Give us this day our daily bread

"'Give us today our daily bread'. When you are in Heaven, God alone will be your nourishment. Beatitude will be your food. But here, you still need bread and since you are the children of God, it is only fair to say: “Father, give us some bread”. Are you afraid He will not hear you? Oh! No! [...] But when you pray the Father, you do not turn to a friend of the earth, but you apply to the Perfect Friend Who is the Father of Heaven. That is why I say to you: “Ask, and it will be given to you, search, and you will find, knock and the door will be opened to you”.

Wording:

• Latin: Panem nostrum quotidiánum da nobis hódie;
• English: Give us this day our daily bread.

In his book The Prayer of the Our Father. A Renewed Look, Msgr. Pierre-Marie Carré, questions:

"With this request begins the second part of the Our Father, the one that concerns the fundamental needs of human beings on earth. This request may seem very simple at first glance. In fact, it is particularly complex.

"[...] What does 'bread' mean? Through this image, one thinks that Jesus means all basic food for the body, varying according to continents and cultures. The request is for 'today'. Prayer is an attitude of trust in which what matters is the present moment: we should not worry about tomorrow, says Jesus (see Matthew 6:34).

The most difficult term is the one translated as 'of this day'. The Greek term used is found nowhere else and is very difficult to interpret. It can designate the bread we need, the one necessary for our existence, in a word, daily bread. Thus, from a temporal point of view, it would be the simple confirmation of the adverb 'today'. But it can also designate the 'coming' bread, the one that God will give at the eternal feast, and therefore be the announcement of food for eternal life. It can also indicate the 'superessential' bread, that is, the Bread of Life, the Body of Christ, without which we do not have Life in us."

This temporal and spiritual meaning is indeed found in the teachings of Jesus.

In the Work of Maria Valtorta

Catechesis of July 7, 1943

In the work of Maria Valtorta, this teaching is given by Jesus at the very beginning of his dictations. During this period, he deepens, for our time, the fundamentals of the Christian faith, including the Lord's Prayer: the Our Father. He takes care to bring material needs back to the spiritual level in his comments. The bread is also a spiritual bread because "man does not live by bread alone"

"'Give us this day our daily bread'.

I said this day and I said bread. I never say anything useless.

This day. Ask the Father for help day by day. It is a measure of Prudence, justice, and humility.

Prudence: if you had everything at once, you would waste a great deal. You are eternal children and capricious, in addition. The gifts of God should not be wasted. Furthermore, if you had everything, you would forget God.

Justice: Why should you have everything at once when I received help from the Father day by day? And would it not be unjust to think that it is well for God to give you everything together, secretly considering, with human solicitude, that-one never knows-it is good to receive everything today, in the fear that God will not provide tomorrow? Distrust-you do not reflect on this-is a sin. God must not be distrusted. He loves you perfectly. He is the most perfect Father. To ask for everything at once affronts trust and offends the Father.

Humility: having to ask day by day refreshes in your mind the concept of your nothingness, of your condition as poor ones, and of the All and Wealth of God.

Bread. I said 'bread' because bread is the king of foods, the one indispensable for life. With one word and in the word I have enclosed-so that all of you would request them-all the needs of your stay on earth. But as the temperature of your spirituality varies, so does the extent of the word.

'Bread as food' for those who have an embryonic spirituality, to such a degree that it is already a great deal if they are able to ask God for the food to fill their stomachs. There are some who do not ask for it and take it with violence, cursing God and their brothers and sisters. These are looked upon with wrath by the Father because they trample upon the precept from which the others come: 'Love your God with all your heart; love your neighbor as yourself'.

'Bread as help' in moral and material needs for those living not only for their stomachs, but who are able to live for thought as well, possessing a more highly-formed spirituality.

'Bread as religion' for those who, even more highly formed, place God before the satisfactions of sense and of human sentiment and are already capable of spreading their wings in the supernatural.

'Bread as spirit, bread as sacrifice' for those who, once the full age of the spirit is reached, are able to live in spirit and in truth, concerning themselves with the flesh only to the extent that is strictly necessary to continue to exist in mortal life, until it is time to go to God. They have now chiseled themselves according to my model and are living copies of Me over whom the Father bends in a loving embrace."

On the gift of the Our Father

The giving of the Our Father to the Apostles takes place during the second Passover and in the absence of Judas who left to join his toxic relations of the Temple. Maria Valtorta's account is closer to the narrative of Luke 11:2-13 than to that of Matthew, who gathers the coherence of several teachings. Part of the teaching of the Our Father is found in Matthew 6:9-13 and another part in Matthew 7:7-11. Jesus gives the "bread" a material sense. Perhaps He wants to reassure the Apostles who had to leave everything to follow Him. In any case, Jesus also wants to reassure them about God's care for them: He will provide for their needs.

"When you are in Heaven, God alone will be your nourishment. Beatitude will be your food. But here, you still need bread and since you are the children of God, it is only fair to say: “Father, give us some bread”. Are you afraid He will not hear you? Oh! No! Just think: If one of you has a friend and, if he finds out that he has no bread to offer another friend or relative, who has arrived in the middle of the night, and he goes to his friend saying: “Lend me three loaves, because a guest has arrived and I have nothing to give him to eat”, can he possibly hear his friend answer him from inside the house: “Do not bother me, I have already bolted the door and my children are already sleeping beside me. I cannot get up and give you what you want”? No. If he has gone to a true friend and if he insists, he will receive what he asks for. He would receive it even if he went to someone who was not a very good friend. He would be satisfied because of his insistence, as his friend, of whom he asked the favour, will hasten to give him what he wants, so that he may no longer be bothered.

But when you pray the Father, you do not turn to a friend of the earth, but you apply to the Perfect Friend Who is the Father of Heaven. That is why I say to you: “Ask, and it will be given to you, search, and you will find, knock and the door will be opened to you”. For the one who asks will receive, the one who searches always finds, the one who knocks will have the door opened to him. What father among you would hand his son a stone when he asked for bread? Or hand him a snake instead of a roasted fish? A father who did that to his own children would be a criminal. I have already told you and I will repeat it to convince you to be good and trustful. As a sound-minded person would not give a scorpion instead of an egg, with what greater bounty will God give you what you ask for! Because He is good, whereas you are more or less wicked. Ask, therefore, the Father for your bread with humble filial love."

To go further

• Our Father
• Our Father who art in Heaven
• Hallowed be Thy Name
• Thy Kingdom come
• Thy will be done on earth as it is in Heaven
• Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us
• Lead us not into temptation
• But deliver us from evil

In the Catechism

The magisterial teaching on "Give us this day our daily bread" adds the necessity to share the "bread" with those who lack it. This aspect is taken up elsewhere in the Work of Maria Valtorta. For the rest, one finds confirmation and justification of trust in God and of the meaning, both material and spiritual, of the bread to give to all.

§ 2830 " Our bread." The Father, who gives us life, cannot but provide us with the food necessary for life, all the good things "suitable," material and spiritual. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus insists on this filial trust that cooperates with Our Father's Providence (cf. Matthew 6:25-34). He does not encourage us to passivity (cf. 2 Thessalonians 3:6-13) but wants to free us from all fostered anxiety and worry. Such is the filial abandonment of the children of God.

§ 2835 This request, and the responsibility it entails, also concerns another hunger from which men perish: "Man does not live by bread alone but by every word that comes from the mouth of God" (Matthew 4:4 with reference to Deuteronomy 8:3b), that is to say His Word and Spirit. Christians must mobilize all their efforts to "proclaim the Gospel to the poor." There is a hunger on earth, "not a hunger for bread nor a thirst for water, but to hear the word of the LORD" (Amos 8:11). It is why the specifically Christian meaning of this fourth petition concerns the Bread of Life: the Word of God to be homilized in faith, the Body of Christ received in the Eucharist (cf. John 6:26-58).

§ 2836 "Today" is also an expression of trust. The Lord teaches it to us (cf. Matthew 6:34; Exodus 16:19); our presumption could not have invented it. Since it is above all His Word and the Body of His Son, this "today" is not only that of our mortal time: it is the Today of God.

§ 2837 "Of this day." This word, epiousios, has no other use in the New Testament. Taken in a temporal sense, it is a pedagogical reprise of "today" (cf. Exodus 16:19-21) to confirm us in "unreserved" trust. Taken in a qualitative sense, it means what is necessary for life, and more broadly all good sufficient for subsistence (cf. 1 Timothy 6:8). Taken literally (epiousios: "super-essential"), it directly designates the Bread of Life, the Body of Christ.

Second part of the Bible, from the coming of Jesus Christ until the Apocalypse.