An Apologetical Explanation of

Our Daily Bread

What does the Lord’s Prayer mean when we pray, “Give us this day our daily bread”?

“I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you shall eat or what you shall drink, nor about your body, what you shall put on.  Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing?  Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them.  Are you not of more value than they?… Therefore do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’  For the Gentiles seek all these things; and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all.  But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things shall be yours as well.”  (Mt 6:25-33)

The petition for “our daily bread” is an expression of trust in God to provide for our earthly needs; it also refers to our spiritual food, the Eucharist, which is the Body of Christ, the Bread of Life.

Though the Lord directs our eyes to the essential, to the “one thing necessary,” he also knows about and acknowledges our earthly needs.  While he says to his disciples, “Do not be anxious about your life, what you shall eat” (Mt 6:25), he nevertheless invites us to pray for our food and thus to turn our care over to God.  (Pope Benedict XVI, Jesus of Nazareth, 150)

Common bread is emblematic of our fundamental human need to eat.  We speak of a worker “putting bread on the table,” meaning that he or she works to provide the basic food and essentials that a family needs to survive.  When we ask God to “give us this day our daily bread,” we are asking that our human needs be met.  Yet in the Lord’s Prayer, this petition is more than a simple request: It also implies a trust in God will provide for us, a trust in his Divine Providence (cf. Mt 6:25-34).  Even if we work for our bread (cf. 2 Thes 3:6-13), it is still a gift from god that calls for our gratitude.  (Cf. CCC 2828-2830, 2834, 2836)

There are other dimensions to this petition.  It also reminds us that we share responsibility for those in the world who do not have their basic needs fulfilled: the hungry, the homeless, the oppressed, etc.   It also reminds that “man does not live by bread alone” (Dt 8:3; Lk 4:4; cf. Mt 4:4), that we need to be nourished also by Christ, the Bread of Life (Jn 6:35, 38), present in the Eucharist and in the Word of God.  (Cf. CCC 2831-2833, 2835, 2837)

To those who seek the kingdom of God and his righteousness, he has promised to give all else besides.  Since everything indeed belongs to God, he who possesses god wants for nothing, if he himself is not found wanting before God.  (St. Cyprian, De Dom. orat., 21: PL 4, 534 A)

The Catechism addresses this question in paragraph 2830.

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