Holy communion, or eucharist, comes from the Greek eucharisto — I give thanks — because worshippers use this meal to give thanks to God.
It is a sign and a seal of God’s love. This meal is also called the Lord’s Supper, because, according to one scholar, “the Lord himself hosts us at this meal”
Through the Lord’s Supper we witness Jesus’ availability to all humankind, and his desire to share in our vulnerability. For all people who have visible vulnerabilities, including people with disabilities, holy communion has a particular relevance: All people are “fearfully and wonderfully made” (Psalm 139) in the image of God, and all Christians — including people with disabilities — can discover our true natures as embodied “jars of clay” (2 Corinthians 4:7) who point to God’s glory.
I am a 25-year-old Canadian male of English, Scottish and German descent, who possesses cerebral palsy. Because of, or concurrent with, an inexplicable inability to breathe at birth, I suffered what is called an intraventricular hemorrhage; that is, I bled within the two halves of my brain. The bleeding primarily affected the left side of my brain; thus, the right side of my body is, and may always be, shorter, weaker, and less balanced than the left. I also possess scoliosis (curvature of the spine), a lack of fine motor control, and a distinct spatial impairment. All these mixed blessings exist alongside verbal, social and artistic gifts.
When I refer to people with disabilities, I mean primarily those people who possess sensory impairments, whose interactions with the environment are interrupted. This definition includes those who possess blindness, deafness or severe hearing difficulties, paraplegia, quadriplegia and the physical manifestations of various neurological disorders; this definition also includes anyone who endures other chronic or recurrent physical symptoms of what one scholar called a “familiar body gone wrong.”
The vicissitudes of my birth require that I seek interdependence with other people: I sometimes need help to physically find my way, to balance myself, and to lift heavy objects. In turn, this interdependence also makes me available to the needs of others. This symbiotic relationship means being open to our mutual joys and pains; it means embracing the “power made perfect in weakness.” (2 Corinthians 12:9) Jean Vanier writes about this paradoxical power in his book Becoming Human: “Weakness carries within it a secret power. The cry and the trust that flow from weakness can open up hearts. The one who is weaker can call forth powers of love in the one who is stronger.”
Loneliness
Holy communion addresses several human needs, including and especially the need for belonging, and the need to move away from a space of isolation or competition and toward the abundant reign of God. Loneliness relates to vulnerability, and to human interdependence in general, because those who are in the greatest need of available love often do not receive clear expressions of that love. Tellingly, Vanier writes,
Loneliness comes at any time. It comes in times of sickness or when friends are absent; it comes during sleepless nights when the heart is heavy, during times of failure at work or in relationships; it comes when we lose trust in ourselves and in others. In old age, loneliness can rise up and threaten to overwhelm us. At such times, life can lose its meaning. Loneliness can feel like death.
Similarly, Henri Nouwen, the Dutch priest who worked for many years at Vanier’s L’Arche Daybreak community in Toronto, notes, “We become increasingly aware that we are living in a world where even the most intimate relationships have become part of competition and rivalry.”
Vanier’s second theme in Becoming Human is belonging: he asserts “all people are fundamentally the same,” because we all have an instinctive yearning to belong to a community of “love that understands.” This understanding love can only exist when we open ourselves to the weaknesses of others.
Additionally, Nouwen says we must care; we cannot simply “use our expertise to keep a safe distance from that which really matters.” Because holy communion is a space of availability and vulnerability, it forces us to “grieve, to experience, to cry out with.” Therefore, anyone who willingly accepts his or her own pain can become a source of healing for others, particularly in a space like the Lord’s Supper. Holy communion provides everyone with a community of belonging, because all communicants participate in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ: this community is bound together eternally by the grace of God the Father.
The Great Prayer of Thanksgiving
The Great Prayer of Thanksgiving, an integral part of the liturgy of holy communion in the Presbyterian Church, is central to any discussion of disability, availability and vulnerability. There are seven versions of the prayer available to ministers who can use different sections from each version to compose their own unique interpretations. I am particularly interested in the fourth template of the prayer as available in the Book of Common Worship. This version affirms the unity-in-diversity of the body of Christ: “Remembering our Lord’s command to take and eat, we ponder the mystery of his promise that in this meal we are joined to him and to one another as a holy people uniting heaven and earth.”
Just as we are one in Christ, we are united with one another. God forms the church by forming “common people … to be the body of Christ in the world.” Being Christ’s body in the world means opening ourselves to each other’s suffering. The focus on our unity and vulnerability within the great prayer dispels the potential for isolation and division among the communicants, because it allows us to concentrate on the death and resurrection of Christ. The direct statements of the great prayer emphasize God’s extravagant grace.
It also reminds us that Jesus Christ “took flesh and lived among us” and is “[present] with us in this feast.” These affirmations of Christ’s incarnation, his engagement with suffering, and his continued presence with his faithful people speak to the communal nature of the feast. This emphasis on Christocentric community holds at bay our despair in the face of life’s griefs and pains, for Christ is “re-membered” as the head of what one scholar has called the “household of vulnerability.”
After the affirmation of the mystery of faith (“Christ has died; Christ is risen; Christ will come again”) the prayer engages in an invocation of the Holy Spirit that affirms God’s desire for community. These different strategies — affirming the unity of Christ’s body, declaring Christ’s continued presence, and invoking the Holy Spirit that lives in us — can also counteract the demoralization that often accompanies human weakness, because we have affirmed the “power made perfect in weakness” of the Lord of the universe (2 Corinthians 12:9). Finally, the appropriate use of language in the invocation of the Holy Spirit reaffirms God’s existence as a community and His desire to relate to us on a personal level.
While the great prayer manifests the potential for human community, marks Jesus’ continued presence with us, and affirms God’s personal relationship with His creatures, it also contains a paradox, which appears in every version or template. The congregation affirms God’s “power and might” as the “holy, holy, holy Lord.” This is a mystery hard to convey in direct speech: while God chose and chooses to “empty Himself” through Jesus Christ, He is also the omnipotent, creative and holy Lord of the universe. This is what Jean Vanier means when he affirms the “secret power” of weakness.
Thankfully, the paradox is not one-sided: overall, the great prayer enacts the availability and vulnerability we have been discussing. Even though Jesus represents God’s strength, he affirms human vulnerability in the other two persons of the Trinity. Therefore, while we are distant from God, He comes near to us in our liturgy.
Conclusion
I have experienced the Canadian Presbyterian form of holy communion in two distinct ways, both of which have value for me and, I hope, for my readers.
First, when I was a child and an adolescent in Summerside, P.E.I., and Sackville, N.B., I experienced the liturgical method of “passing the plate.” The elements — the signs and seals of God’s grace — were cubes of bread and plastic cups of grape juice, handed out by the minister and four presiding elders, using the same kind of trays that were used for the offering. We always said the words of the great prayer. Because I have always struggled with the paradox of my own power alongside my vulnerability and availability, I have never truly been comfortable saying the words, “holy, holy, holy Lord of power and might.”
While these words created a distance between God and me that made this ritual less than enjoyable, they taught me the values of patience and critical thought. In my own engagement with the world, I find it necessary to always strive for a clear understanding of the reasons behind Christian faith and ritual action. Furthermore, I knew — and know more fully now — that, despite its ambiguities, the Great Prayer of Thanksgiving as a whole points to a gentle, loving God who desires intellectual and spiritual liberation for His children.
Second, upon entrance to Knox College and attendance at Knox Spadina, I experienced holy communion by intinction. Proceeding to the front of the church to receive with others, and dipping the bread in the wine impressed on me the value of the communal meal, and emphasized the importance of the embodiment of the sacrament. It is notable that at Knox Church, congregants do not recite the great prayer. I have experienced similar welcome at Knox College while giving and receiving communion in the round, although we usually say some version of the prayer.
Although I struggle with my image of myself as a person with a disability, I have felt Jesus’ love for me in both of these ways of sharing at the Lord’s Table. I feel and know that Jesus Christ feels, knows and shares my embodied experience. Since Jesus reveals himself to me in these ways of receiving the sacrament, I must share them with you. I hope fervently you will both affirm the Lord’s Supper in itself, and seek ways to be inclusive of those in need of an available love.
