Corpus Christi is one of those feast days everyone liked where I grew up. Like Palm Sunday and Ash Wednesday, it was an active time. We walked in procession around the town. The first communicants for that year got to wear their communion dresses and drop peony and rose petals on the road.
There were several stops in the processions where Father blessed us with the monstrance. The women decorated those places with flowers, linens, and carpets. The day was a feast for the senses with people to SEE, flowers to SMELL, music from the choir to HEAR. When the procession got back to church we all got to EAT—the Eucharist, the Body of Christ.
The other signature events of late spring and summer are weddings. Strangely enough thinking about Corpus Christi and marriage together has helped me understand the Eucharist in a new way.
In British novels, the couple makes vows according to the old Anglican prayer book.
After declaring their intentions, the man places the ring on the woman’s finger and says,
With this ring, I thee wed. With my body, I thee worship. With all my worldly goods, I thee endow.
Body means the whole person—body, mind, spirit. This is what the husband is entrusting to his wife. He promises to give his body, mind, and spirit— his whole self—in love and reverence and awe to her.
Corpus Christi celebrates just that kind of promise from Jesus. He says, “This is my body given for you,” We know my body means his entire self, his ministry and preaching and healing and his ultimate acceptance of death.
When Jesus tells us at the last supper, “Do this in remembrance of me,” he isn’t telling us to just remember his death. He wants his friends to remember his love for them that was his whole life. He could have said, “With my body, I thee worship.” I have given and am giving my whole self to you.
When we gather at Eucharist, we remember Jesus’ life given for us. We gather to give each other the strength and courage to try his kind of self-giving ourselves.
And we come together over and over again, so that we become more and more like him. Until, finally, we can’t do it any other way. We keep pouring out our lives, as he did. This is what makes Jesus present. We are Jesus’ real presence in the world.
- What is at stake for Christian communities in the way we celebrate the Eucharist?