Stones to Bread
Why Are Our Communion Meals So Paltry?
But I can think of no busier night than those two particular nights: Passover, when the Hebrews were readying for their journey from bondage to freedom. Who had time to cook and eat dinner? But God required a meal, however hastily it was eaten. Jesus had betrayal and death before him, and all of history to overturn on his night. Who had time or appetite for a meal? But the events of those nights were too important not to eat and remember.
I hunger, spirit and body, for the day when our Communion tables are freed from regimentation and parsimony, images of a cautious, lugubrious, measurable redemption so unlike the real table God has set before us. Let us find ways to extend the table to a fuller meal, if not every Communion service, then once a month or quarterly. It is now, in this world, when we are parched and starved, that the church needs the meal most. Let's eat the feast already given.
Copyright © 2012 Christianity Today. Click for reprint information.
Related Elsewhere:
Previous Christianity Today articles on communion and spirituality include:
Lessons from an Usher | What I learned about humility from a gentle greeter. (December 27, 2011)
Why Doubters and Non-Doubters Share a Common Faith | And why it's really not about "their" faith anyway. (September 1, 2011)
Atheists, the Eucharist, and a Controversial 'Cracker' | The Catholic League treads where no one needs to: the blogosphere. (Liveblog, July 10, 2008)
Previous Stones to Bread columns by Leslie Leyland Fields include:
Intercultural Fiesta Fail | 'We are all alike!' doesn't fly in a fly-infested hut in El Salvador. (November 21, 2011)
A Wordless Presence | Where spit, blood, and sweat are to be found, so is God. (September 14, 2011)
The Power and the Glamour | Searching for Beauty amid Hollywood's beautiful people. (July 25, 2011)
People of the Nook | What Bible smartphone apps tell us about the Book. (May 16, 2011)
Stones to Bread
Leslie Leyland Fields
Leslie Leyland Fields is a writer, speaker and professional editor who lives on Kodiak Island, Alaska in the winter and Harvester Island in the summer, where she works in commercial salmon fishing with her family. She cohosts "Off the Shelf" on KMXT Public Radio and is the author of Parenting Is Your Highest Calling, Surprise Child, and other books.
- The Cosmos's Best-Kept Secret
- Throwing Christ Over the Cliff
- A Pro-Life Plea This Election Season
- Intercultural Fiesta Fail
- A Wordless Presence
Grieving with the Good Friday God
La complejidad hispana: Todo cambió en el 2012
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David Mueller
Respectfully, perhaps the reason you feel like you and your church are doing a "pretend meal" is because you are--because you don't believe our Lord when He says simply and clearly, "Touto estin to soma mou." But the Church doesn't *need* the "larger" meal, because She believes it is just what He said it is--His body and His blood, given and shed for you for the forgiveness of sins. *That* is one fabulous feast. The "comments" of BJ above are getting at the point--this Meal isn't "stronger" or "more meaningful" because of what we do or how we do it. The Meal He instituted has all the power of His death and resurrection for the sins of the world in it, because the bread we eat, little wafer though it be, is His true body and the wine we drink, tiny sip thought it be, is His true blood. So to distract and detract from the Gift He gives by thinking a "bigger" meal or "potluck" (ala the Corinthians) makes it "better" is its own punishment: we despise His Supper, or lose it altogether.
Kathleen Kexel
My Pastor, when asked about Communion, will say that he considers the fellowship time after the formal service is over, when we sometimes have snacks that are equivalent to an entire meal to be our "true" Communion time. However, I understand why churches have just a wafer and a sip of juice. Remember when the Apostle Paul took the early church to task because some individuals practiced gluttony at the Lord's Table while others went hungry? He told the people to eat at home before coming together to worship. And that is what we have been doing for nearly 2000 years.
BJ
Your article is interesting. I always thought 1 cor 11 was rebuking the Corinthians for treating the Lord's Supper like a potluck dinner. That is why Paul wrote "So then, my brothers and sisters, when you gather to eat, you should all eat together. Anyone who is hungry should eat something at home, so that when you meet together it may not result in judgment." Anyone able to clarify this for me?