I am finding it difficult to summarize our sessions - as many of you know, editing something down can take as much time as the original writing.

So in the interest of being thorough, as long as they are, here are my notes for last Sunday's session.

Communion Week Four

The Lord's Supper, The Last Supper, The Mass           

What does the Lord's Supper have in common with the last supper?

• little.

We do "reenact" that evening as we speak the words aloud. But our ritual, and the ritual or communion (Eucharist) is not a real meal with courses of food, it is not in a home with a dozen people, there is not a foreboding mood (as there was with the betrayal of a trusted friend).

So how did this meal, the last supper gets changed to first the Love Feast (as spoken about in Corinthians) and then over time ritualized to what we have now? What can we learn from these roots, from these traditions? What does our celebration of Communion say about our faith, our church-community, of the universal church?

John D. Rempel (MCC liaison to the United Nations) writes:

"The Lord's Supper is our most profound and formative symbol. How we practice it reveals more of what we believe about grace, the church, and mission than any other aspect of congregational life; it is our theology incarnate.

The Lord's Supper in Mennonite Tradition, Vision Journal

Love Feasts

As mentioned last time, the early church had many shared meals, which they nicknamed agape, or love feasts. The common meals were practical expressions of love.

And it is at one these meals that Paul criticizes their practice (1Cor. 11). The rich arrived early, maybe after visiting the baths, and went ahead with eating and drinking. The poor, some who would be slaves, came later when there wasn't much left and all the good spots were gone, so they had to remain out in the courtyard. Paul calls this behaviour of the rich "contempt for the church of God" and a humiliation of the poor.

He calls them to be aware of the others needs, much more than just being nice to each other, they have a responsibility to care for each other. This behaviour describes the "unworthy manner" or partaking the Lord's Supper. Years later, sensitive Christians apply this to their inward piety, and suffer guilt over whether they are worth to take communion.

Now, these love feasts have their roots in both the Jewish Festival Traditions (like Passover) and the Roman Banquet celebrations. The Christian church adopts these - one thing to note, again, is how the love feast is at the same time (same event/meal) as the Lord's Supper. Yet, they are separate even in the time of the church at Corinth.

In the third century the love feast continue - Tertullian writes about North African Communities that had shared food and drink, and blessings, prayers, a free worship for all - and a way of helping the needy members.

Church Grows - Agape dropped

As the Christian movement grows, congregations grow in numbers, and worship and fellowship no longer centered around an actual meal table. As numbers increased, the agapes could no longer serve the entire community - so they became special events put on by the rich for invited guests.

To gain status Christian groups organized themselves as burial societies (giving a funeral character to the meals which focused on the great banquet of the Kingdom of God to come). 5^th century - Augustine writes about the debaucheries and lavish banquets in cemeteries. The meals are separated from the ceremony of the Eucharist - and get increasingly criticized as drunken feast - and of sexual misconduct. Basically, these meals fade away during this time.

Where does the Eucharist Go? Early Christian Worship

So if those meals go, where does the ceremony go? The ceremony of the Eucharist is part of the Lord's Day (now called Sunday in Rome) - and the thanksgiving to God shines out of that service (eucharistein - which is why the service become known as that). The range of thanksgiving to God was wide - thanks for creation, for redemption, victory of Christ over evil, for nature. Calling their worship time by that name - "giving thanks" - reminded the Christians of the inner meaning of worship.

Question -

What does our communion service remind you? (thanksgiving, unity of the body, Jesus' story, our theology? Where does this fit in?)

Medieval Mass

"The earlier corporate character of Christianity gave way to Christians being a group of individuals within a hierarchal structure that dispensed benefits according to a tightly controlled means."

There is a shift in tone in worship - gone is the youthful, clean shaven Good Shepherd Jesus of early depictions to the haloed Christ of glittering mosaics (lots of stain-glass too) depicting him as emperor and judge. (some of this was rooted in all the discussion of whether Christ was divine or not - so there was this overemphasis of the majestic Christ enthroned in heaven).

The Sunday service of Eucharist was celebrated in massive buildings by huge crowds and had become remote, splendid and mysterious. Overawed and afraid, people increasing shied away from the communion table. A bishop of the time called the Eucharist the "shuddering hour". People were terrified to stand in front of the judgment throne (and felt grotesquely unworthy).

The once moveable table becomes the altar - fenced off for clergy only - it was surrounded by careful attendants who created and preserved this mysterious and Holy purpose. The service was called the "mysterium tremendum".

A huge shift away from the focus on a reconciling community to a focus on individuals before God, asking the dreaded question: Am I worthy?

And two clear divisions emerge between the clergy and the laity. The churchgoers, in writings of the time, are compared to sheep and goats in their pens, Deacons are kept busy walking around with long rods to discipline any sleepers, gigglers or whisperers.

Paying penance for your sins emerges here. Basically what is to be done about sins committed after baptism? There were the major sins, denying the faith, adultery and murder, those penances could last a life time - but there was a whole catalog of lesser sins, with specific periods and acts of penance (standing outside the church door in sackcloth and ashes - a lot of the penances involved humiliation). Something else that emerges is the need for a sacramental confession of sins before taking communion (this becomes obligatory in the 10^th century). And a bunch of reasons why you couldn't take communion were added (borrowing from PT purity laws) - sexual activity, menstruation and childbirth.) A 12^th century theologian glosses over this by saying: "From infrequent celebration has grown reverence for the sacrament."

All these awe inspiring rites and ceremonies created a fear. Pagans used to be afraid of God. Now Christians were terrified of Gods' Condemnation. The only way to gain favour with God was the penitential system.

I've mentioned this struggle with Christ's divinity at this time (the earlier Council Of Nicea is all about establishing that Divinity within the trinity. And this divinity gets overstressed so much that Christ's humanity, his mediatorship, recedes into the shadows - people turn to Saints for this personal relationship.)

12 century - when the Sanctus bell rang, the people looked in adoration as the priest raised the consecrated bread. By the 16^th century, people fell on their knees during the consecration of the bread and wine - so they could NOT look at the holy and mysterious elements. Further was a teaching that the priest ate and drank as the representative for the entire community.

How far this had come from the Love feast?!!!

Required to confess and take Communion at least once a year, medieval European Christians were no longer active participants but watchers. The mass was a priestly act. Ordinary people participated by looking on.

Council of Trent

Just to mention how far this goes - and hopefully you can see some of the stirrings of the reformation here - but at the Council of Trent, part of the counter reformation in the mid-16^th century - it was stressed by the Catholic Church that: the Mass was not a mere meal, nor just a memorial service to recall a sacrifice made long ago. The mass a sacrifice - possessing its own power of atonement and petition - it was to be understood as simultaneously the sacrifice of Christ and the sacrifice of the Church.

Now, mostly we are Protestants but this history of the church is our history too (not to blame it all on the Catholic Church). There is nothing that justifies the medieval abuses of the penitential system - yet, the ancient tradition carried on the memory and the importance of confession and forgiveness. (we confess before communion).

Each of the reforming traditions maintained different themes from the early church.

Lutheran: remember God's grace and the impossibility of doing anything to earn God's forgiveness.

Calvinists: took seriously the need to prepare to approach the Communion table.

Anabaptists: emphasized corporate purity, and used the kiss of peace, love feasts, and the foot-washing ceremony as liturgical means to deepen the vitality of the gathered church.

Question:

What elements do you respond to? What symbols have meaning for you? If any? Are you drawn to a certain form of Communion? Do you feel worthy?

Closing

Basically Catholics and Protestants can learn from each other - gain depth in listening to each other (mention the article: A Sacramental approach to life and worship - by Arthur Boers, Pastor of Menno Church). Return to the origins of the early church (you see this in a lot of the emergent church movement) - embrace the whole long story of the church as our own. Not start blaming and condemning others.

God if infinitely able to deal with humanity, continually recalling us to his love.

Next time - a bit on the Eastern Church

And the Reformation

Note - this teaching has been gathered from different sources, but notably Eleanor Kreider's wonderful book: Communion Shapes Character.