Christ the Cornerstone

Our encounter with Jesus starts in the breaking of the bread

“Stay with us, Lord, for it is nearly evening and the day is almost over” (Lk 24:29).

The Gospel reading for the Third Sunday of Easter tells the wonderful story of the two disciples on the road to Emmaus (Lk 24:13-35).

Two rather obscure disciples of Jesus (only one, Cleopas, is named) leave Jerusalem three days after Jesus’ crucifixion. In spite of the fact that they have been told about the empty tomb, they are filled with sadness. All their hopes seem to be unfulfilled, and as they walk toward Emmaus, a village seven miles from Jerusalem, they share their disappointment with each other.

A stranger accompanies them and asks what they are discussing. The disciples are amazed at the stranger’s unfamiliarity with the recent events in Jerusalem. “Are you the only visitor to Jerusalem who does not know of the things that have taken place there in these days?” they ask him. “What sort of things?” the stranger replies. They said to him, “The things that happened to Jesus the Nazarene, who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, how our chief priests and rulers both handed him over to a sentence of death and crucified him” (Lk 24:18-20).

The disciples explain that they had hoped Jesus “would be the one to redeem Israel” (Lk 24:21) but now that hope appears to have been crushed. The stranger whom they do not recognize, but who we know is the risen Jesus, says, “Oh, how foolish you are! How slow of heart to believe all that the prophets spoke! Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory?” (Lk 24:25-26)

Then, St. Luke tells us, “Beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them what referred to him in all the Scriptures” (Lk 24:27).

In spite of Jesus’ efforts to open their minds and hearts by teaching them what the Scriptures foretold, the disciples don’t get it. They still do not know who the stranger is. As a result, they can’t possibly understand the truth about the Messiah, “the one to redeem Israel” (Lk 24:21).

The truth is that Christian faith is not an ideology or even merely a collection of religious and moral teachings. It’s an encounter with a person. As Pope Francis pointed out recently in one of his weekly audiences:

Evangelization is more than just simple doctrinal and moral transmission. It is, first and foremost, witness—one cannot evangelize without witness—witness of the personal encounter with Jesus Christ, the incarnate Word in which salvation is fulfilled.

In the story of the disciples’ experience on the road to Emmaus, the personal encounter with Jesus that is essential to their understanding of what took place in Jerusalem happens “in the breaking of the bread” (Lk 24:35). Only when they have invited the stranger to stop in the village and eat with them, do they have the profound religious experience that opens their minds and hearts and reveals to them the Word incarnate, the risen Lord.

The “breaking of the bread” (the holy Eucharist) is the place where the disciples encounter Jesus. The disciples do not recognize him at first because they are “slow of heart” and, therefore, incapable of grasping the truth that is right before their eyes. The eucharistic encounter with Jesus that occurs in the meal they share makes a profound difference in their lives. It prompts them to turn around and return to Jerusalem so that they can share their experience with Peter and the rest of the disciples.

That makes them what Pope Francis would call “Spirit-filled evangelizers,” and it is Christ’s gift of himself in the breaking of the bread that nourishes them in their mission to spread the good news, saying: “Were not our hearts burning within us while he spoke to us on the way and opened the Scriptures to us?” (Lk24:32)

The National Eucharistic Revival sponsored by the bishops of the United States is intended to inspire and prepare the people of God to be formed, healed, converted, united and sent out to a hurting and hungry world through a renewed encounter with Jesus in the Eucharist—the source and summit of our Catholic faith.

We bishops pray that all Catholics, but especially those who no longer participate actively in the Sunday Eucharist, will have an “Emmaus experience” that touches their hearts and causes them to burn with a holy zeal for Christ and his Church.

When this “pastoral and missionary conversion” happens, our hearts will be opened and with St. Peter’s successor, Pope Francis, and all the disciples throughout the ages, we will joyfully proclaim, “The Lord has truly been raised and has appeared to Simon!” (Lk 24:34) †