"We Echo on Earth..."
Lenten Series 2010
A reflection on Scott Hahn's "Lamb's Supper: the Book of Revelatiion
(Presented in reverse order)
A New Covenant
Now the point in what we are saying is this: we have a high priest, Jesus, one who is seated at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in heaven, a minister in the sanctuary and the true tent which is set up not by man but by the Lord. For every high priest is appointed to offer gifts and sacrifices; hence it is necessary for this priest also to have something to offer. Now if he were on earth, he would not be a priest at all, since there are priests who offer gifts according to the law. They serve a copy and shadow of the heavenly sanctuary; for when Moses was about to erect the tent, he was instructed by God, saying, "See that you make everything according to the pattern which was shown you on the mountain." But as it is, Christ has obtained a ministry which is as much more excellent than the old as the covenant he mediates is better. - Heb 8.1-7
I mentioned earlier that Dr. Hahn, still an evangelical, attended a small daily Mass and saw the book of Revelation in front of him. It was a significant moment in his conversion to Catholicism, as he often notes.
It's interesting how often we owe a debt of gratitude to converts. They remind us of what we have and in which they now share. They bring "fresh eyes" and see what we, by habit, take for granted. Personally, I have noticed many more references to the Eucharistic liturgy framed by the book of Revelation than I have before. I see it in the art and architecture of our church. I hear it in the teaching and the texts of our faith. I have always believed that the mass is "heaven on earth" and I can also see more how it is "earth in heaven."
So how does any of this impact what we do at the Eucharistic celebration?
First, I hope it enriches our approach to Mass. By approach, I mean more than the preparation and transition into the liturgy. Beginning with St. Paul in first Corinthians, the church has always understood the need for this. Over the centuries, many treasures of prayer had been employed to this end. In fact, we take it so seriously that it was ritualized in the order of Mass up until Vatican II. Collections of hymns, prayers, and Psalms have been handed down to us to prepare us for the celebration. I'm sure we've used some of these in the past and still do.
These devotions are vocal prayer. They train us and point us to the reality of this mystical encounter. Pausing to consider what is about to happen opens our vision of what God is doing more than what human beings are assembling to create.
There's no magic formula to this because magic has nothing to do with it. Each person finds whatever works best. For some it will be a half hour of meditation; for others it will be that transitional moment just coming into the church or chapel. The only essential thing is to do what Sister said, "remember where you are."
Secondly, we begin to have a deeper appreciation of why we are at the Eucharist.
It is important to understand the essential rituals of our faith. Many attempted to teach us mechanics of the holy Mass. Most of us have an understanding of the basics.
As with most things in life, the simple things are the most profound.
Let's take as an example the bread and wine. We've seen antiquity of these two symbols in the Old Testament in particular at the feast of Passover. Thousands of years later, we're still using them. Sure, the language is different as well as the vessels holding them. But things do not change much in eternity, do they? Time and space become irrelevant as measures of reality because we are encountering Reality itself.
Let's consider the simple gesture of gathering around the altar. This is more then furniture arrangement or convenience seating. We are standing around the throne of God just as much as the redeemed are in heaven. Our song is their song. We praise God for who He is and thank Him for what He has done.
When we realize this great dignity, our participation is saturated with true piety. False piety has the principle aim of calling attention to itself. Jesus was pretty clear on how valuable empty religious customs are not. No, this is a participation that doesn't merely understand. It is a quiet but exuberant headlong rush into the Mystery. Is allowing ourselves to be impressed by being absorbed. When Prince Vladimir sent delegates to the Eucharistic liturgy in Constantinople a thousand years ago, they reported back that they did not know if they were in heaven or on earth. We can only hope to be able to say there really is no difference.
Lastly, I believe we discover that worship -- true worship -- transforms us.
In the Old Testament, there are directions for the pilgrims to enter the temple through one gate and leave by another. I think this is more than crowd control. I believe it was a statement that we do not leave the worship of Almighty God as the same people. The Passover would never mean the same to the disciples after the Last Supper. They began to see the transformation of the covenant in their celebration of it.
A spiritual director asked me what was my favorite part of the mass. Being a good Catholic, I told him the Consecration. He said, "no, I mean emotionally." I realized it was after Communion. Whether at a quiet daily mass or huge Papal rally, it was that prayerful quiet after receiving the Eucharist that meant the most to me. He asked me to describe it and I told him it was a very intimate time as well as the urge to move on. He noted that the Catholic Mass has a very abrupt end. “Ite, missa est” literally means "go. You are dismissed" after short prayer. There's no reason to hang around much longer because God has done in the soul what He set out to do. This is the transforming moment. All the prayers and praises have been offered and now it is God's turn. Moses’ face literally glowed after being in the presence of God that he had to wear a veil. When we realize that we have encountered the Lamb of God in his glory, we cannot help but be transformed as well.
Archbishop Sheen once commented that people claim to not "get much out of the mass." He questioned how much they put into it. Vatican II called us to actively participate in the work of the church in the liturgy itself. This never meant everybody doing everything. Rather, it meant throwing ourselves into the heavenly worship as local as our parish church. It means to contemplate the “immortal, invisible, only wise God” as the babies around us are screaming and the cantor is completely off key. It called us to a spiritual transformation of the deepest order even when it was clear Father had spent less than 10 minutes preparing his homily. It ultimately meant that people who are temporarily confined by the passage of time were already in eternity itself.
The few themes we have reflected on in this Lent are far from complete. The study of Christian worship will never end. Asking what we do and why we do it is that divinely inspired motivation God has planted within our nature. This is a "holy curiosity" because it is an internal motivation to go deeper. Dr. Hahn has hit on something I think is exceptionally important in today's church.
The "liturgy wars" raging around us are too often devoid of this truly mystical appreciation. Folks argue -- and validly -- the role of tradition, custom, continuity and so on. But with out this higher -- and I argue, better -- appreciation, it's all a bunch of noise.
The enemies of the church have always made it their business to eradicate the Sacrament of the Eucharist. We think of those brave souls from the past who celebrated the Mass in secret even when death was the assured penalty. Of all the treasures of the Archdiocese of New York, one of the most valuable is a collapsible chalice used by priests in Ireland during the Penal Times. So while we now enjoy the luxury of the freedom to worship, we still must treasure this Sacrament. We only treasure what we value and understand.
May the Lord to established this sacred banquet the night before He died give us that desire to understand more and more. May we one day see in heaven what we already know here on earth.
5. The Glorious Appearance
No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him; and I will raise him up at the last day. It is written in the prophets, `And they shall all be taught by God.' Every one who has heard and learned from the Father comes to me. Not that any one has seen the Father except him who is from God; he has seen the Father. Truly, truly, I say to you, he who believes has eternal life. I am the bread of life. Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died. This is the bread which comes down from heaven, that a one may eat of it and not die. I am the living bread which came down from heaven; if any one eats of this bread, he will live for ever; and the bread which I shall give for the life of the world is my flesh." – St. John 6
If you want to see Christianity on steroids, bring up the topic of Jesus coming in glory at the end of time. It conjures up images of universal cataclysm and total destruction. In the immortal words of Homer Simpson, "the end is near; God loves you and now he's going to kill you."
It seems as if everything is on hold until Jesus shows up. Or better, every activity imaginable is merely a preparation for the day when the Judge of the living and the dead appears surrounded by the Angels. I think we are left with not only the confidence of God's ultimate triumph over sin and death. I believe this popular image falsely creates the impression that God is somehow or another not present today.
We have to evaluate lovingly is the opinions of so many non-Catholic "end-times believers." They study the book of Revelation, surf the Internet, and devour newspapers to determine what Jesus Christ Himself said He didn't know. Using scare tactics and the privileged isolation of a true believer, they are longing the presence of God in the world where apparently, He has not yet returned to.
That is not our faith. And more importantly, it is not the faith of the book of Revelation.
But hold on, we have all these plagues and wars in the opening of heaven with the Lamb enthroned in glory. Isn't this all about a particular moment in history? I mean, don't we even say during the Mass, "Christ will come again?"
Yes, from Christ's own words we believe that all creation will be subject to a last judgment in the presence of the risen Lord of glory. Dr. Hahn maintains the book of Revelation is referring to something more in the present than merely at the end of time. He writes this moment of glory is not about the calendar but about the Eucharist.
The Bible uses a Greek word for the appearance of Jesus in the world. Parousia is that the concrete reality of the appearance of a person. We know it when the king or queen comes into the room to the sound of trumpets and choirs. We experience it at the ballgame when the star player’s name is announced and he comes running out on the field to crowd going wild. We even use it to describe the effect certain people have when they enter the room and light it up with their personality.
And by faith, we know the Real Presence in the Eucharist. Dr. Hahn says, “The Eucharist is the Sacrament of the parousia.” If all things will find the end point in the presence of the Lamb of God, we are already there. When we receive the Eucharist or are in Its presence - as we are right now, there is no difference essentially between the glory of heaven and what we see around us. We can pray for the things and graces to help us reach heaven even if we are there right now.
So this is heaven? It sure doesn't seem like it, does it?
Remember, we human beings got bored with Paradise. We had it once, remember? We rejected the simplicity of it all and found ourselves outside. And ever since, we have felt the tug to try and find it again. The consequence of the sin of Adam and Eve was not only original sin, but original desire. If absence does indeed make the heart grow fonder, it would only be the Sacred Heart of Jesus that could guide us back to where we always knew we belonged.
Faith is not a program or a checklist; is a romance. When it comes to God we seek a Person more than principles. Our discovery of the presence of God is the single defining reason and description for why we are living. In the Eucharist, we find it even as we search for it.
St. Thomas Aquinas refers to the Eucharist is the presence of God under "the veil of a sacrament." To use the language of the book of Revelation, the Eucharist is the apocalypse of the parousia. It is the unveiling of the sacramental veils to discover the Presence of God. As human beings, sin has darkened our understanding and ability to enter into the immediate presence of God. As the Lord said to Moses, "no one can see me and live. If they see me, they will die."
The Incarnation has changed all that and so, our humanity shared by Christ, becomes the vehicle by which we enter heaven. By grace, we stand before the Father in the same humanity His beloved Son stands before Him in glory.
So welcome to heaven! The Eucharist is the Real Presence of Jesus Christ, body and blood soul and divinity. This is His appearance in glory because it is His presence. There is no less Jesus here in this chapel then there is in heaven. We do not get more God "up there" than we do down here. The difference is how well we see it.
St. Paul refers to this well when he said, "now I see indistinctly as if through a mirror, but later I shall see fully." The Eucharistic journey for each Christian is the never ending exercise of seeking the face of God himself. "It is Your presence O Lord that I seek, hide not Your face from me."
The Bread of Life, the “hidden manna" nourishes us and draws us deeper into its own reality. It speaks to our hearts that Jesus is here now. A faith without the Eucharist at the center can only see that far off moment when sacraments are no more. That is why we offer this todah, this thank offering of praise, "until He comes again.” And in offering it, we come to know Him "in the breaking of the bread."
In seeing Him now, we will be sure to recognize him latter.
3. Reverence
When the Lamb opened the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven for about half an hour. Then I saw the seven angels who stand before God, and seven trumpets were given to them. And another angel came and stood at the altar with a golden censer; and he was given much incense to mingle with the prayers of all the saints upon the golden altar before the throne; and the smoke of the incense rose with the prayers of the saints from the hand of the angel before God. (Rev 8.1-4)
From experience, I have learned yelling at children in church to be quiet is a pointless endeavor. Actually, it's not just children. After trying so many different ways of this type of ecclesiastical crowd control, I learned from the example of a very prayerful educator. When the din was approaching deafening, she would stand at the microphone and simply say, "please, remember where you are." Invariably, the church fell silent.
She had discovered reverence.
What I saw in that was a complete shift from protocol to prayer. In some way, there was a power to believing in contrast to the power of behaving. He was a movement from the human towards God.
If there is one thing clear from the heavenly liturgy in the book of Revelation it is this. Reverence is seen throughout the book. We find it in the thundering praise of all creation and in the silence of the angels and saints before the Lamb. It infuses the gestures of those who worship bowing their faces to the ground or standing strong before the throne of God. The smoking thuribles of humanity's prayer and the shining brilliance of the white robes signify the dignity of worship.
It stands to reason that in the perfect glory of heaven, the worship would be perfect as well. But friends, we're not in heaven yet, are we?
Dr. Hahn actually makes it very clear in his book The Lamb's Supper that we are in fact in heaven when we celebrate the Eucharist. We are joining with, not imitating or mimicking, the worship of angels and saints. The sacred furnishings and rituals of the Jerusalem Temple were patterns of heavenly worship. What we do is the real thing. The presence of Jesus Christ in the Eucharist is as real as His presence upon the altar of heaven.
Remember how sacred sacred was in that Jerusalem Temple. The holy of holies was a small room in the heart of the Temple that held the Ark of the Covenant. The high priest was allowed in only once a year on the Day of Atonement – Yom Kippur. Under King David, as they were bringing the Ark of the Covenant into Jerusalem, someone tried to steady it and was struck down because he was unworthy even to touch it. Needless to say, the high priest was probably trembling on Yom Kippur as he went behind the large, ornate veil. There is even a legend at the high priest had a rope tied around his ankle in the event he had to be rescued from being overcome by the presence of God.
Yes, holy was serious.
I'm sure most of us have had similar experiences of a profound respect in the presence of the sacred. I remember as an altar boy being told to put the key in the tabernacle. I climbed the steps as if I was climbing Mount Sinai. Perhaps we have had those moments like that upon coming to church when the Blessed Sacrament is exposed and we really knew in our hearts that we were in the presence of the Eucharistic King. Or maybe it was just an ordinary moment remembering “where we are.”
The customs and traditions of proper church behavior are definitely worth keeping. They are incarnate gestures of reference. We cannot forget that according to our faith, the spiritual is most comfortable in the physical. The Rosary candle-light procession in Lourdes involves prayer of the heart, words of the mouth, and the movement of the human body. The fullness of holy Communion is realized in the physical reception and consumption of the sacred Host. Physical Christianity is normative and actual.
Having said all that, I also know how easy it is to forget. We are rightfully shocked at the all-too common displays of irreverence in church and seek the easiest remedy in yet more rules. Before we go there, before we add to the rules that are so easily broken, maybe we need to try something else. Maybe we need to remember where we are.
We used to call this the "fear of the Lord." It is a solidly biblical principle but one that has taken on a negative connotation in our society. "Fear" is something bad and something to be avoided. Our Confirmation ritual uses a perfectly good substitute for this expression as we pray for the Holy Spirit to be given in the gift of "awe and wonder in your presence."
Bingo! We have a winner! Our gestures and attitude of reverence inspired by this awe and wonder is more than being polite; it is actual prayer. Is the non-offensive demand to be generous and attentive and considerate as we worship alongside the heavenly hosts. It is a proper and reflective disposition that allows the tremendous mystery of grace into our souls. As Dr. Hahn says, "we have to contemplate in order to participate." Vatican II rightly called us to "active and conscious participation” in the liturgy that is impossible without reference and remembering where we are.
But I have to warn you: reverence is addictive. When we get a taste of it, we want more of it. We may even go so far as to fight for it. This quiet recollection is one of the great treasures of our church. We find it everywhere regardless of style or setting. This is our "inner room" from whence we "pray to the Father sees in secret." And like all good gifts, it is from above. It is a gift of the Holy Spirit in the ordinary grace of the redeemed of the Lamb.
So as that ancient hymn of the Eastern liturgy prays,
Let all mortal flesh keep silence,
And with fear and trembling stand;
Ponder nothing earthly minded,
For with blessing in His hand,
Christ our God to earth descendeth,
Our full homage to demand.
King of kings, yet born of Mary,
As of old on earth He stood,
Lord of lords, in human vesture,
In the body and the blood;
He will give to all the faithful
His own self for heavenly food.
Rank on rank the host of heaven
Spreads its vanguard on the way,
As the Light of light descendeth
From the realms of endless day,
That the powers of hell may vanish
As the darkness clears away.
In the most full, active and conscious way, with heart, soul and body, we pray for the interior and exterior grace to remember where and with Whom we are.
As the Scripture say: The Lord is in His holy Temple; let all the earth keep silence before Him. We pray, that we will reverence the Holy Presence in our hearts before all else.
2. Sacrifice
In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to him who was able to save him from death, and he was heard for his godly fear. Although he was a Son, he learned obedience through what he suffered; and being made perfect he became the source of eternal salvation to all who obey him, being designated by God a high priest after the order of Melchiz'edek. Heb 5.7-10
The 40 days of Lent are directed to the ultimate sacrifice -- the offering of Christ on the Cross. The penance of the season is a reflection of that sacrifice. We attempt to image what we worship.
But what is sacrifice and why does it play such an important role in religion?
Think about our popular image of sacrifice. God creates something good for us and we destroy it in order to honor Him. Again, this is the popular image that may or may not have anything to do with the Judeo-Christian heritage. But the sacrifice of the Lamb of God is very, very different.
We first note the presence of sacrifice soon after Adam and Eve are expelled from the Garden of Eden. Cain and Abel offer sacrifice. Abel offers a lamb and Cain offers the produce of his farm. God looks with favor on Abel’s sacrifice because of its vitality. We soon begin to see covenants sealed with animal sacrifices and worship requiring them.
But in Genesis 14 we learn of a particular sacrifice that stands out from the others. Melchizedek was both the king and the priest of Salem. In fact, he is the first priest mentioned in the Bible. And what does he offer? He offers something we are familiar with now -- bread and wine. And through this sacrifice, he blesses Abraham and those who will follow him.
A few years later, Abraham would return to Salem on Mount Moriah when God called him to offer the unthinkable sacrifice -- his own son, Isaac. As Isaac carried the wood up the mountain, he asked his father where was the animal to be offered. And Abraham responded that “God himself would provide the sacrifice."
Catholic tradition has always held these as prophecies of the Eucharistic sacrifice. These examples have been incorporated into the first Eucharistic prayer, the Roman Canon, from ancient times:
Look with favor on these Offerings and accept them as once You accepted the gifts of Your servant Abel, the sacrifice of Abraham, our father in faith, and the bread and wine offered by Your priest Melchizedek.
These ancient Isrealite offerings would lead to the most important sacrifice in the history of Israel -- the Passover lamb. And Christians would see its fulfillment in the Lamb of God offered on the cross.
Our key to understanding the Christian meaning of sacrifice begins with the sacrifice offered by that mysterious character Melchizedek. What made an offering holy was the action of offering more than what was being offered.
The bread and wine, the testing of Abraham, the yearly Passover lamb, and the self-offering of the Lamb of God all occurred on the same mountain. Mount Moriah, Zion, Jerusalem, Calvary -- these are all part of the same landscape. They are the spiritual center of the earth and beyond. They still are.
The book of Revelation points to a new heaven and a new earth. The church is the new Israel of the new covenant. The magnificent Temple in Jerusalem is now the redeemed of the New Jerusalem. God has in fact provided the Lamb for sacrifice, the Passover himself Jesus Christ. And as Melchizedek blessed the descendents of Abraham in his sacrifice, so too are his descendents in faith blessed in the sacrifice of the Mass.
But aren't we taking the symbolism just a little too far? We would be except for one significant point.
The sacrifice offered by Melchizedek was called a todah. In Greek, the word is eucharistia. In English, we translate it as a ‘thank-offering’ or a ‘cup of blessing.’ Animal sacrifices were different. They were either offered up whole or partially. They were acts of consecration or reparation.
The todah was not about destruction but sanctification. It was a recognition of God's presence particularly in a time of difficulty. The rabbinical tradition has reflected on this even saying that in the age of the Messiah, all sacrifices will be fulfilled but the todah will be eternal.
In the Eucharist, that eternity is fulfilled. By Christ's command, we offer the Christian todah, the "bread of eternal life and the cup of salvation." The self-sacrifice of the Pasch, the divine Passover lamb, is continued and presented before the Father. As one of the church fathers long ago noted, "the priest does at the altar on earth what Christ is doing before the Father in heaven." And as we receive this "hidden manna", we receive the blessings of that sacrifice.
Does this really make a difference? To some, it doesn't. Sadly, in our church today, a good number see the Eucharist as only a ‘ritual of continuity’ or a ‘sacred expression of community.’ I hope we do not descend to that reduction. The sacrifice of the Mass is deeply rooted in salvation history. It began at the dawn of human history and continues into the day where there shall be no sunset. It encompasses all our human thanksgivings and offerings into that one great sacrifice of Christ. It is the offering of the great high Priest by the great high Priest to the great high Priest.
Nothing here is static or stale. There is a constant movement, a perpetual journey, from the wilderness of recent redemption to the mountain of the eternal City of God. As Christians, it is this flow that defines us as the "pilgrim people of God." Sacrifice is not something we do; it is who we are. It is offering everything in our life and in our world to God. It is sanctifying everything we create and must endure. It is the dignity and the duty to present what is here in time to the eternal glory of God.
And to quote Psalm 116 prayed by Christ himself:
What return shall I make to the Lord for all the good he has done for me?
I will take into my hands the chalice of salvation and call upon the name of the Lord.
As we come to the Eucharist, may we realize that we do exactly the same.
Introduction
Then I looked, and I heard around the throne and the living creatures and the elders the voice of many angels, numbering myriads of myriads and thousands of thousands, saying with a loud voice, "Worthy is the Lamb who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing!" And I heard every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and in the sea, and all therein, saying, "To him who sits upon the throne and to the Lamb be blessing and honor and glory and might for ever and ever!" And the four living creatures said, "Amen!" and the elders fell down and worshiped. – Rev 5
Many years ago, I remember reading this passage from the book of Revelation and I was struck by something. It was clear to me that in this one passage, everything in creation was worshiping God. Soon after, I added it to my private devotions at Mass. I had been taught, and rightly so, to repeat the words of St. Thomas at the moment of Consecration: My Lord and my God. To this prayer, I added these words from the book of Revelation: to the One seated on the throne and to the Lamb the praise and honor, glory and might, forever and ever. Amen."
And I'm very happy I did this. I felt I was joining in a universal prayer of praise and worship. What I did not realize was that this was nothing new.
I have a pretty good idea of many aspects of the theology, history, and ritual of the Mass. I have studied it on my own and in school. I have experienced many variations of the Eucharistic liturgy as a Roman Catholic and watched from the wings of the celebrations of our ‘Separated Brethren.’ But still, there was something more, something touching eternity.
Recently, I read several times Dr. Scott Hahn's book The Lamb's Supper. The book shines a very different light on what we do at the Eucharist. In the richness and variety of our theology, there are many ways of appreciating this essential part of our spiritual life. This time, the view is through the filter of the craziest book in the Bible -- the book of Revelation or has it used to be known, the Apocalypse.
This Lenten series is meant to be a reflection on just a few aspects of the holy sacrifice of the Mass from Dr. Hahn’s work. Throughout the book, he is very clear to say that none of this is his original work. He is rephrasing the understanding of what we do that goes back all the way to the Upper Room.
And by going back, we go to heaven.
1. Covenant
So for our first theme, let's begin with what we are doing at the Mass.
I always found it amusing that people would call the Eucharist a "meal." I mean, there were no appetizers, no well-balanced menu, and no dessert. After all, it was just bread and wine. All those religious images of the Eucharist as a feast seemed as if the host wasn't exactly breaking the bank on the caterer!
The image of the Eucharist as a meal in this sense is a very "low" image. But a better understanding is a "covenant meal."
A covenant is very different from a contract. As Dr. Hahn notes, "a contract produces something. A covenant creates something." We can say that if a contract produces an economy, a covenant produces a family. The bond of a covenant seals the heart and soul. And having agreed to a covenant, the ancient Israelites would offer a cup of blessing and grain to be shared among the family this covenant had created.
And every time we mark the covenant, we renew its terms and reality. The memory of it is more than a commemoration of something past but a celebration of its continued existence in the present. That is what Jesus meant when He asked us "do this in memory of me." There was no danger that God would forget or that we needed a reminder. It was a command to constantly renew the agreement, sealed with His own blood, that He made to us. In the Mass, we were to literally ‘make the memory’ of this new reality.
So, yes, the Eucharist is a "family meal." It's not something we do just because we are a family of faith but it is the one thing that indeed makes us a family.
And not just with each other. God is a participant in this covenant. He is the priest who sanctifies it. And he is the sacrifice that seals it.
St. Augustine, to paraphrase something he wrote, basically said that “we are what we eat." In the Eucharist, we are literally covenanted in the Trinity. We are joined mystically to the family that is God himself.
Covenant stands in opposition to isolation. Communion is the mirror image of damnation. We may not always see the difference between "feeling alone" and “being alone.” Life is too many variables to allow such an easy clarity. It takes faith, or more accurately, a decision of faith, to understand this. But every Eucharist proclaims the truth -- and calls on us to believe it fully – that we are one with all who worship the one God.
And so with each other, we go forward toward that life eternal, to the throne of God and all those who share in this new and everlasting covenant. We are, even in the dark and difficult times, to share in the worship of all things, above, below and on the earth of the One who is our Lord and God.