+Z’ev

Commemoration of Anthony.

Today’s assigned readings:
Genesis 4:17-26, Hebrews 3:1-11, John 1:43-51

…brothers and sisters, holy partners in a heavenly calling…
Hebrews 3:1

Pardon the use of such a tiny portion, but I notice the word for “partners”, Metochos, is only used 6 times in the NT. 5 of those uses are in Hebrews and two are in this (third) chapter, although today’s assigned portion cuts off just before the second use in Verse 14. One third of all the uses are here in front of us, I thought it might be important?

There are two Greek roots in this word, “meta” and “echo”. They mean, respectively, “along side” or “also” and “to hold”. So, simply, “to also hold” or “to hold together” or “to hold at the same time”. It’s a bit deeper than it sounds, for one implication of the “echo” root is “to eat”. So we also get “to eat alongside” or “to eat with”.

The second use in this chapter is in Verse 14, and it runs: “we have become partners of Christ”

We were having a discussion on an Episcopal blog the other day about “open communion”, as it is normally called. Liturgically/theologically that’s not correct. “Open Communion” is what is practised between (e.g.) the Lutherans and Episcopalians or between the Methodists and Presbyterians. But the practice we were discussing is that of allowing anyone to come to the table, even those who do not identify themselves as Christian. The tradition of the early church (at least as we have it recorded) is to allow only Christians to receive communion. The practice we were discussing has been better called, “Radically Open Communion”.

This was my experience at St Gregory of Nyssa Church: that we allow everyone to come to the table. In fact, as I noted on that other blog, we brought communion into the congregation which was gathered around the Altar. One not only had to distance oneself from the Communion being offered, one had to say “No” when it was presented.

One way to read this passage (including today’s verses, plus the ones up to 14 which won’t get read this year because of tomorrow’s feast day), mindful of the sub-meaning of “to eat” and “to eat with”, is to start at Verse 14 which warns us that in order to be a partner with Christ, to eat with him, we must “hold our first confidence firm to the end” and to read that exclusion all the way back to “sisters and brothers” in verse 1. I think that’s the normal way of understanding this. We can carry this even to the idea of “excommunication”, of kicking someone out of Christian fellowship or “shunning” someone because their faith hasn’t held firm.

But if we start in verse 1 and read forward, I think we get a different idea.

We (all of us) start out as partners of a heavenly calling. Mindful that to the Jewish mind “heaven” was a stand-in word for “God”, this heavenly calling is God’s calling. Who is called? From a Calvinist point of view, of course, only some of us are called - some are not called at all: only those who are called will be saved because God is all powerful and we can not resist God’s call. But the traditional, Orthodox and Catholic view is that all are called - and free will gives us the power to resist that call. Those who are called - that is all of us - are together in our heavenly calling - are to eat together. And as I said over at that other blog,

By my definition, we never gave communion to non-Christians for everyone at that table was answering God’s call in Jesus to “come”.

I have a pretty high concept of the elements in the Holy Mysteries - and of the Church. The same book that says the bread is the Body of Christ says the Church is as well: and never says one is “mystical” but the other literal. I think we short change ourselves if we say yes to one and no to the other. Once, after I had been standing around the altar distributing communion, I asked our priest “When I hold up the bread and say ‘the Body of Christ’ am I stating a fact about the bread or naming the person to whom I’m giving the bread?” Donald said, “Yes”.

When St Paul was writing about “discerning the body” he was writing on all those levels: Communion is a state of being and God calls to that whom God will (ie Everyone) That’s why John Wesley said everyone can come to the table: for some it *is* their Baptism, their sacrament of conversion. He wrote that they should then be counselled towards their baptism. It’s like saying the doors of your Church are open for everyone. They come in, if they partake of fellowship, they are in communion. It’s not a theological question: it’s a heart and mind question. Even a child can tell when someone’s heart isn’t “in it”.

If they somehow (spiritually) hear the call to come in. They are in.

(Photo Source)

As another writer posted over there, the issue is “fencing the table”. The idea, the phrase, may make some shudder! Who are we to fence off what Jesus offered so freely? This is why the table at St Gregory’s church hasn’t even an altar rail or steps. Everyone stands at the table together - clergy and laity, believers of all sorts, guests, friends, beloved of God: ie, all of us.

Ideas of “closed communion” developed because we (Christians) were protecting ourselves from outsiders during persecution; or because of superstition such as when the Christian Heresy of “Satanism” caused people to steal the elements. We don’t live in that world: but we are still in the world where God calls all of us to partake.

Much love,

Huw