My question for today is an easy one: how many of you own cell phones, or have someone in the family who has one? Yes, it’s OK for you to raise your hand. Looks like quite a number do. It seems as if cell phones are now as much a part of our lives as regular phones or tv might be. For those of you who have cell phones, I have another question, but for this one you don’t need to raise your hand, because I’m not sure I really want to know the answer. OK, you’ve probably guessed my next question: how many of you turn them off when you go into a public place like a movie or a restaurant or, better yet, here at church?
I suppose I could, also, ask how many of you are disturbed when one starts to ring for the person next to you in that movie, restaurant, or (heaven help you) on a commuter bus? Sometimes we talk about “road rage.” It may not be too far away when we have stories about “cell phone rage.”
I also wonder about a particular cell phone event that’s becoming more and more common throughout the world. Recently Karen and I were on a vacation in Italy. We were sitting at a table outside a very pleasant café. An attractive, young, Italian couple was sitting at the next table. But what surprised me was that the man was not paying any attention to the very good-looking woman with him. Instead, he was deeply involved in a telephone conversation on his cell phone, while she tried not to look bored with being ignored for the next 15 minutes.
How often have you seen something like this: two people being in the physical presence of one another but not being in the essential presence of one another? There is a difference, you know, in being physically present and being essentially present. It seems to me the person on the other end of the telephone connection was much more “present” to that man than was the woman sitting two feet away from him.
Another way to put it is: who was the “real presence” to the man – the woman he could see or the person with whom he was interacting? I would suggest the real presence, the essential presence, was the person with whom he interacted rather than the one he could merely see. This conclusion, of course, brings me to the point of today’s homily reflection: the “real presence” of our Lord, Jesus Christ, under the appearance of bread and wine.
For the last several weeks, we’ve been hearing about Eucharist and about the real presence of the risen Christ in Eucharist. By now, it should be possible to conclude you don’t need to physically see the body and blood of Christ in order to accept he is really and truly present. He is present by being heard and felt within you. He is present in our deepest, personal interactions with him in the Eucharist.
Over the years, there have been many human words used in attempts to explain just how this happens, how the risen Christ can be completely present under the appearance of bread and wine. Catholic theologians have tried to describe this presence in philosophical language using such terms as “transubstantiation, essence” and “accident.” As pointed out last week, these theologians say the “essential” substance, what makes bread, bread – and wine, wine – are changed, but the “accident,” the appearance remains the same.
Anglican or Episcopalian theologians or Lutheran theologians, who also believe that the “real presence” of the risen Christ resides in the consecrated bread and wine – they use words like “con-substantiation” rather than “trans-substantiation.” But regardless of the human words used, all three Christian groups – Roman Catholics, Episcopalians and Lutherans, along with Greek Orthodox, Russian Orthodox and others belonging to the Eastern Christian traditions – they all believe in the “real presence” of Christ in the Eucharist.
These particular Christian groups accept what we have been hearing these last several weeks in the Gospel of John: “I am the living bread that came down from heaven; whoever eats this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the world. …. whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him on the last day. For my flesh is true food and my blood is true drink. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me and I in him.” These Christian groups, also, hear the words spoken by Jesus at the Last Supper when he said, according to the Gospel of Luke: “This is my body, which will be given for you; do this in memory of me … this cup is the new covenant in my blood, which will be shed for you.” And when they hear this instruction, they focus, in the light of John’s Gospel, on the words: “Do this.”
They continue to do what other early Christians did when they followed the words of Saint Paul, who in his letter to the Corinthians, quoted Christ as saying: “This is my body that is for you. Do this in remembrance of me. … this cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.”
However, other, later Christians, such as Methodists and Baptists, focus not on the words, “do this”, but rather on the phrase, “… in remembrance of me …” and, so, they do not believe in the “real presence” of the risen Christ under the appearance of bread and wine, but, rather, they view the Lord’s Supper as a symbolic memory of an event occurring some two thousand years ago.
In the early Christian church and in the centuries afterwards, those who followed Christ, who believed he was, indeed, the Son of God, continued to express their unity with him and with one another. They came together around the Eucharistic table. They joined in a fellowship meal and believed the risen Jesus was truly present with them. As we have been recently reminded by the teachings of the Second Vatican Council, the risen Lord was present to them, and continues to be present to us, in the gathered assembly, in the proclaimed word, in the presider, and, especially, in the consecrated bread and wine.
However, over the intervening years – and because of many human causes and human events – this unity of gathered Christians has been broken. This unity has been broken in such a way that its focal point can no longer be shared by all Christians. Pope John Paul II has repeatedly expressed his sorrow over this broken unity and the fact Roman Catholics and other Christians cannot take part in intercommunion, except in very well-defined conditions which are outlined in Canon Law and in the Catechism of the Catholic Church.
At the same time, this troublesome disagreement on what Jesus said and meant is not a new phenomenon. It dates back to the times of today’s gospel reading. We heard a few minutes ago, how some of his disciples, those who followed him and believed in many of his teachings, in the words of John’s Gospel – “Returned to their former way of life and no longer accompanied him.”
However, we, also, heard, in the words of Paul to the Ephesians, how others viewed the relationship of Christ and the church, those gathered together in his name. They saw this relationship in very intimate terms. They saw the union of Christians as being like the marriage of a man and a woman who leave their parental homes, their previous lives of protection and nurturing, in order to join together as one flesh. Paul encouraged these Christians to “be subordinate to one another out of reverence for Christ.” The church, those gathered together as Christians, were to see Christ as their head and one another as members of his body.
And, so, it is that when we gather around the Table of Eucharist, we continue to gather as the Body of Christ. Each member of this Body of Christ gives the Body of Christ to every other member of this Body of Christ. We are one body, with the risen Christ as our head, the head who gives us vision, who listens to our prayers, who speaks words of comfort to our heart.
We become what we consume. We become Eucharist to one another. We become present to one another. We become truly present, not merely a physical presence, not merely someone sharing space together on this planet, but rather, an essential presence, a real presence, sharing the life, the flesh and blood of the risen Christ.
Twenty-first Sunday in Ordinary Time; August 27, 2000
Josh 24: 1-2a, 15-17, 18b; Eph 5:21-32 (short form); Jn 6:60-69