COMMUNION

COMMUNION

     A few years ago, Pastor Jim decided to break with tradition on Communion Sunday.  He said we would all come to the alter and be offered communion instead of having it delivered to us in our pews.  He held a big goblet of wine and Deacon Hopkins held a tasty looking loaf of bread.  We all went down front, advancing one section at a time from the left side of the church. When we got their Deacon Hopkins offered us a blessing as we broke off a piece of bread and then Pastor Jim offered us a blessing as we dipped our bread in the goblet of wine.  I was near the last of the people in line.  We’d never done it this way, so I watched the people who went before.  Deacon Hopkins maintained a firm grip for those who wanted to break off their own bread.  Pastor Jim held the goblet while the parishioners dipped the chunk of bread, then plopped it into their mouths. A lot of folks, particularly those whose grip, given the stress of dealing with this unfamiliar procedure, was less sure, dropped the bread into the goblet and had nothing to put into their mouths but their fingers.  Others, particularly devoted, shared with pastor Jim a more complete experience, including the chewing.  One woman looked him right in the eye watching him rhapsodically while she worked over the soggy bread in her mouth.  By this time the line had stopped and was waiting for her to conclude this epiphany.  She swallowed and, satisfied that he had been a partner in this experience, turned and returned to her seat.  An elderly man took his soggy bread with him and turned up the center aisle as did many others, not wishing to hold things up.  On the way back to his seat he tossed the bread at his mouth, but his mouth wasn’t exactly where he thought it would be. The bread went over his shoulder and landed in the hair of the choir director, who was seated in the front row.  He chewed away and returned to his seat, commenting on the bread’s exceeding lightness.  A lot of people had trouble getting a piece of bread broken off the loaf.  By the time I got there the area around Deacon Hopkins and Pastor Jim was a mess.  All these pieces of bread were being ground into the carpet by us all and there was a damp trail going up the aisle—as if Hansel and Gretel had been by.  At last, we had all been given communion except the Deacon, Pastor, and Winnie, the organist, who was still some way from the end of a typically beautiful rendition of “Christ is Risen”. The two climbed the steps to the organ, one carrying the mangled remains of the bread and the other the goblet of grape juice swimming appetizingly with soggy dumplings.  As they bent forward to administer to her they disappeared from view behind a column.  Suddenly Winnie played an uncharacteristically sour note.  We could only assume, and did since her hands never left the keyboard, that they’d broken off a piece of bread, dipped it in the wine and plopped it into her mouth.  I’m sure the confluence of activity, Winnie trying to read her music and play, Deacon Hopkins administering his blessing, and Pastor Jim helping her mouth open and stuffing in the bread produced the sour note.