The Eucharist is the ritual time in which we celebrate this divine "making-space-for-us-and-inviting-us-in." Eating the bread and drinking the wine, we remember the body broken "for us" who were God's enemies, and the blood spilled to establish a "new covenant" with us who have broken the covenant (1 Corinthians 11:24-25). We would most profoundly misunderstand the Eucharist, however, if we thought of it only as a sacrament of God's embrace of which we are simply the fortunate beneficiaries. Inscribed on the very heart of God's grace is the rule that we can be its recipients only if we do no resist being made into its agents; what happens to us must be done by us. Having been embraced by God, we must make space for others in ourselves and invite them in--even our enemies. This is what we enact as we celebrate the Eucharist. In receiving Christ's broken body and spilled blood, we, in a sense, receive all those whom Christ received by suffering (129).

posted by Peter at 12:34 AM
| | permalink |