592. What is the sense of the petition “Give us this day our daily bread”? (part 3 continuation)

592. What is the sense of the petition “Give us this day our daily bread”? (part 3 continuation)      

(Comp 592 repetition) Asking God with the filial trust of children for the daily nourishment which is necessary for us all we recognize how good God is, beyond all goodness. We ask also for the grace to know how to act so that justice and solidarity may allow the abundance of some to remedy the needs of others.

“In brief”

(CCC 2861) In the fourth petition, by saying "give us," we express in communion with our brethren our filial trust in our heavenly Father. "Our daily bread" refers to the earthly nourishment necessary to everyone for subsistence, and also to the Bread of Life: the Word of God and the Body of Christ. It is received in God's "today," as the indispensable, (super-) essential nourishment of the feast of the coming Kingdom anticipated in the Eucharist.

To deepen and explain

(CCC 2832) As leaven in the dough, the newness of the kingdom should make the earth "rise" by the Spirit of Christ (Cf. AA 5). This must be shown by the establishment of justice in personal and social, economic and international relations, without ever forgetting that there are no just structures without people who want to be just. (CCC 2833) "Our" bread is the "one" loaf for the "many." In the Beatitudes "poverty" is the virtue of sharing: it calls us to communicate and share both material and spiritual goods, not by coercion but out of love, so that the abundance of some may remedy the needs of others (Cf. 2 Cor 8:1-15).    

Reflection

(CCC 2834) "Pray and work" (Cf. St. Benedict, Regula, 20, 48). "Pray as if everything depended on God and work as if everything depended on you" (Attributed to St. Ignatius Loyola, cf. Joseph de Guibert, SJ, The  Jesuits: Their Spiritual Doctrine and Practice, (Chicago: Loyola University Press, 1964), 148, n. 55). Even when we have done our work, the food we receive is still a gift from our Father; it is good to ask him for it with thanksgiving, as Christian families do when saying grace at meals. [END]  

(Next question: What is the specifically Christian sense of this petition?)