I want to return to a question that I began to raise a couple of weeks ago regarding liturgy online.
Let me concoct a scenario this time and ask a question.
Last year I went down to one of the glorious English Cathedrals to preach. Being robed and up at the sharp end of things, I was also asked to help in the distribution of the bread and wine. (I think I had bread). At the offertory, someone came round and gave me me a ciborium full of hosts and told me to stand next to the altar for the consecration.
Now, I was surprised by this as in the norms I know, the bread would need to be on the altar to be consecrated. However, in this house of God, there was just one host and one chalice on the altar. The rest of the bread and wine was presumed to be consecrated whilst being held in the hands of the Eucharistic assistants who gathered on either side of the altar holding up the elements during the consecration.
Now, firstly, do we think that is OK? (I know that some will think this is a dancing on the heads of pins question, but quite a lot hangs on it).
If it is OK, how far away might the bread and wine be and still be presumed to be consecrated? Is there a particular distance or does it depend on the intention of the consecrating priest, the intention of the gathered community or both. (As a curate I once baulked at celebrating the Eucharist on an altar on which a harvest loaf was perched for fear of having to eat the whole thing afterwards. My training rector at the time declared that it was not consecrated if I did not intend to consecrate it).
Now, suppose we have two congregations which are linked in fellowship and love but who live on adjacent islands. Their priest, Father Indulgent wants everyone to have communion each Sundayand they are devout and holy and desirous of weekly communion. However, the person who runs the ferry link between the two blessed islands belongs to the Free Church of God of the Sabbath (continuing) and consequently will not operate any boat on a Sunday, for fear of eternal damnation.
What would we think, if Father set up a system (either closed circuit TV or via the internet) whereby he could stand at the altar in St Anaglypta-of-the-Rocks on one island but be seen and heard in St Eucalyptus-by-the-Skerry on the other island and then proceeded to have one communion service? Could he be deemed to consecrate the elements in both churches whilst remaining in one of them?
We will presume that the devout communities in each, respond with a loud Amen at the end of the Eucharistic prayer.
Any thoughts?
At the risk of proffering a can-opener… Define `consecrated’, I guess?
This is an interesting question, and not just for the Bishop of The Isles. A proper answer needs lots of definitions, but one is that the Eucharist is a physical thing – real Jesus, real priest, real community present, real bread and wine, one place and not another (it is also a spiritual thing, so you can have ‘spiritual communion’ – ‘res’ without the ‘sacramentum’). Consecration is a physical setting apart of a physical thing for a spiritual purpose – can’t get away from the physical/spiritual divide. Looking at the 1662 communion service I was struck how physical it is, ‘take… into his hands’, ‘break the Bread’, ‘lay his hands on all the Bread’, ‘lay his hands on every vessel’. The Eucharist at St Eucalyptus-by-the-Skerry sounds a bit like cyber-sex.
Might be relevant……
http://www.episcopalcafe.com/lead/congregations/45_years_on_a_collegeserving_c.html
please lets go back to angels and pins.
(shudders in horror at the very thought of virtual consecration)
A few weeks I observed a similar instance to that you have described.
At the offertory, the elements for the altar party were brought up to the altar and then eight “station teams” stood at the bottom of the altar steps. When the Bishop said the appropriate sentences of the consecration, those with the elements elevated them as appropriate.
Now to consider your question in detail, the words of consecration come from the last supper when the disciples were sitting round a table in close proximity – all in the upper room.
Our buildings are of varying sizes and depending on the size of the congregation, there are practical issues with us all being round a table (altar). Now the current trend for altars in the centre of the congregation. I do recall a proposal to replace the pews with seats at St Mary’s and move the Nave Altar further west. Consider the layout of the RC Cathedral in Liverpool with the altar in the centre of a circular building.
But in the case I was present at and the case you were at the bread and wine for consecration were in the same physical room at the point the words of consecration was said. I will leave aside the issue of reserved sacrament for consumption later for the moment, however this can open another thread to this discussion
My feeling that connecting the congregations by internet / phone / etc removes one aspect of community which I feel we are losing with our tendency for everything to be email / text / facebook / twitter / etc. To my mind nothing beats the ability to look someone in the eye and hold their hand and say Peace be with you and subsequently share our Lords Supper.
With respect to you thoughts on consecrating a Harvest loaf, it had always been my understanding that anything on the corporal was intended for consecration (and subsequently anything not on the corporal was not intended for consecration). This was reinforced as a Midnight Mass at St Mary’s in the closing years of the 20th Century when the celebrant left a flagon of wine on the corporal – which had to be consumed (or decanted into small vessels for the tabernacle).
However then what do we do about island communities. In Mull throughout the winter they use elements consecrated in Oban the previous week, and this is a means of connecting with others.
Can the words of consecration be transmitted over our communication methods – a twitter message? No doubt the theologians can argue that one for years.
Try visiting the Cathedral of Second Life on Epiphany Island …
😉
Do you have a link, or is this not a virtual visit?
Many thanks for excellent responses so far.
Just a few thoughts…
Firstly, I think that some community building online leads to real community. Indeed, I think that the advent of such possibilities leads to virtual villages where there are new possibilities of real care and kindness. (Bad things are possible too because the people involved are real).
I’d be interested to know from Kimberly (and others) whether the scenario I’ve painted above is a greater threat to catholic order than the ferrying of the consecrated host from one place to another or indeed the consecrating of loads of hosts for loads of subsequent services for the same people.
The reserved sacrament question, Stewart, is actually very much what I was hoping people might think about. Just for the record, do you think that the elements held up in front of the bishop (and not put on either altar or corporal) were consecrated or not? They either were or were not, after all.
I’m aware of Second Life but not a participant. The scenario I’ve painted above does not seem to me to be particularly virtual.
Can we presume that the link goes both ways and that during the service the intercessions are led by someone at St Eucalyptus? Presumably that person could lead the people of both islands in prayer. Yes?
As the intercessor prayed for those who are sad and downcast, I can imagine the people of both communities holding in their hearts Gloria Sourpuss the Ferrywoman.
I quite like the analogy with cyber-sex – I had not thought of that. Presumably no-one indulges in that then.
By the way, Stephen, is the real presence physical?
As a former Presbyterian, my understanding of the sacraments is pretty weak, although I am keen to learn more, especially about the sacraments according to what Kelvin has called “catholic order”.
Can anyone point me to some reading or website links which might enlighten me a little more?
What is happening at the Eucharist?
Please forgive me if I try and give me own, quite ignorant, views as a spring board to some more enlightened opinion.
Firstly, one of the reasons I left a Presbyterian congregation to attend at my local Church of Ireland (Anglican) church was because of a felt need for regular Holy Communion. It was the tangible nature of Holy Communion that first drew me in. I could “receive” something in my hands and into my body. The physicality was important to me.
Secondly, and spiritually, it is a place of grace in my life. I can start again at the alter. It is a tangible, that word again, place of forgiveness, renewal, restoration, thanks and communion all rolled into one. I have felt my heart strangely warmed at the alter.
Thirdly, I still have little understanding of the theology behind all this. It seems obvious to me that this is much more than a mere memorial meal to remember the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. It is a memorial but it is much more than that. It is also participation in that very life, death and resurrection – which is why I suppose it becomes significant as to what we believe actually happens during Holy Communion. Christ is present, but how?
This is where my own understanding breaks down and I need a little help.
Steven McQ
Thank you for your questions – they are all very relevant to the things I’ve raised above. Your experience of finding comfort and grace at the altar is one which I recognise from my own journey.
I think that the primary thing that is happening to us at the Eucharist is that God meets us, loves us, touches us and changes us and the world through that meal. Any Eucharistic theology or attempt to explain “what’s going on” is in my view subordinate to that experience.
Having said that, for a quite wander though different Anglican notions of what’s going on, the Wikipedia page on Anglican Eucharistic Theology is a starting place. Some folk would recommend Dom Gregory Dix’s wonderful The Shape of the Eucharist. Others enjoy the sense of humour of Richard Giles in Creating Uncommon Worship. Maybe other folk will want to post their own recommendations here.
Kelvin, I was thinking of the real Jesus at the last supper but didn’t want to get into the priest = Jesus thing. The real presence isn’t ‘physical’ otherwise we could find a physical change in the elements, but it is nonetheless real – if we believe our liturgy – and is carried by physical signs in a physical community.
Does anyone prefer cyber-sex? Is that a good, healthy & human thing?
Thanks Steve H
(There’s a danger of getting my Stevens and Stephens and Steves mixed up here)
Yes – the difference between real and physical is exactly at the nub of the matter here, isn’t it? One might have real community amongst folk who are not physically together and one might not have any positive experience of community in a gathering of people who do happen to be in one place at one time.
Somewhere in our liturgy there is a phrase about Jesus being with us in every place at all times.
Whilst I’m not hearing any support from anyone else yet, I have to say that if I turned up at either of the churches on the islands described above on a Sunday morning and found this going on in a holy manner, I think I could get my head around it better than someone getting Jesus out of a cupboard and proceeding to distribute communion from a Eucharistic celebration which the community had celebrated earlier in the month.
The latter is actually happening. I’d prefer to see the former.
Might what I have described be the best possible good in the circumstances?
Am I alone?
I can see it being really special for a sick member of the throng to have a wee pack of wafers and a bottle of sherry (Watts & Co. of course) given to them which they use when ‘attending’ the online service. On planet PMo that would seen very real.