Holy Communion in the Book of Common Prayer 5

ST PETER, MANEY

LENT 2010

Holy Communion in the Book of Common Prayer

Five sermons

5

 ‘for us and for our salvation’  the sacrament of Christ’s cross.

We do not want to return to the sixteenth century, with its bitter religious divisions and its squadrons of martyrs from both sides of the Reformation divide.  The ecumenical work of the last hundred years has repaired many of the breaches of that time and found common ground where the Catholic and Protestant of those times could see only contention.  But one thing we must acknowledge: the passionate commitment of our forebears in the faith—both of the Anglican and Roman traditions.

Thomas Cranmer’s passionate concern was to release the people of his land from all that prevented them receiving the pure and wholesome medicine of the Gospel: the good news that Christ, in his death and resurrection, had taken away the sins of the world. To him, the Mass stood like a great obstacle, a massive boulder, obscuring this truth. The worshipper at the Mass, as he saw it, was beguiled into adoring the sign—the consecrated bread and wine—instead of the reality—Christ our God.

Rather than put all their reliance, in faith, in the redeeming work of Christ, they were led to trust in the Mass itself, as a means of invoking or activating the remission of sins and shortening the pains of purgatory.

To clear away these obstacles, the new liturgy replaced the doctrine of transubstantiation  - with its stress on the presence of Christ in the elements themselves,  with a stress on the heart and mind of the person receiving ’in remembrance that Christ died’, and the work of the Holy Spirit in that person’s faith.  Yes, Christ did truly offer himself for us in the sacrament of bread and wine (’this is my body’) but that offer was not automatically fulfilled  by the sheer act of eating.  It was in the act of taking ‘by faith with thanksgiving’ that Christ’s offer was fulfilled.

The new teaching emphasised the change worked by God in the heart (through receiving communion) rather than the change in the bread and wine. And it replaced the old doctrine, that the Mass was itself a sacrifice or oblation offered by priest and people, with the twin ideas that, on the one hand, Christ had made the only sacrifice needed for the sin of the world on the cross, and on the other, that those who receive communion could make a different kind of sacrifice –a thank-offering.

When we reach the moment of the administration of Communion, our service has a very distinctive feature.  The Prayer of Consecration comes to a sudden end with the words of Jesus, ‘Do this, as oft as ye shall drink it, in remembrance of me.’ We all say ‘Amen’ and then immediately make out communion.  In fact, in the service of 1552, even the ’Amen’ was omitted, as if to ensure that the last word we hear before communion was the word of Jesus.  This exactly pinpoints the intent of the service. As Cranmer wrote elsewhere: ‘Hearken to Christ, give ear unto his words, which shall lead you the right way unto everlasting life.’  We are invited to use the liturgy as a sounding board enabling us to hear his voice or as a pane of glass, a window through which we look and see the love of God in Christ.  

If, to quote Paul in his  letter to the Galatians, this service ’publicly portrays (or ’placards’) Jesus Christ as crucified before your eyes’ and brings forth a response of faith active in love, it has fulfilled its intention.

There was, of course, a negative side to the Reformation, in liturgy as in everything else. Not only was it the cause of division and even warfare, but it could encourage simplistic ‘black and white’ thinking. In 1552, the Reformers were so keen to stress that the bread and wine were no more than symbols of Christ’s body that they put in a rubric to the say that the ‘curate’ should take the rest of it home for breakfast.  It was as if even to show reverence for these holy signs was to run the risk of idolatry. Fortunately, in 1662 that rubric was removed.

There is, rightly, no shame now in combining what were once seen as ‘Popish’ and ‘Protestant’ views.  In fact there has been a wonderful convergence in our understanding of the old divisive issues.  But perhaps we may still cherish Cranmer’s desire, that we value this service not for its antiquity or dignity, or, indeed, for anything in itself but because it draws back the curtain between us and Christ.