Wait for each other, 1 Corinthians 11:23-34

1 Corinthians 11:23-34 (NRSV)

23 For I received from the Lord what I also handed on to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took a loaf of bread, 24 and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, "This is my body that is for you. Do this in remembrance of me." 25 In the same way he took the cup also, after supper, saying, "This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me." 26 For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes. 27 Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be answerable for the body and blood of the Lord.

33 So then, my brothers and sisters, when you come together to eat, wait for one another. 34 If you are hungry, eat at home, so that when you come together, it will not be for your condemnation.

Paul was writing to the Christians in Corinth who had developed a rather nasty habit of worshiping separately from one another and some were shut out of the Eucharistic Feast and had to worship later. This may sound trivial to us today, we who worship at churches that might have various services of various styles and liturgical forms. However, Paul was deadly serious about the fact that the people of Corinth should "wait for each other" and not make worship a factional, separatist kind of experience. Paul knew that the way that we worship and pray affects the way that we believe. Leonel Mitchell coined the phrase (in English) "Praying Shapes Believing" when he wrote his book on the liturgy with the same name. In Latin, the phrase is "Lex Orandi, lex credendi" - which can be translated, the law of prayer affects the law of belief.

The way that we gather the way that we worship the way that we offer reverence the way that we organize ourselves does have an effect upon the way that we believe. Our actions do help to create our lived theology. Worship is not really meant to be something that is a la carte, it is not really meant to be something that we choose what feels "best" or most "comfortable"...worship done well may challenge us beyond our comfort zones, and may move us to see that God is bigger than our imagination (and our liturgical tastes). "Wait for one another" is a challenging and helpful prayer to keep on my lips as we consider how we will be in relationship with people from other denominations and from other liturgical sensibilities.

If our praying does shape our believing, it matters that we do wait for one another and work to build up the Body of Christ rather than separate and fragment it. These are challenging and helpful word for us.

~The Rev. Peter M. Carey

Church: Dynamic Ecclesiology of Communion - Bonhoeffer, Cone, Williams - on Wordle

I put my Master's thesis through "wordle" and this is what I got:

pretty cool...click on the image above for higher res (more visible) version

~The Rev. Peter M. Carey

Can there be Unity without Uniformity?

A brief question that encapsulates some of the issues that I tried to address in my honors thesis was the question of "Can there be Unity but not Uniformity?" within the Church, within the gathered community, within even other entities such as schools, families, organizations? My assumption is that there can be Unity but not Uniformity, though it will require a dynamism that most communities have difficulty tolerating and celebrating. My assumption needs to be challenged and tested ... as it probably is in many local churches, as well as in the Global Anglican Communion.

Can there be Unity but not Uniformity?

Summary (abstract) of the work...

An ecclesiology of communion that is Trinitarian offers a model for the Church of living together in unity though not in uniformity. This model may allow for and affirm prophetic voices from the margins so that the church might respond to the cries of a world in need. This thesis attempts to explore and describe an ecclesiology of communion that is influenced by Trinitarian theology. In this awareness of difference and tension, this model of ecclesiology is dynamic and transformational. The hope is that this ecclesiology may describe a more dynamic Church that not only exists in judgment but also exists in action to dismantle systems of oppression.

This thesis begins with Dietrich Bonhoeffer and his sense that the Church is constituted socially by Christ. He states “The church is the hidden Christ among us.”[1] In this ecclesiology, Christ is at the center, and communion is known within and between people as they encounter Christ and one another. Further, the “church is only the church when it exists for others.”

The poetic and mystical descriptions of church by Rowan Williams offer a model that the church, along with the creation itself, is gift. As God made the world and as God gave his son to the world, God also gave the church. As such, the church exists in a contingent way, it exists in judgment. As a community of the forgiven, the members of the church are made up of persons, not mere individuals. The persons of the church can be likened to the persons of the Trinity, living in unity and difference, in the mystical Godhead. Finally, in Rowan Williams description, Christ is present in the interaction between people as they encounter and welcome those who are different, that is; the other.

Lastly, to evaluate how communion exists in judgment and action this thesis takes up James Cone’s critiques of ecclesiology. For Cone, “The Christian church is that community of persons who ‘got the hint,’” and thus refused to be content with human pain and suffering. Refusing merely to speak of the church mystically or metaphysically, Cone challenges conventional (white, European) assumptions and claims about church and also challenges even the highly nuanced theology of Rowan Williams. If the church universal and local embraces such a model, it may move from individualism to community, from inward gazing to outward mission, from a focus on the in crowd to focus on all those at the margins.

Living into a model of the dynamic church, the persons of the church would hear the cry of the poor and oppressed and then act to end oppression, to see the injustices of our world, and act to counter them. As we turn to one another in our local churches, in our larger church bodies, and in our worldwide churches, we rely on the work of Christ to bring us to full unity. As we turn to one another with the ordinary, time tested practices of our tradition, we approach one another with humility, with an awareness of our own brokenness, and our own incompleteness. From the interaction between and among the members of the church there emerges a personal and communal transformation into a church that is dynamic, outward looking and responds to a world in need. In the contexts of the Anglican Communion and The Episcopal Church, we are perhaps at a turning point, an opportunity, or a catastrophe, depending on one’s perspective.

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[1] Bonhoeffer, Dietrich No Rusty Swords: Letters, Lectures and Notes – 1928-1936- From the Collected Works, Volume I (Collins, London: 1965)