I’m curious, George …
Why do you keep talking about Eucharist?
by George Porter
I’ve discovered that many people have lots of questions about the Eucharist. I’ve had questions from people as "old" as five and as "young" as 80. When I was still a parish priest, I prepared a booklet as part of the training process for acolytes which included lots of explanations about what things we do and why we do them as we celebrate this sacrament. Very often it was parents who would say: “I never knew that.” More and more I hear from young people that they just don’t get it.
As Anglican Christians, we are inescapably sacramental in our approach to life, theology and worship, yet we often don’t know much about what we experience, how we do sacramental things or the many whys associated with it. Even for people who have been celebrating the Eucharist for many years it can be confusing or become a routine. As others continue the current trend of exodus from gathering together as the people of God, the confusion and lack of understanding only deepen.
Of course, within Anglican tradition there is a broad spectrum of sacramental understandings and shades of ritual. While understanding some of these things is important, and the sacramental reality is bigger than just the celebration of it (but that’s a topic for another time), we can get so caught up in all the trappings that we forget what lies at the very heart of this celebration.
On the one hand, we recall the life, death and resurrection of Jesus as we eat and drink together. On the other hand, we are assured of the promise that there is a future resurrection life for us in God’s new creation. Lying right between these two realities, however, is the often-missed heart of the Eucharist: the presence of Jesus with us now.
This sacrament is repeated, not just to remember the past or anticipate a future, but primarily as a wake-up call — a call to remember and be aware that we have not been abandoned by God, but that Jesus is present with us now. We may not be able to explain just how, but we know he is. (There is, after all, a reason why the ancient Christians referred to the Eucharist as a mystery.) Rather than plunge into the muddy waters of ‘how’ Jesus is present, we need first to just walk on the water and realise that in some way he is.
I’m curious about what our worship would look like if we really got that.
When we really take seriously the reality of God’s presence can we fall into routine, become bored, or give up meeting together to celebrate? How would this eucharistic experience spill over into the rest of our lives, our relationships and our missions? Would we perhaps be better equipped to, as one writer said, “love mercy and do justice?”
The Rev. Canon George Porter is Director of Youth Action.
