Remembering at the Table

This weekend we celebrate Corpus Christi, the Solemnity of the Body and Blood of Christ. We have the chance to revisit the mystery of the Eucharist in the life of the Church and in the life of every believer. In this Year of the Eucharist especially, we can pray and think about the mystery of the Lord present among his people.

This week on my plane flight of many hours, I had the chance to remember that the very day of my return was the fifty third anniversary of my First Communion. Again on Saturday night as we celebrated the Sacraments of Initiation with two groups of children, the excitement of the children and their families allowed an occasion to remember the importance and centrality of the Eucharist in the liturgical life of the Church.

Fifty-three years is a long time, and that’s a lot of communions since the first time. Often enough, as our former religious education director, Marie Kordes, used to tell parents, the emphasis is on "communion," not on the “first”. First Communion is a big day certainly for the children, but also for the parents, the godparents, the grandparents. Like all sacraments, there is a normal “remembering” of the events of this important day in our life.

Nostalgically, I can remember the class of children way back in 1952. I can remember the white outfits, the Buster Brown shoes, the brown bags on the water fountains (lest we drink water before the Mass). The family party at our house with all the aunts, uncles, and cousins is delightful to enjoy another time. Most of us can remember the day of our First Communion.

Remembering in Another Way

The Eucharist--like all sacraments--invites us to another kind of remembering. The beginning of that process is what we heard about in Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians on Holy Thursday. After the breaking of the bread and the pouring of the cup, Jesus tells his disciples (and us) “Do this in memory of me.” Paul tells us that “As often as you eat this Bread and drink this Cup, you proclaim the death of the Lord until he comes again.”

This is liturgical remembering, in the Greek: “anamnesis”. How is it that we remember? The Church from the earliest days remembered in a specific liturgical “shape”. The shape or pattern of our remembrance is to take bread, bless it, break it, and give it within the community. The similar shape is done with the cup. We take the cup of wine, bless it, and pour it out for all to drink, and give it for the sharing. This remembrance is more than nostalgia or historical event. Rather, in the breaking of the Bread and in the pouring of the Cup we enter the very process of our redemption in Christ. The death-rising of the Lord is realized for each faith community that gathers to celebrate the Eucharist. This is an action of the Spirit within the community.

Eucharist reminds us of our baptismal life, when we passed through death to life in Christ. In the eating and drinking, by the action of the Spirit, we become that which we eat, the Body of Christ.

Eucharistic Communities

Our experiences are replete with memories of multiple and diverse Eucharistic communities. One needs only recall the actually historical communities with whom we have celebrated at the Lord’s Table. In faith-filled communities, we have known the presence of Christ among us. Along with my First Communion, for example, I can remember the many, many communities and occasions when the Eucharist has called us together as the Body of Christ. Fifty-two years of Communions, forty-one years with my community, thirty-three as a priest bear witness to the dynamic and real Presence of Christ in his Church.

The How of Communities

The scriptures in multiple stories speak of how the community has come together to remember eucharistically. Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians, Luke’s account on the Road to Emmaus, the post-Resurrection meals of Jesus all bear the same witness to the shape of the Eucharist. From the earliest days of the Christian community, the Lord gathered his people for public retelling of the story of God’s saving deeds for his People. People gathered to hear God’s Word. They gathered to proclaim, to sing, to give thanks for all things in Christ.

The gathered community then moved around the Lord’s Table to “make Eucharist:” i.e., to give thanks and to offer praise in Christ to the Father. Eucharist is to speak good things (eu-logy) over the gifts (charis). The head of the Presider and the Assembly spoke praise over the gifts of bread and wine. Gathered in Christ and by the action of the Spirit, the gifts are thus transformed as is the community. Christ present invites his People to become the Body of Christ before the Father and before the world. That’s how and what we remember.

The Moment of Communion

What the Church has discovered in its long history, and what each believer discovers in their shorter personal history, is that we are invited communally and personally to communion with the Lord. What is revealed in God’s Word, what is done in Eucharistic action, what we pray for in the Lord’s Prayer, all become a moment of intimacy at once personal, but also communal, in the life of the Church. Christ is present in “co-union”, communion with his People.

The mystery of the Eucharist is precisely that God is present in Christ for us and for all. He is food and drink for the journey through our world to the fullness of the Kingdom. In this mystery, the Church remembers the past saving deeds of Christ, now realized in the present moment, and as Church we remember into our future hope in Christ.

CDH