by CCW | 18 April 2018 17:37
Our readings in Chapel this week take us from the company of the broken hearted to those whose hearts are on fire with love and joy. And all, in part, because of the breaking of the bread. That action consolidates the teaching and brings it home in the minds of the disciples. It is not just that seeing is believing. It is rather the breakthrough of the understanding, seeing as understanding, seeing things in a radically new way. That is what happens on the road to Emmaus, the story which we read in two installments; one last week, the other this week.
“He was known of them in the breaking of the bread.” Christ’s actions at the Last Supper on the night of his betrayal are now seen and remembered in the light of his passion and resurrection. He opens our understanding by opening the Scriptures, showing us that our wholeness, our wellness and health, if you will, are found in the face of our brokenness and not in spite of our broken hearts. But the opening of the Scriptures to our understanding is not all; what brings the teaching home to the heart is an action related to our being together at a meal.
Food plays an important role in the accounts of the Resurrection because of the body. Immediately after the conclusion of the story of the Road to Emmaus, Luke tells of another appearance of Jesus to the disciples gathered in Jerusalem, it seems, where he proclaims peace and shows them his hands, and feet, saying, “it is I myself; handle me, and see; for a spirit has not flesh and bones and you see that I have.” And yet, “they still disbelieved for joy, and wondered,” Luke tells us. It is in that context that Jesus then asks what might seem to be an utterly bizarre question. “Have you anything here to eat?” “They gave him a piece of broiled fish” which he took and ate. Nothing confirms the reality of the body more, it seems, than eating. Something powerful is made known through our being together at a meal. Through something as ordinary as a piece of broiled fish comes something extraordinary and powerful.
This is why the Mass or Communion is such an important aspect of the Christian Faith, just as the fast of Ramadan for Muslims ends with Eid al-fitr , the festival of the breaking of the fast, and just as the Jewish Passover is a celebratory meal commemorating God’s deliverance of Israel from Pharaoh’s bitter yoke. Thursday night the Cadet Corps held its Mess Dinner. The term mess does not refer to the state of students’ rooms or the conditions of our world. Mess refers to a company of people who take meals together. Mass and Mess are related terms deriving from the Latin. It is about being gathered together in a common purpose and understanding. And it is about sacrifice and service in which we are healed and made whole.
Some of our students were servers at the Cadet Mess Dinner; others, holding rank, were the ones being served. Does that mean that some are better than others? That it is better to be served than to serve? No. It is about honouring and respecting one another, both those who serve and those who are served because we are all together as one body. An important feature of the religions of the world is the concept of service towards others.“The Son of man came not to be served but to serve,” Jesus says, reversing our ordinary perspectives and desire for privilege and position. Such ideas and ideals contribute to an education which builds character and which sets us in motion towards one another with dignity and respect
That, too, is part of what is involved in facing the forms of our broken-heartedness without which we cannot be whole. It reveals character. This is what we are seeing, I think, in the remarkable ways in which the communities of the broken-hearted are dealing with their grief and loss and sorrow in the aftermath of the terrible bus crash of the Humboldt Bronco Hockey team. They are refusing to be defined by just their sorrow and grief.
We go from broken hearts to burning hearts through the breaking of the bread; even through a piece of broiled fish! Just so God uses the things of the world and the things of our hearts to gather us to himself
(Rev’d) David Curry
Chaplain, English & ToK teacher
Chair of the Department of Religion and Philosophy
Source URL: https://christchurchwindsor.ca/2018/04/18/kes-chapel-reflection-week-of-16-april/
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