The Incumbent's Fall Message 2009

“Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I in him” John 6:56

Every Eucharist that we celebrate re-enacts the Last Supper that we all know so well. How many of us think about that as we receive communion. In a parish that I served prior to coming here a young girl came to church with her Grandmother one Sunday for the first time. It happened to be communion Sunday and she came to the altar rail to receive. She put her hands forward as all the others did and took the bread, then when we came along with the chalice she backed off and said in a loud voice “I’m not drinking that, that’s someone’s blood”. Of course Grandma was upset yet for me it was an amazing statement, she truly understood and accepted what theologians call transubstantiation or consubstantiation. In essence, that the bread and wine of communion become in substance, but not appearance, the body and blood of Jesus Christ.

Each time we consume the element(s) of communion we take into ourselves the living symbol of our faith. It becomes a part of who we are, it is integrated into our very being. That is what our faith is all about isn’t it? It is an integral part of our being, inseparable from who we are. I don’t know about you but I find that absolutely amazing. So much of what we do is identified as a part of who we are, but nothing else in our life becomes a part of us quite like that.

It is interesting, knowing that, how we don’t feel free to talk about our faith openly with those we meet. I can’t say how many times someone has said to me, “I was surprised that so-and-so was in church today, I didn’t know they were Anglican!” Yet we have no problem talking about our jobs, our families or our hobbies etc. We are intimidated by the word of evangelism and the thought of being the one who has to spread the word around. Interesting isn’t it!

You all have that amazing job to do, to put your faith out there in ways that I don’t have to and for that I truly admire you. All I have to do is wear my collar and folks seem to know all about my faith, or at least their version of what that involves. The assumption is that I pray, that I know the Bible, that I can be called upon to be of help in a spiritual way at times of stress and concern.

My prayer for each of us is that we can become more comfortable with our faith and the role it plays in our lives. That we can live in acknowledgment that it is a part of who we are and nothing that we have to be embarrassed about. We are members of the family of God, and let’s celebrate and share that each and every day of our lives, not just Sunday morning.

The Rev. Jeanette Lewis