I’m sitting in someone’s living room, with a small group of people. We’re in silence, though it’s not an awkward silence. We’re waiting and thinking and praying. We’re about to take communion together.
Although our church has communion once a month, I realise that this is the first time in years that I have done this with a small group of people and not as part of a larger congregation. It’s different. Well, OK, let’s call a spade a spade. It’s better.
There’s something about intimacy that grounds the communion service; that takes it back to its roots as a final meal shared by a group of friends. It doesn’t take too many people before communion becomes about logistics, and then before long it turns into an assembly line, and once that’s happened it’s just so much harder to capture the sense of mystery and significance of the fact that we’re encountering the risen Christ in a scrap of bread and wine.
While sitting there, in the silence, I am reminded of a story told by a Methodist minister called Thomas Pettepiece, who spent some time in prison as a prisoner of conscience. One Easter Sunday, he and a group of prisoners held what Pettepiece called ‘the Communion of Empty Hands’. Lacking bread or wine, they shared communion by passing an imaginary loaf and chalice among themselves. After the event, a father whose daughter had died came up to Pettepiece and said, “Father, that was a real experience. I believe today that I discovered what faith is…”
It’s not about the bread or the wine, or the gluten-free roll and red grape Shloer in our case. It’s not about the logistics or the best and most hygienic way to share food and drink. It’s about the community. It’s about looking around at a small group of people and understanding that this here is the body of Christ, and that we belong to each other as well as to God.
I realise, in the silence, that I’ve missed this, and I’m thankful to have it back.
Thanks, brother and friend