Ite, missa est
Notes
Transcript
Back in 2018 I was sitting in Ratana surrounded by clergy from across the Diocese, and I was feeling pretty grumpy. I was at the Diocesan Leaders Family Camp, and I was feeling unsettled because I was in the middle of my ‘disestablish the church’ phase - I was working at the Cathedral, and was deeply struggling with the divide between lay and clergy - and in particular why the Eucharist was so formal, served in silver chalices and patens, and could only be distributed by the few special people in white robes.
I wasn’t having a crisis of faith so much as a crisis about the formality and structure of the church. I wondered how much those first disciples would have recognised if they walked through the door, and I was almost at the stage of walking away from the Cathedral, or possibly even church in general.
But while I was at Ratana I felt the presence of God in a way I hadn’t before - and the deeply ironic knowledge that God was calling ME to ordination - the very thing I was rallying against. God has a great sense of humour.
Now, if I’m brutally honest - I still have questions about the nature of how we celebrate the Eucharist within the Anglican church - but I’m not going to dive down that wormhole too deeply today.
But it’s useful to have a quick surface level skim across some broader history. In the early church the Eucharist usually formed part of a meal in a home setting with all manner of people present - the pagan writer Celsus dismissed Christianity as a silly religion, fit only for the uneducated, slaves, and… women. These early church members didn’t always get it right - in fact our first reading today follows on immediately from a scathing rebuke from Paul to the church in Corinth who were apparently holding private, drunken feasts for the wealthy while the poor in their community went hungry.
Things changed when the emperor Constantine made Christianity the state religion - Eucharist became infused with pomp and elements of pagan ceremony - it all became more stylised and fixed. As Rachel Held Evans puts it:
Solemn chants replaced the familiar hymns, vestured processions the mealtime banter. Christians no longer gathered around crowded tables but instead stood before altars of stone over which only priests could preside.
Things changed again with the tumult of the Protestant reformation - some radicals dispensed with formal communion altogether, and returned to shared meals.
I admit that is a very broad summary, glossing over a lot of nuance and intricacy - but here we are today, with debates continuing to rage within the church about how Eucharist is served. This article from the Guardian earlier this month made me feel quite grumpy:
Church of England refuses call for gluten-free wafers and non-alcoholic wine
The Anglican Church in New Zealand is, thankfully, less prescriptive. Our only requirement about the bread and wine is that:
The bread for the Eucharist should be a good quality bread (either loaf or wafer) and the wine for the Eucharist should be a good quality wine.
This is one I take seriously, because it aligns with my theological understanding of the Eucharist - which is why we have non-alcoholic wine rather than grape juice.
But there is one significant thing that I’m extremely grateful for. Within the Anglican Church in New Zealand there is no limitation on who can receive Eucharist.
The 1662 Book of Common Prayer dictates that “there shall none be admitted to the holy Communion, until such time as he be confirmed, or be ready and desirous to be confirmed” -
within the New Zealand context this has been replaced by “All the baptised may receive communion.” Even the most pernickety NZ Anglican deep thinker I know concedes that “there is nowhere in our formally agreed liturgies that indicates that baptism is required to receive communion. In fact the opposite: at communion time, all present are invited forward to receive communion.”
The barriers are dropped. There is no requirement to be baptised, or Anglican or… well, anything. My default philosophy is ‘if this is meaningful for you, then welcome!’
And to be perfectly blunt this, along with my call to ordination, is what helped me see just how much Jesus loves the church. At the cathedral I slowly came to realise that it wasn’t the person serving the meal that was important - it was the people who were receiving it. Moira, the most beautiful prayer warrior, received alongside the man who slept in a tent on the cathedral grounds, alongside the elderly gentleman who would verbally attack the Dean at every AGM, alongside the choir member who didn’t quite know if they believed in God. None of them, and none of us, can truly consider ourselves perfect and worthy of receiving the body and blood of Christ - but Jesus invites us anyway.
As the former Archibishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams puts it:
One of the most transformingly surprising things about Holy Communion is that it obliges you to see the person next to you as wanted by God.
Each and every one of us is wanted by God.
Over the past three years you’ve probably worked out that language fascinates me. So far (other than that quote that’s on screen now!) I’ve only used the word Eucharist to describe the meal Jesus gave us, because that’s more or less the default Anglican name.
Now the word Eucharist comes from the Greek word eucharistia, which more or less means thanksgiving - Jesus uses the word in our Luke passage where he gives thanks for the bread.
What other words do we use to describe this meal?
Communion - communio - fellowship, sharing, mutual participation
Lord’s supper - kyriakon deipnon - belonging to the kyrios (Lord) - realignment to purpose - only appears in our 1 Corinthians reading
Mass - Ite, missa est - Go, it is sent - empowered by God and sent out to live the Gospel in the world. Final bit of Catholic liturgy.
I love the way these names are a bit like looking into a kaleidoscope pointed at the same thing - it’s thanksgiving, fellowship, sharing, realignment, and sending all in the one moment.
There is so much to continue unpacking, experiencing, and learning about the The Lord’s Supper - but it’s also very simple - it’s a moment that links us in and connects us to past, present and future. It looks back to the Passover - draws the disciples and us into the current moment - then points to what is yet to come. But it’s not just remembering - it’s a sacrament - and it does transform people in ways that I can’t quite understand.
In his last night with his disciples, Jesus doesn’t give an speech, or dictate a liturgy, or leave us with a pithy one-liner - he gives us an action. Eat this and remember me. It’s like the food memories we talked about a few weeks ago - every time you eat the bread, or drink the wine - remember Jesus - why he was born, why he lived, why he died, and why he rose again.
But here’s the thing. Jesus invites us to his table - but he also calls us to live and act in the way that he did. And that includes, I believe, inviting people to your table. And not just the familiar, comfortable friends you know - but those who you don’t. Those who are different to you, those who will challenge you, hold a mirror up to you. Even Judas ate bread with Jesus at that last meal.
Given that all are welcome at the table - who isn’t here? Who are you inviting to share in the grace that you are so freely given? Who needs to experience the welcome of Jesus and invitation to his table? And just as important - who is not at our own tables at home? Again - who needs to experience the welcome of Jesus and invitation to the table through your own hospitality?
Now, the way I see it is that this isn’t extra for experts - rather, this is the call of all who follow Jesus. Jesus called his disciples, and us to
And he said to them, “Go into all the world and proclaim the good news to the whole creation.
Now, hospitality is not the only way to proclaim the good news - but I’m convinced it’s the easiest one - and definitely one that was embedded in the life of Jesus. But it’s something we’ve largely forgotten how to do as a society - you only have to look back a generation to remember how normal this used to be, inviting people over - or even inviting yourself around to visit other people. This is also evident when we compare the survey from three years ago to the one a few weeks back - while there is a positive increase in the number of people who feel loved and accepted in our congregation and feeling good enough about St Mike’s to invite others - the answer to the question ‘Within the past month I have welcomed another member of St Michael’s into my home’ shows a nearly 20% decrease in this happened - but this is coupled with half of the people who haven’t wanting to change. It is admittedly a small sample size - but it’s still significant.
I suspect most of us think we still we do this well, but let’s not take it for granted. I’d encourage you to have a deep look at how you are in this space. If you think you’re doing it well then awesome - that’s great! But you may also find that it’s a muscle that you need to develop. Maybe you need to get used to inviting people from church around regularly - then start inviting your neighbours, colleagues, or friends that don’t attend church. It’s up to you to make the decision about how you respond.
When you receive Eucharist today, take time to look at the people around you - and remind yourself that each and every person here is wanted by God. We are God’s guests - we have experienced the hospitality of God in Christ - so our response has to be to extend hospitality to others - because you will never meet a person that isn’t wanted and loved by God.
