In the story of Jesus feeding the five thousand, it always says he took the bread, he blessed it and he gave it. It's the same in our Mass.

Monday, 8/1/16

Let’s look first at the reading from Jeremiah. In 597 B.C. When Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon had conquered Jerusalem, carrying off its leading citizens to Babylon, he replaced their lawful king Jeconiah with his uncle Zedekiah. (Then ten years further on, in 587, Nebuchadnezzar would carry off the remainder of Jerusalem’s people, leaving not a stone upon a stone in a devastated Jerusalem.)

While Jeremiah was predicting that by persisting on their sinful ways the people would bring complete ruin for the city and themselves, the false prophet Hananiah was gaining popularity by prophesying the good things the people wanted to hear.  

Now, although we think of the four Gospels as eye witness accounts of the miracles of Jesus, the evidence clearly proves that they were written about fifty years later. The Gospels story of feeding five thousand with just five loaves and two fish is the only miracles that is described in full in all four Gospels.

What is more, all four Gospels use the same sequence of verbs in describing what Jesus did with the bread. He took the loaves, he looked up, he broke the loaves, he blessed them, and he gave them. Most scholars think that their all using that same sequence of verbs was due to their  always saying it that way as they celebrated the Eucharist every Sunday for those fifty years.