"Come have breakfast" are not quite the words you would expect coming out of the mouth of the Savior of the world. Yet again, they're exactly appropriate. How can one not smile when reading that phrase from this week's Gospel from John (21:1-19). Not only that, but it's Jesus himself doing the cooking!

   Sometimes Catholics don't put enough thought, enough effort, into the importance of hospitality, and that's exactly what Jesus was about in so many ways.

   Think about your own life. You run into an old friend at the grocery store one morning: "Let's stop for a cup of coffee and catch up." A neighbor calls out over the fence on a warm summer evening: "We're cooking out, come join us!" A nearly grown grandson stops by unexpectedly one morning: "Come, have breakfast!"

   We bring food to comfort grieving friends. We share pints of ice cream with a sister crying about a breakup. We make casseroles and baked goods for church potlucks. Gathering over a meal is a part of the tapestry of our lives.

   Sharing at table is a way to connect, grow closer. It's a way to enter into the lives of others. Over a meal, that which is so familiar, so ordinary, becomes a sacred moment in time, the stuff of which priceless memories are made. We become part of a divine presence by ourselves being a presence to others.

   Jesus knew this. Our Lord wants us to find him in the routines, the patterns, of our lives. I don't think he wants us to countdown the days pining for what will be in the life to come, as awesome as that might be. He first wants us to look around and find heaven in what we have right before our very eyes. Shouldn't we be looking into the eyes of others and there find Christ?

   Jesus said it well to Peter and the disciples that chilly morning on the beach with the tantalizing smell of sizzling fish filling the air. "If you love me, feed my lambs." God wants us to not only gather once a week for the breaking of the bread at Mass, but to also see the many opportunities for Eucharist in the ordinary of our lives. We need only to be part of the community, but also strive to build it.

   God wants us to joyfully gather at table in so many ways. The opportunities are right there for the taking.

   "Come, have breakfast!"