I’m pretty sure people wouldn’t take it and they wouldn’t be satisfied.
As for circuses, well, literal circuses seem to be a thing of the past. But we do have our live entertainment. Sports! We build cathedrals to all sorts of sports and call them stadiums. We build new ones every few decades.
And look at the success of Dick’s Sporting Goods. Eastview Mall outperforms most malls, but its stores still struggle. Dick’s doesn’t.
There’s also fantasy sports; sports betting.
And of course there is youth sports – all too easy to pick on! They run our society. I’m not going to go bashing the dynamics that many parents struggle to navigate. Most parents I talk to feel like they’re in a bind. The sports are essential for their kids to not feel left out, but the sports really aren’t benefitting them all that much, if at all.
The ugly truth about our culture-wide obsession with sports is that it really doesn’t do anything to build us up. You certainly don’t want to build your sense of self-worth on the success of the Buffalo Bills! (Or the Cowboys, Eagles, or Steeles for that matter!) Some say that, where youth sports are concerned, they develop teamwork and discipline. But I’d say that’s a stretch. Sure, sports are fun to play. I don’t want to undermine that at all. But at the end of the day, they accomplish little that is tangible. They’re entertainment. They’re diversions. We need some of that, but not a culture built on it!
Panem et circenses – bread and circuses.
There should be little wonder why depression rates are high and people feel purposeless in life.
Alright, that’s a long enough introduction to get into Jesus’ great Feeding of the 5000 Miracle. Your mind may easily jump to, “Didn’t Jesus just give them bread? And weren’t the miracles ultimately a great show?” Indeed, that would be a logical ‘bread and circuses’ response! But that is a misunderstanding.
If you can remember our gospel readings from the last few weeks, you’ll remember that Jesus is being hounded by the crowds. He tries to get away for some time of restoration. He also wants to get away for some time with his disciples, but he isn’t having much luck.
Our gospel reading today opens with the disciples returning from their first missionary trips. They are tired. Jesus says to them, “Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest a while.” But despite going to a deserted place the crowds follow them. Mark’s gospel tells us they were like sheep without a shepherd.
Now what are they supposed to do? Jesus is tired. The disciples are tired. What Jesus does is have compassion for the crowd. He somehow digs up whatever strength is necessary within himself to continue ministering to them.
I think people today are like sheep without a shepherd. Like I said before, depression rates are high. People’s lives feel pointless. They don’t know where they’re going in life; if they’re going anywhere at all!
They have their bread. They have their circuses. And many say they are, “spiritual but not religious,” but that sort of self-made faith isn’t giving them what they need.
They need Jesus! Jesus is the true bread of life.
They need Jesus and we are Jesus’ disciples, whose role it is to give them that bread.
Notice what happens in the Feeding of the 5000 Miracle. Jesus says to the disciples, “You give them something to eat.” Remember, the disciples have just gotten back from their first missionary journeys and they need a place to rest. Jesus’ instructions to them before he sent them out were, “…take nothing for their journey except a staff: no bread, no bag, no money in their belts.”
They’ve just gotten back and Jesus says, “You give them something to eat.”
How?!? How could they possibly do that? They have no bread. They have no money… at Jesus’ command!
Somehow, out of nothing, in their tiredness they manage to come up with five loaves and two fish.
Then, Jesus like a shepherd, orders them to get all the people to sit down in orderly groups on the green grass. The crowd sat in groups of hundreds and fifties. This is not a crazy mob. This is an organized event.
Then Jesus blesses the food and he gives them to the disciples, who in turn give it to the crowds. Notice that: from Jesus, to the disciples, to the crowds. That’s our pattern for discipleship.
Our translations overlook a verb in verse 41 that is in Greek is in the imperfect tense. It would more accurately read, “and [Jesus] was continuously giving [the bread] to his disciples to set before the people.” It wasn’t a situation of – Poof, a huge pile of bread! It is a situation of the disciples giving to the people and then coming back to Jesus over and over again to get more bread.
So there we have the picture for our discipleship. Jesus is still Jesus. We are the disciples. We may feel like we have nothing of value to give. We’re spent. We’re tired. There’s no way we can come up with what is needed to solve the problem. Perhaps people today are like sheep without a shepherd. Yet they don’t realize it. They have their bread and circuses. They don’t want to hear anything about commitment and discipline and discipleship. How do we respond to that?
We respond to it by letting that be God’s problem! It is not our problem to fix. I think that is where a lot of good intentions fail. People don’t see how it can really help and so they give up. But that is the wrong approach. Jesus fixed the feeding problem, not the disciples. What we do is focus on our own discipleship. We put effort into on our own spiritual journeys and needs. We continue to listen, to learn, to pray, and also to serve. What we do is be faithful disciples in the midst of the world’s ongoing problems.
We entrust Jesus with the meagerness that we do have. Just like the feeding miracle, with an insignificant amount Jesus turns it into an abundance. We prioritize our own lives towards the goodness of God. As the disciples of today we then return to Jesus over and over and over again, and we set his abundance before those who need it. God is still providing abundantly.
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