Sustaining Ritual

I have just come back from the races, the first of the 2013 round. It was a fun afternoon seeing a lot of people out enjoying themselves. Looking around I couldn’t help notice the symbolism and ritual involved with the races. Men and women doll themselves up for the races, suits, hats, fascinators and other more unusual garb appear. People drink champagne and become instant experts at horse anatomy and breeding influences. We all survey the odds closely, even though most of us have absolutely no idea what we are doing. It is all ritual:  we are put into a different space, out of our normal zone so that we can experience something new and interesting within clearly defined boundaries. So it happened, and the results are predictable: I came home having placed a bet and lost: all is as it should be!

The Eucharist is our pre-eminent ritual, and as such it shares some basic elements with the races. It is predictable, since we know what we are coming to experience and therefore can prepare ourselves adequately. It is symbolic, and we know that each gesture, each word is loaded and brings with it salvation history and sacramental reality. It has a purpose which is to hold us together and to give us life.

At the outset, the miracle of the loaves and fishes may not seem to be the most natural expression of the Eucharist, but when we consider that we are talking about ritual, and that Jesus was talking about rituals that would sustain his people after he had left, the link becomes apparent.

The twelve gathered with Jesus are symbolic of the whole of Israel; they gathered in a deserted place, symbolic of the Exodus experience; they sit in groups of fifty, the jubilee number, a cause of rest, refreshment and celebration; Jesus gives the little he has to heaven, and trusts in God’s bounty; and finally, after everyone has eaten, there are twelve baskets leftover, enough for the whole world to eat. Jesus sustains and feed his people within the context of salvation history.

But that is not all the symbolism. Look at St Paul, who is reflecting on the experience of the early church. The church had been able to make the huge leap to realise the link between the Last Supper and the Cross that is ritually celebrated in the Eucharist.

The Eucharist is our ritual. On this Feast of Corpus Christi we reflect on it to help us to realise our roots, where we came from, so that we may see more clearly where we are called to and what we are called to become.

As we take the bread and wine remember that we are gathered by Christ as his people on earth. We are part of a long and venerable tradition of God calling and guiding his chosen people. We are formed and fed by his Word, as were the Israelites in the wilderness and the five thousand men.

As we bless the gifts, we recall the offering of the meagre yet staple gifts and bread and wine by Christ. We bring ourselves in all our poverty.

As we bread the body of Christ at the Lamb of God, we recall the broken body of Christ on the Cross. We recall the broken body of the Church: weak, vulnerable and sinful when left to our own devices, but in our weakness conscious of our dependence on the Father, as Christ was when he stated: into your hands I commend my spirit.

As we share the Eucharistic elements and receive the most holy Body and Blood of Christ we relive the distribution of the loaves and fishes from God’s endless bounty to all who allow themselves to be included in his family, we are included in the resurrection and the power of the Holy Spirit

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There is an ancient principle, Lex orandi, lex credendi, ‘the law of prayer is the law of belief’, or ‘you pray what you believe’. We pray the Eucharist. We are the Body of Christ, we become what we receive until we are completely at one with our Lord and God.

Homiloy for the Solemnity of CorpusChristi Year C, 13th June 2013