Introduction
The coronavirus pandemic has created great disruption but also opportunities. For Christians one of the most poignant conundrums is that of holy communion during social isolation. For many Christians, taking the bread and wine of Holy Communion each week is not only a matter of fidelity to the words of Jesus at the Last Supper: “Do this as often as you drink it in remembrance of me” (1 Corinthians 11.25); it is also a deeply-felt recharging of one’s spiritual batteries. A member of the church I attend said, “It’s the only thing that saves my whole existence. I don’t think I could exist without it.”
The Church of England speaks
The Church of England reacted quickly to the threat of a pandemic. It closed all churches, even to priests whose homes led directly into the church, as well as prison chapels even when other activities like education were still going on. Priests can celebrate holy communion in their homes, with the bishop’s permission, as I did with Linda on Passion Sunday (although I did not then know about asking the bishop’s permission).
Breaking the rules
Celebrating communion together was so meaningful that we decided to open up our short service to friends and fellow church members on Zoom. We had a lovely service, which included an interactive discussion in place of a sermon, and everyone took the bread and wine together, ending with blessing of palm crosses. The following day the Area Dean, who receives my emails, told me that what I did was against the rules:
“Participants in a streamed service of Holy Communion should not be encouraged to place bread and wine before their screens. Joining together to share in the one bread and the one cup as those physically present to one another is integral to the service of Holy Communion; this is not possible under the current restrictions, and it is not helpful to suggest otherwise. Any idea of the ‘remote consecration’ of the bread and wine should be avoided.”
My wife could not see the logic of this. Either we believe in a form of transubstantiation, and what bar, then, is there in remote consecration, for God is everywhere? Or it is principally a memorial, in which case, again, why the bar?
A new way of socialising
The pandemic has brought the internet into a whole new dimension of socialising into people’s lives, in a way that the normal live-steaming does not. Zoom is a website enabling video conferencing, chat and webinars. The Houseparty app which makes it easy to interact with friends on line has grow from 130,000 downloads a week to 2 million. I am part of our weekly Bible discussion group on Zoom. It works very well, including the breakout groups in which we divide into small groups for prayer. People are inviting friends to virtual dinner parties, which Linda and I intend to try for my birthday. I have started a weekly morning coffee time for friends and fellow church member to share (sadly no cake!) The new technology is very different from normal live-streaming. When we attend a live-streamed service we are essentially spectators. When we meet via Zoom in face to face groups, we are participants.
It is perhaps a shame that the Church is failing to grasp a major opportunity to grow in sacramental fellowship outside the church walls.
Why break the rules?
The first reason why we should break this rule is that Jesus said, “Do this as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.” He did not add, “As long as the government or the bishops allow you to.” The early theologian Tertullian (155 – 240) wrote “The very fact of (heretics) being deprived of holy communion is witness of their being aliens” (On Baptism). It was only when Tertullian embraced Montanism and moved to espouse a “spiritual church” rather than the actual church that he was seen as heretical himself. Does the present C of E’s espousal of ‘spiritual communion’ as the new norm fall into a similar heresy?
(The ‘Act of Spiritual Communion’ produced by the Church of England is a lovely short service of prayer. But it is no substitute!
See: https://www.churchofengland.org/sites/default/files/2020-03/Guidance%20on%20Spiritual%20Communion%20and%20Coronavirus.pdf)
And breaking rules can sometimes be good. When the Japanese invaded Hong Kong in 1941 normal church life in Macau, China became very difficult. In these circumstances Florence Li TomOi (1907 – 1992) became the first woman to be ordained as a priest in the Anglican Communion. As Bishop Ronald Hall wrote to Archbishop William Temple at the time: “I’m not an advocate for the ordination of women. I am, however, determined that no prejudices should prevent the congregations committed to my care having the sacraments of the Church.” He clearly did not think ‘spiritual communion’ was good enough. It took between 25 and 40 years for the rest of the Anglican Communion to catch up.
Crises such as the present pandemic are just the time when we should start trying out new things so that people are not prevented from “having the sacraments of the Church”.
Another way or two
After reflecting on the Area Dean’s email, I decided not to do a holy communion service via Zoom. This was not because I thought it wrong, but because if I did so, I would inevitably have some internal motivation of ‘making my point’, which which would be contrary to the spirit of the sacrament. And I had thought of a way to retain the physicality of the bread and wine while clearly being different from communion itself, namely artoklasia and kiddush.
The bread of fellowship
Three times I have taken part in the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity in Jerusalem, as part of a Living Stones pilgrimage. Each evening of the week there is a service in a different church. The Week typically concludes at the Greek Melkite Catholic Cathedral of our Lord of the Annunciation where we end with a breaking of the bread – ‘artoklasia’ – as a sign of fellowship. After prayer over the bread, a prayer which is largely taken from the 1st century Christian work called ‘the Didache’, we are given some bread dipped in wine which we share with those around us.
I used this on Easter Day, but omitted dipping the bread in wine to make clear that it was not communion. After the readings, discussion and prayers, I said the blessing over the bread, in Hebrew and English, then this prayer:
O Lord Jesus Christ our God,
Who did bless the five loaves and with them did feed the five thousand:
May You, the same Lord, bless this loaf, and multiply it in this holy place,
and in all the world; and sanctify all the faithful who shall share in it.
For it is You, O Christ our God,
Who blesses and sanctifies all things; and to You we ascribe glory:
with the Father Who has no beginning, and Your all-holy, good, and life-creating Spirit, now and ever, and unto the ages of ages.
How did we make it a sign of fellowship, because we could not offer bread through our screens? By combining it with the Peace. We offered the bread as a visual expression as we said, “The Peace of the Lord be with you,” It worked.
The wine of fellowship
In the 1980’s I was curate at St Leonard’s, Streatham. Several times I went to the sabbath morning prayers on Saturday at Streatham Liberal Synagogue where Julia Neuberger was rabbi. I was particularly struck by what happened at the end. We all crowded into the lobby area, raised a small glass of wine as a toast and said “L’chaim!” – “to life!” A wonderful expression of fellowship and faith. So that is what we did on Easter Sunday, using my father’s family antique kiddush cup as a physical link to our joint Abrahamic heritage. It was a great way to conclude worship
And so …
And so, what I intend to do each Sunday in lockdown is to invite people from my local bible study group, family and friends (from Canada to Israel) to share in the Ministry of the Word (the Bible Bit) and ending with a Bread and Wine Bit as an act of fellowship.
I offer this as a way of making the most of the lockdown. If anyone is interested in having the actual words used, please email me on aoroland@gmail.com
NO HOLDS BARRED
Open discussion of “How are we doing? The Church in Lockdown”
Wednesday 6th May 19.00 – 21.00
Zoom Meeting ID: 725-4312-9362