Ordinary Pita Bread
Is Extraordinary

Today, as we celebrate Abraham Lincoln’s and Charles Darwin’s birthdays, it is only right that we talk about bread. Not just any bread but fresh Pita Bread made daily by a local Middle Eastern grocery store.

Lincoln is known for being a person of substance. In a few words he could eloquently state a thought simply. Bread is the substance of life for most humans and Pita bread is an early form as well as present form of bread.

Bread has evolved since the first Pita bread but still Pita bread remains delicious, especially when it is made fresh at my friend’s Attari’s Supermarket. It is one of the small wonders of the world, like the ones in nature that Darwin saw deeply into.

Yesterday I heard a radio show on National Public Radio Speaking of Faith series called: Evolution and Speaking of Wonder, Understanding Charles Darwin. Contrary to popular opinion, it turns out that Charles Darwin took religion seriously and made observations on the natural world that spoke of God. It was just that he did so outside of the Victorian idea of God at the time “who had fixed every detail — including every social flaw and injustice — at the beginning of time.” Darwin saw God in all things and in the evolution of nature.

Back to the basics, bread. Just as Lincoln saw the substance of life and what was important, Darwin saw the wonder and beauty of nature. Both believed in God.

Pita bread is like the unleavened everyday bread of the time of Jesus. We Catholics believe that Jesus took ordinary pita bread of the time, blessed it, broke it and gave it to his disciples to eat saying: “Take, this is my Body.” Ordinary bread becomes the body of Christ.

Much is made of Lincoln as an ordinary guy who became an extraordinary President.

So it is only right at these celebrations of ordinary persons who became extraordinary persons of history that we take this ordinary pita bread and remind ourselves of what is the substance of life and how we can live our ordinary life in an extraordinary way each day.

(This pita bread will soon join the Just Trade list.)

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