Faith Matters 10: For The Gardner News, September 30, 2006
World Communion Sunday
For many of the world’s Christian churches, the first Sunday in October is celebrated as World Communion Sunday. Its observance dates back to 1936 in the Presbyterian Church, but has been adopted by most of the world’s major denominations. On this day faith communities around the globe will be breaking bread and sharing the cup in celebration of one of the fundamental sacraments that unites Christians around the world, the sacrament of Holy Communion.
The bread will be present in forms as diverse as the world’s peoples. Fine white bread, coarse and crusty peasant breads, flat breads and pita bread, specially made transparent wafers, and many, many other variations will be lovingly laid on the center of the altar or communion table. The cup or cups will contain wine, or grape juice, or denatured wine, and perhaps other local variations we haven’t imagined. And across the world, in a visible sign of what unites us, people will gather at tables made of wood and stone and metal to remember, and pray, and share in the sacred meal.
In some churches each person will come forward to the table where they will be addressed by name and served the bread and the cup. Some will kneel reverently at an altar rail. Others will be served in their pews, allowing all to share in the meal at exactly the same moment. In some churches the people sit at table, often with an empty chair representing the presence of Jesus.
As the faithful gather to share in this meal they will experience the presence of Jesus. For some he is present through the power of memory to summon him. For some his presence is symbolic. For others he is present literally in the bread and the cup, transformed into his body and blood. For others he is understood to be present because two or more are gathered at the table in his name. All agree, however, that his presence with us in this simple meal has the power to touch and transform our lives, just as his feeding of hungry crowds on hillsides in Galilee, or a meal shared with his closest friends on the night before he died, touched and transformed the hearts and lives of those who encountered him.
One of the most moving stories I’ve heard about communion comes from Thomas G. Pettepiece, who writes in his book Visions of a World Hungry, (Nashville,1979) of his experience while a political prisoner. It was Easter Sunday and a score of Christians wanted to take communion. But there was no bread, no wine, not even a cup. Even so, they gathered for a communion of empty hands. The non-Christians among them offered to talk quietly so that the sudden silence wouldn’t attract the attention of the guards.
He told his fellow prisoners "We have no bread, nor water to use instead of wine... but we will act as though we had... I held out my empty hand to the first person on my right, and placed it over his open hand, and the same with the others. Take, eat, this is my body which is given for you; do this in remembrance of me.' Afterward, all of us raised our hands to our mouths, receiving the body of Christ in silence. ‘Take, drink, this is the blood of Christ which was shed to seal the new covenant of God with men. Let us give thanks, sure that Christ is here with us, strengthening us'... We gave thanks to God, and finally stood up and embraced each other." Even in this communion of empty hands, the risen Christ was known to them in the breaking of the bread.
On World Communion Sunday the deep divisions that often separate Christians will fade as we celebrate what ultimately unites us as the body of Christ. Through this simple meal of bread, broken and torn like our own broken lives and broken world, we discover God’s healing, wholeness, and new life offered to us all. Ultimately, communion cannot be explained; it can only be experienced. Its meaning is deep, rich, and powerful, beyond words to describe. Much as a review of a new and wonderful restaurant can only hint at the culinary delights awaiting diners, so too it is only in the sharing of this simple meal that we can savor the true bounty of the table. The Psalms say it this way: Come, taste and see how good it is! Come, taste and see!