It has been agreed upon that the sole Universal Language is that of Love. Because it is one that is understood and cuts across all existence (even though in some cases, we who know how to speak this language or about it tend to choose the way of apathy by blatantly refusing to speak it.) And just like any other Macrolanguage, it too, has dialects (or what we can refer to in this case as ‘love languages’).
Now, outside of the standard love language framework, we have seen one, though unlisted, seemingly take prevalence: food. In almost every culture, the sharing or offering of food has been held as a sign of hospitality/welcome, care, esteem, communion, provision, service, good health and well-being and on the end of the recipient, a sign of trust, mutual respect or appreciation.
The general or most natural ‘reflex question’ for many of us with regard to those we love or wish to accommodate is “have you had anything to eat?” and even more so, to save the best meals or food provisions for those we hold dear and consider close to our hearts. We see this in the suggestion of the disciples when they ask Jesus to “send the crowd away into the nearby villages so they can buy food for themselves” And this is typical of all of us who either belong to a particular race, are of a certain social class, profess a particular creed, have a particular political affiliation, or identify with a given community, name it.
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The tendency to look at anyone outside of ‘my people’ or ‘our people’ as alien and unfitting to benefit from the goods or possessions of our own for fears best known to ourselves, is one that is directly challenged by Jesus in His response to His disciples. And Jesus Himself, throughout the course of His life keeps undoing these circles we continually draw up by setting up tables that stretch beyond them.
We are faced today with issues of partialism, nepotism, racism, xenophobia, religious clusterism and genocides or tribalism, just to mention a few, because of this very way of ‘scarcity thinking’. Yet scarcity appears to be more of a fear problem than that of resource: the very evidence of the lack of Eucharistic Imagination which the Gospel images through the open hand of Jesus with everyone’s sense of belonging not being restricted by connections but lovingly guided by where life can be best served.
The love language of food becomes very radical in the hands of Jesus through invitations for all who “look to God to give them their ‘food’ in due season” to “come without paying and without cost” for all of us to see no need for the ‘other’ to go away in search of what we ourselves are already in possession of.
The even greater invitation today, is to not be the reason someone feels separated from the love of God on account of their race, tribe, creed or affiliation. Perhaps, this is the call for us to move from ownership to stewardship in our various capacities by not letting the ‘others’ go away to fend for themselves and not withholding anything but giving them the ‘food’ (hospitality/welcome, care, esteem, communion, provision, service, good health and well-being, etc.) ourselves.
