“This do in remembrance of Me.”
—
When my husband and I began attending the Episcopal church we now call home, I’m not ashamed to say it’s primarily because we were drawn to the rector of the church, Fr. Rob.
I still remember the first teachings we received from him, how they were sprinkled with references to Dallas Willard, C.S. Lewis, spiritual formation, and Celtic Christianity — all references that meant something to us personally. We were pretty smitten with him from the start. And when he later added a Sunday evening contemplative eucharist service to the mix of offerings at the church, we were hooked. That’s when we began attending regularly.
In truth, it was Fr. Rob’s spiritual leadership that first drew us to the Anglican tradition we’re now prayerfully considering making our permanent home.
But somewhere between what drew us to the church and where we stand today, the Eucharist became more meaningful to me. Somewhere along the line, I began to stare longingly at the large round symbol of Christ’s body that Fr. Rob held up each week while speaking Christ’s words about the bread. Somewhere in there, I came to love the sign of the cross he made over the plate of small wafers while saying, “By him, and with him, and in him,” then continuing with, “In the unity of the Holy Spirit,” while making the sign of a circle.
I know that, ecumenically speaking, the worldwide body of believers, present and past, believe different things about what happens during this portion of corporate worship. Our Catholic brothers and sisters believe in transubstantiation — the transformation of the bread and wine into the actual body and blood of Jesus. Those in the evangelical stream tend to view it more as an act of remembrance of Christ’s work for us on the cross. (And this is the way I viewed it throughout the whole of my life as a nondenominational Christian.)
The Anglican tradition, which holds the via media — the middle way — between Catholicism and Protestantism in the totality of its corporate expression of worship, tends toward the Catholic view in this particular sacrament by believing in the “real presence” of Christ in its enactment. This means, as I learned last Sunday in the weekly forum Fr. Rob is offering to “pilgrims on the Canterbury trail,” that when Paul spoke of this meal in 1 Corinthians 11 by quoting Christ’s words, “Do this in remembrance of me,” he used a word — anamnesis — that means “to make present,” to bring history into the present moment. As I heard it described last week, it is as though Christ was saying, “Do this, and I will be present.”
It is comforting to me to think that whatever I may be experiencing of Christ’s presence in my personal spiritual journey at any moment, the Eucharist is a place I will always find it.
How do you experience the presence of Christ in the Lord’s Supper?
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Okay, Ms. Squires, I know you know you’re preaching to the choir with me! However, I am just so intrigued with this journey you and Kirk have undertaken. If you haven’t already done so, look into the life story and subsequent ministry of Dr. Robert Weber. He has been a huge influence on my own understanding of Lectionary driven, liturgical-Sacramental theology and worship. He actually found his way from a Bob Jones University fundamentalist Christian expression into Anglicanism!
“Evangelicals on the Canterbury Trail” is a must read for you both. It described my own journey. It will help you continue contextualizing your own as well. I’m sure of it.
This is wonderful. I can’t wait to see where the Spirit takes you on this exciting new journey of faith and life!
Thanks, Rob. And thanks for the book recommendation. A friend just mentioned to me yesterday that she’s reading that same book!
Christianne, I second Rob’s recommendation of Weber. He has a whole series titled “Ancient-Future….”. In it he explores spirituality from an ancient/early church, liturgical, and post-modern perspective. It’s great stuff. Your experience with the Eucharist is a great story 🙂 As someone who feels called to stay with my Pentecostal roots, I also hold out hope that my “tribe” will develop a richer view of the Lord’s Table.
Amen, Paul! And thanks for seconding the recommendation!
Welcome aboard Christianne! About time you explore the richness of the Anglican tradition. As a former Baptist (and I still feel indebted to this tradition as well), I’ve always known that the Catholic blood continues to flow through my veins over all those years I was finding my “home”. I just knew at one point, that my Baptist days were going tone over because I was being drawn more and more to a liturgical and sacramental expressions of my faith. I sort of knew that I would eventually land into the via media – enjoying both my Protestant theology and my Catholic sacramentality and liturgy. I am a happy and proud Episcopalian—I say that, despite all the swirling controversies surrounding the denomination! Thanks for sharing about your own journey with which I suspect many can identify!
Thank you for your words, Wil! Good to hear a little more of your journey into this tradition too.
By the way, Presbyterians call themselves the via media as well!
Wow! Thank You Christianne.
I was in my fifth year of Bible college and with six kids, we were running late for church. On top of that, I was in my third year of NT Greek, doing ministry, working 50 hours a week and getting 4 hours of sleep a night.
On a whim, I said let’s go to this other church. We’ll be early.
We walked in to his haven of rest and peace. To be honest, I was sick of the emotional rat race of Charismania.
As we walked in, people were sharing prayer requests and praying for each other, before we all entered in to sit down. We all processed in together. One lady came up to me and after I introduced myself, took both of my hands, looked me dead in the eyes and said, “Welcome Home.”
It was total culture shock. We even sang some of the service with call and response, without accompaniment.
When I knelt down to take communion, something happened. God touched my being, deeper than my emotions, and deeper than my intellect. I haven’t been the same since.
That is a fantastic story to hear, Bob. Wow! Thank you for sharing it. I’m thankful for the way God touched you. And I’m thankful you found a haven of peace and rest. Isn’t it funny how God can use what seems like a “whim” to us to move in the way he wants in our lives? So cool!
Christianne THANK YOU for speaking out (what I love about Young Initiative Contemplatives), not against anything, but into the deeper truths. As I listened to your story (and thank you for sharing it)…something happened. I came into a sacred space with you…beyond our heads. While I started out Catholic, I went to a more fundamental tradition that really disallowed all teachings of the Catholic faith…and 30 years later, came back “home” (as Wil eluded to). Living into polar opposite sides…I learned how much the protestant space invited me to communally and individually remember Jesus…sort of worshiping as a way of thanking Jesus for what he did. Now that I am back in the Catholic faith it is more about letting the Eucharist remember you. Always a beautiful image as I see lines and lines of people walking toward that mystery during every mass. Your very good depiction of the Anglican version is so interesting because as I read it I realized that none of these pictures are wrong and all are good. But each version acts as an invitation to go deeper into the mystery (so too for Lutherans, Methodists…Prebys…..). It is an unfolding mystery from breaking bread to transubstantiation. This is why I see the Catholic church as the mother ship. But she had to let go of her “little boats” so that they could wander far into the seas of dualism to gather those who awaken to the universal loving mystery we call God, and paradoxically, this always comes back to reform the Mother ship. I could go on and on. So thank you for starting a sacred conversation!
Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful, Val. Thank you. I love that image you shared of the mother ship of Catholicism and the small boats let out into the sea. Would love to hear you share more about the dualism portion of this that you see. Also, I too love the procession of all the people up to the Eucharist. I am so moved by it when I watch it happen each week, and hearing the celebrant and chalice ministers repeat over and over, “This is the body of Christ, the bread of heaven … This is the blood of Christ, the cup of salvation.”
That is a really neat way of explaining it. As an Episcopalian, I was beginning to wonder if it was as much of a mystery as the Trinity, Jesus human AND divine … but I really love this image of Jesus being present, except how is this different from Jesus always being present?
As for how I experience it… that is much harder to explain.
Hi, Leanne! Well, there are sure no shortage of mysteries to contemplate here, are there?!
You ask a good question: How is this different than Jesus always being present? It reminds me of something the priest who married me and Kirk said to us on the day of our marriage, which took place in the ruins of an 8th-century monastery. He said, “God is present everywhere, but there are some places where the presence of God is especially thick because it has stood as hallowed ground, where prayers have been offered again and again for centuries.” It hearkens back to what are known as “thin places” — places where the veil between heaven and earth becomes particularly thin or more transparent. Perhaps the Eucharist is a thin place.