Just when I thought I was smart...

So I was at a training session for Lay Eucharistic Ministers (LEM) at church this past weekend, and I had a bit of an epiphany, or maybe even more than one. I should start by clarifying what a LEM is. At our church, they are the people who take the consecrated host and wine to people who can’t make it to church on Sunday. At other churches LEMs are the people who help at the altar. So in case anyone needed to know, that’s what that is at Trinity, and that’s what I was being trained for.

Anyway, part of our training included going over what happens at the Eucharist so we understand the magnitude of the work LEMs do. While we were going over the service in the prayer book, Fr. Charlie asked us what we believe happens during the sacrament. So I jumped in and said something about how I was raised Catholic and thus was raised to believe in transubstantiation. We had been joking about some church words being more expensive than others, like “liturgical” being a $5 word, so I threw in that transubstantiation is a $10 word. It’s a biggie. And Fr. Charlie asked me to explain what it meant to make sure I wasn’t just opening my vocabulary wallet and showing a bunch of Monopoly money as the real thing. If you are Catholic and went to Catholic school, you can define this word while you balance cups on your head and at the same time work a hula hoop while standing on a balance ball. I spouted out that it means that the bread and the wine become the actual body and blood of Christ, that they are changed (trans) into the flesh and blood (substance). This led to a short side conversation about ritual cannibalism and what other issues people have with this belief. Fr. Charlie got us back on track by joking that I’d get the gold star for knowing my terms if we gave out gold stars, and asked us what else the Eucharist can mean.

Another member of our group spoke up next. This woman is a wonderful help in church, from volunteering at our soup kitchen to helping in the office every week to singing in the choir. And this woman is one of the most humble people, and caring, you could ever meet. She has been bringing the consecrated bread to a woman who can not come to church due to the cold and ice and snow for fear she’ll fall and be hurt. She said something like this:

I don’t know about the expensive words and I’m not educated like Kristin, but when I bring the bread to this woman, after I’ve given it to her, she just gets a look of peace on her face. It’s as if she takes a deep breath and relaxes after she’s been given the bread. It’s magical and holy and wonderful.

This was my first epiphany. I may know the $10 words, but that isn’t what the Eucharist is about. It’s about the mystical quality and holiness of being “fed with the spiritual food” of this sacrament. Fr. Charlie went on to explain the spectrum of beliefs surrounding this sacrament, and pointing out that both of us who responded were right, but that we were touching on different aspects of the spectrum. I’ll add that one of us did it much more eloquently and with feeling. That person wasn’t me.

But this wasn’t the end of the epiphanies. The next day, Sunday, I was serving on the altar. I had given Fr. Charlie the chalice and helped him wash his hands. He had handed me the water pitcher and the other items he didn’t need, and I had gone back to my post beside the altar. I listened as he said the prayers over the hosts and wine, lifting each up at the right time, and I heard the Sanctus bells ring at the right moment. But at some point when he was going through the prayers, a voice in my head said very loudly, “You don’t believe in transubstantiation. You’ve just been parroting that because it was what you’ve been taught.” Wow. Just like that. I don’t believe that. I don’t. After the priest and the congregation have prayed for the world, said the words from the Last Supper, and said the Great Amen, I think the bread and wine are special and blessed and holy, like holy water in Baptism, but they’re not flesh and blood. At least not to me. Who knew? Not me, evidently, and not my friends who sat with me the training the day before.

It doesn’t mean that the sacrament is less special to me now; in fact, I thought about my revelation a lot that day, and it’s been on my mind throughout the week now. It is special. It’s so special that I am prayerful in giving the wine to people at the altar. It’s not passing out drinks at a party. It’s so special that I understand why we don’t toss out the bread after we’re done, but we eat it all or make sure the birds do. It doesn’t go to the garbage disposal or the waste bin. And the wine gets finished off or poured onto the ground, the earth God created. It doesn’t get put back with the wine that hasn’t been prayed over. And it means that taking the host and wine to someone who cannot be at church, someone who needs them so much that he or she asks for them to be carried to the nursing home or apartment, is a very special and humbling task.

Just when I thought I was secure in my beliefs, that I could put them down on paper, as I’ll have to shortly as an assignment for my discernment committee, I was wrong. I do need to think carefully about the difference between what I’ve been taught to believe and what I really do. There is a difference. And the true beliefs are what I need to cull out and ponder. I guess I’ve got some work to do.

Serving on the Altar

Deacon Debby had suggested that I start serving on the altar to get used to being up there. So about a month ago I asked Fr. Charlie to get me some training and start using me up there. He was thrilled since we haven’t had new people serving at the altar in a long time. He got the two regulars together and went through some training.

The training was pretty basic. We walked through a service and I processed the cross, held it again for the reading of the Gospel, went through the motions of the Eucharist, and processed back out. The most difficult part is serving at the Eucharist. There’s a lot that goes on there.

Just as an aside, what happens at the altar wasn’t a complete mystery to me, but it wasn’t very familiar either. I grew up in the Catholic Church before them time girls were allowed to be altar servers. The phrase “altar server” wasn’t even an option since there were only altar boys. And really, during the Offertory when all the moving around is going on up there, there are a lot of things to distract us folks in the congregation. We’re singing, passing the plate, watching the ushers go by, finding our places in the books, all sorts of things. And I can only focus on what’s close around me. This is why when I started driving at 16 I couldn’t find my way around the city I had spent my whole life in. Sitting in the passenger or back seats, I was looking at stores, mountains, cars, annoying my sister, singing along to the radio. I had to ask my mom how to get to the mall after I got my license. This is why I was a little clueless with the whole Communion dance.

And really, it’s like a square dance when you’re up there, only there’s no caller. You have to know when to be beside the altar and when you need to sit behind it. You need to follow cues to know when to go get the cross, when to put the book on the altar, what to grab next. And the whole serving Communion is a dance all in itself with the priest, two people with chalices and then the people lining up at the altar.

So my first service, I just followed. There was a twist since we had an extra person carrying the brass incense burner. I got to follow him and carry the silver jam jar of incense crystals. (I’m sure there’s a name for the silver jam jar, but I haven’t learned it yet.) And John, the incense guy, hadn’t been on the altar in a long time, so we kept bumping into each other since I was following him and he didn’t always know where to go. But I made it through the readings and the Sign of Peace just fine. Then Fr. Charlie asked me to help with the table, which I wasn’t expecting.

It’s not hard to serve at the table, but there is an order to things which should look serious, reverential and coordinated. I can do serious and reverential for the most part, but I’m so not to the coordinated part. Fr. Charlie kept having to direct me, and I kept forgetting to bow after each transfer. Priest hands me wine carafe, we bow. Priest hands me the host holder (again, I know it has a name), we bow. So Charlie would bow, and then I would hesitate and bow. It probably looked a lot like someone visiting China and being a little awkward with a new cultural handshake. But again, I know not many people out in the audience are paying attention, so I think I’m safe.

Then, I got to pass the chalice. Here’s the list of warnings I got about giving people wine:

· DO NOT let go of the chalice, even if the person holds it to their lips.
· say “The Blood of Christ” before offering the wine for people to drink.
· say “The Body and Blood of Christ” for people who are “Dippers”
· for people who are “Dippers” (the right word is “tincture” I know that one) hold the cup low enough that they can see what they are doing.
· some people want you to dip the host and put it on their tongue
· some people don’t want any wine, in which case they will either cross their arms over their chests, shake their heads, or hiss and cross their eyes (well, maybe not the last part)
· after someone takes a drink, wipe the edge, turn the chalice a ¼ turn, and move to the next person.
· after everyone has finished, do not slug the remains. Put the chalice either back on the Credence table or on the altar depending on which chalice you get. The Altar Guild get first dibs on whatever wine is left.

I think I did okay. I didn’t spill anything, said the right things, didn’t trip over Fr. Charlie as he went back and forth, and no one hissed at me.

Then, we made it through the clean-up and I did okay putting everything back as Fr. Charlie finished up. I processed just fine. I just forgot it was my job to put out the candles on the altar, but it got taken care of.

Since that first time, I’ve been on the altar a couple of more times, even when the Canon to the Ordinary came to visit a couple of weeks ago. And I guess I did well enough that Fr. Charlie is going to put me n a regular rotation and give others a break from serving. It’s wonderful taking part more fully and up-close at the mystery of the Eucharist, and I just have to keep reminding myself that no one “out there” is watching for me to mess up. But I can see them during the sermon from my perch up at the altar. And if anyone falls asleep, I’ll know. So be careful you’re looking attentive out there… I’m in control of the wine….