The Soul of Bread

by: a Madonna House Staff worker


"I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never be hungry; he who believes in me will never thirst." (Gospel of John, 6:35)

To bake bread, what a gift this is! Bread is a universal food, an essential food, a sacred food. Almost every country of the world has its own kind of bread, from the flat unleavened chapatti of India, to the long, thin loaves of France, to the round soda breads of Ireland, to the innumerable shapes and flavors and textures of the breads of all continents.

Bread unites us to all men. It must be because bread is so universal that Jesus gave it to us as his own Body. When you bake, you can sense the presence of a woman humming, of a woman patting flat tortillas, of a woman somewhere hauling wood for her winter fire, of a woman showing her small daughter how to knead bread. In bread, Louis DeGouy says, "One feels the sun on wheat fields; one smells the freshness of earth; one savors the fragrant sweetness of honey. In bread is the union of God, man and woman: the Father sends rain to the thirsty earth, bringing to life the grains which man harvests and which are ground into flour, shaped and transformed by woman, in the silence and warmth of her kitchen–into bread – food for all."

Bread is like no other food. It seems made only to be given, to be broken, to be shared. In baking bread you have the gift of making the food that is present at each meal, the food which each person will eat. And what a joy to be able to give a fresh loaf to a visitor, wrapped, with maybe a little note, to take on his travels, to bring to his family, to give to his friends. Even as our Lord shared his Body with all of us–so we have the gift of sharing bread which in so many ways is a symbol of our life, too.

Visitors remark about the goodness of Madonna House bread, as if it were like nothing they had ever tasted before. Small wonder, really. Into our bread goes milk fresh from our cows, and it is baked in an oven heated by wood gathered from our valley. But even more than these ingredients, our bread is a work of love. In it is the salt of many tears–tears shed for all men, as the baker prays in the quiet of the bakery. Hands longing to work for the Lord, to serve him, to do his will, mix the dough, knead it, shape it. A heart longing to give itself to her brothers and sisters is worked into the dough. The bread rises, bakes, a gift for all.

Bread is so ordinary, the food that's always present, nothing too fancy or complicated, no elaborate designs or unusual shapes to attract attention. Just a little brown loaf with perhaps a cross on the top, waiting quietly, unobtrusively at the table, to be sliced, spread with jam, warmed for toast, buttered, dipped in gravy. It is simply there to be used and enjoyed; it doesn't matter how. Perhaps just to be nibbled!

But it is in this very ordinariness that bread finds its chief glory. A dirty little manger, rough and covered with the smell of animals, became the first throne of glory of the King of Kings. Rugged fishermen, unshaven, with the wind and sea in their clothes and hair, were the first called to help build the Lord's kingdom. And all the little forgotten nobodies of all times and places–the rejected, unwanted, the "losers," the poor and suffering–these are God's people, chosen from eternity. In the same way bread, one of the humblest and most ordinary of foods, was chosen to be the food to be transformed into the Body of Christ. "You gave them the bread already prepared, sustaining every delight, satisfying every taste" (Wis. 16:20).

Copyright: Madonna House Publications – With Permission under a Creative Commons License.