The Eucharistic Experience as solidarity and diakonia
Reflexions during Covid19
Paulo Ueti
The Eucharistic Experience as solidarity and diakonia
Reflexions during Covid19
By Paulo Ueti[1]
Hello sisters and brothers
I would like, as a follower of Benedictine’s spirituality, to ground this dialogue by hearing the advice from the Rule of Saint Benedict:
“Run while you have the light of life,
lest the darkness of death will overtake you” (John 12:35).
And the Lord, seeking his labourer
in the multitude to whom He thus cries out,
says again,
“Who is the one who will have life,
and desires to see good days” (Ps. 33[34]:13)?
And if, hearing Him, you answer,
“I am the one,”
God says to you,
“If you will have true and everlasting life,
keep your tongue from evil
and your lips that they speak no guile.
Turn away from evil and do good;
seek after peace and pursue it” (Ps. 33[34]:14–15).
(Rule of Saint Benedict Prologue)
It is a pleasure and an honour to receive the invitation to share in this round of dialogue and mutual provocations during these ecclesiological seminars. It is the task of theology, as a developing language about the divine, to offer possible paths, methods, vocabulary and proper narratives to recover some ideals of the original paradise (place to grow and flourish) and to exercise contemplative processes: be present, observing the current context, understanding the past to build futures in which the order is love and not profit and privilege. No one is safe until everyone is safe.
I want to propose that theology is a language about God. In the Bible, God is introduced to us as a mystery. At the beginning of his Summa Theologica, Thomas Aquinas establishes a fundamental principle for all theological reflection: “Since we cannot know what God is, but only what God is not, we cannot consider how God is but only how He is not.” [2]If this is the case, is it appropriate to think that pursuing theology is impossible?
No, it is far from impossible, but it is complex and demands serious commitment. It is vital to consider that from the beginning, theology is an effort to ‘imagine the mystery’. This effort establishes an attitude when we decide to speak about God. It is a respectful attitude and does not align itself with certain discourses by trying to pretend to know everything about God- sometimes with arrogance.
In this presentation, I acknowledge that this pandemic changed (or should have) our perspectives on ecclesiology, spirituality, theology, liturgy, and how we live eucharistic liturgies and spirituality. It is our call to regularly revisit our t(T)radition and doctrines to be able to read and understand them contextually, avoiding anachronisms and fundamentalisms.
I am Paulo Ueti, a theologian and a New Testament biblical scholar, working with gender and development studies. For many years, I was a university professor in exegesis and theologies of the New Testament and liturgy. I am particularly interested in the interconnection of the New Testament formation and the canonical process within the first four centuries of Christianity. It is interesting to assess how the development and shaping of the churches influenced the biblical texts and their election to be in the canon as we know it. I am still doing some teaching in Asia, Europe and Latin America when requested. I am part of a dialogue and study group on Benedictine spirituality and was a Benedictine monk in an ecumenical monastery for many years. I am a member of the Anglican Episcopal Church of Brazil and currently work as regional director and theological advisor for the Anglican Alliance, which is the department of development, inter-Anglican cooperation and humanitarian aid and resilience building of the Anglican Communion. I am also committed to the Theological Education Department for the Anglican Communion as deputy director, liaising with Portuguese, Spanish and French-speaking regions. I also work with other departments of the Anglican Communion Office, such as Gender Justice, Theological Education, Environmental, Women, Health, Family, Indigenous and Youth Networks, and other Episcopal/Anglican development agencies. I must say that I am a constant student on this path, that I walk together with so many cultures, languages, churches, and theological and ecclesiological perspectives.
As a child of Latin America, I am deeply influenced by our continent’s liberation theologies and a product of my context. I carry this perspective, the flavours, and the knowledge of this context in which I live and so many others when I do theology and try to understand the world.
I was invited because of my global presence through my service in the Anglican Alliance. Anglican Alliance was born in 2011 out of the recommendation from the 2008 Lambeth Conference.[3] The Anglican Alliance brings together the churches and agencies of the Anglican Communion to work collectively to serve the most vulnerable people in our world. Its specific role is to connect, inspire and strengthen the capacity of Episcopal and Anglican churches and agencies in the areas of sustainable development, humanitarian aid and advocacy, sharing skills and collaborating on common goals.
Since the beginning, Anglican Alliance has been building relationships across the Communion. We have regional facilitators, who have developed extensive connections within their regions, and we work based on the Five Marks of Mission.[4]
One of the theological pillars of the Anglican Alliance is the statement that we are the Body of Christ. If one member suffers, all others suffer, if one member rejoices, everyone rejoices. The community is a sacrament of the Risen Christ. And with Christian Aid, one of our partners, we believe there is life before death too. And that is why these bodies desecrated and violated by capital and greed, are sacred and need to be defended in the best way possible.
As someone of Christian spirituality and Benedictine influence, but also as a scholar of the Bible and hermeneutics, the liturgy has a privileged place in my spirituality and my field of research. As we know, behind any text of the Bible, there is always a community of faith. And worship is always the privileged place to nurture and manifest that faith. The text is worship manifesting faith, made into writing and grammar (relationships and articulations between people, between them with reality and between these two with God), made into a book.
The worship and the liturgy are also appropriate channels for influencing and/or imposing ideo-theologies, being them liberating or colonising. And in a colonised continent with a colonising spirit and mindset, it is necessary to recognise this aspect of our liturgy. Also, as people of Anglican/Episcopal tradition, it is worth asking what this means in a continent where we live and coexist with traditions of original people (indigenous) and afro-descendants. How do these traditions express themselves in our rituals, language, architecture, vocabulary, and aesthetics?
If we live by the fundamental motto “lex orandi, lex credendi”, we must take the realm of language and its related power exercises very seriously. Liturgies are a composition of rituals, dedicated vocabulary, and performance. Liturgy expresses something already existing but sometimes not truly seen and teaches how to keep united with Christ and his mystery. “God, who ‘wills that all men should be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth’ (I Tim. 2:4), ‘having spoken of old to our fathers many times and in many ways by the prophets’ (Heb. 1:1), when the fullness of time came, sent His Son, the Word made flesh, anointed by the Holy Spirit, to evangelise the poor, to heal the contrite of heart, as physician of flesh and spirit, mediator between God and men. His humanity was, in the unity of the person of the Word, the instrument of our salvation. Therefore, in Christ, “our reconciliation was fully accomplished, and the fullness of divine worship was given to us”. SC5[5]
Therefore, I would like to propose that theology (and worship/liturgy) is a language about God. As a Bible Scholar, I must start with the Bible. I am following here the well know liberation theology from Latin America Gustavo Gutierrez. In the Bible, God is introduced to us as a mystery. At the beginning of his Summa Theologica, Thomas Aquinas establishes a fundamental principle for all theological reflection: “Since we cannot know what God is, but only what God is not, we cannot consider how God is but only how He is not.” [6]If this is the case, is it not appropriate to think that pursuing theology is an impossible task?
No, it is far from impossible, but it is complex and demands serious commitment. It is essential to consider that from the beginning, theology is an effort to ‘imagine the mystery’. This effort establishes an attitude when we decide to speak about God. It is a respectful attitude and does not align itself with certain discourses by trying to pretend to know everything about God- sometimes with arrogance.
Let’s be precise, however, that from a biblical perspective, when we speak about the mystery, it does not refer to something hidden that must remain secret. It is more about a mystery that needs to be spoken aloud and not silenced, communicated, and not kept to itself. As Eberhard Jüngel said, from the Christian perspective, “the fact of having been revealed belongs to the essence of mystery”.[7] According to Apostle Paul, is to “proclaim about Jesus Christ, in keeping with the revelation of the mystery hidden for long ages past, but now revealed and made known through the prophetic writings by the command of the eternal God, so that all the Gentiles might come to the obedience that comes from faith” (Romans 16:25–26). The revelation of the mystery of God imbues us with the duty (and hopefully desire) to announce this to every human being, even to the earth itself, because “we know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time.” (Romans 8:22). This is the profound call from God to us. To imagine the mystery of God, it requires us to begin from his will to self-communicate to “all nations” (Matthew 28:29). The landmark and the requirements of this announce are fundamental to ‘doing’ theology.
In this conversation here, I offer my thoughts on the changing perspectives that the pandemic forced us to consider and which are embedded in our lives, consciously or not. I assume evangelisation is the primary mission of the church, and already here, we must tackle the diaconal e prophetic nature of this sacred work:
“The Spirit of the Lord is on me,
because he has anointed me
to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
and recovery of sight for the blind,
to set the oppressed free,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour.”
(Luke 4:18–19)
This pivotal statement from Jesus to the church (remember that the Gospels were written about 30 years after Jesus’ murder and resurrection) tells us how to be a church and why we celebrate Eucharist till today.
Rubem Alves, one of the fathers of Liberation Theology in Latin America, once shared this poem:
“I believe in the resurrection of the body …”
Body forever, the face of the Spirit.
Thirsty body,
Ill body,
Hungry body,
Body in prison …
“When you did it to one of my little ones, you did it to Me …”
Body: sanctuary, altar, host.
Holy of holies.
The Spirit loves
Love becomes garden
Bodies that love each other in the garden:
Garden of the Spirit
Jesus of Nazareth
He has made himself bread and wine
Shared body
For more love:
Seed of the Garden, Universe
Body of God … Us. Me.
Rubem Alves[8]
As we speak about Eucharist, we are celebrating a body (and later the Christian community as Christ’s body, the sacrament of his real presence), a concrete body that is still with us today throughout the world because we gather, we hold memory, and we follow his steps (or should at least). Eucharist is the constant reminder and opportunity to celebrate our mission’s success and to be called back to the path of unity, liberation and building up together as a community in a new world. Eucharist is not a price to be awarded but a nurture to be offered to those in need.
The pandemic forced us to rethink how we celebrate Eucharist and how we perceive it daily. It prevented us from taking the body and blood of Jesus Christ in person due to safety reasons that we all know. And still, we are a living community of Christ trying to live up to his calling. And we successfully learned how to be an eucharistic community through these terrible times we have been living in. The pandemic also allowed us to go deeper into our ecclesiological thinking and perspectives. It was very much underlined that the temples were closed, not the church. This very original notion that the church is the community, not the building, needed to be said on and on for us to be strong and to keep connected.
This conversation has obvious reasons to take place. The bodies of people and environment in the world “groan and suffer” pain and violence inflicted by the religion of capital, its gods, and ideo-theologies. In Brazil, you only need a few details. We live in dark times of neglect, lies, blindness, false messiahs, fear, hatred, and divisions. This context is a scandal (stumbling block) and calls us to prayer and action as the body of Christ reveals the Kingdom and inaugurates a new time (Kairos). How is our Eucharistic experience challenging this?
The experience of everyday life, the recognition that this experience “speaks,” and listening to God from it are founding factors of our theology and Christian spirituality that lead us to the discipleship of Jesus, the Christ, the suffering servant. Discipleship can only be prophetic, or it is not true discipleship.
At this Easter time, during the Coronavirus pandemic, the account about the Road/Walk to Emmaus (Lk 24.13–35) has a deep resonance. This account is a deep memory of what the Eucharist is and how it is to be lived in our daily lives.
While the disciples, Cleophas and perhaps his wife Mary (he was married according to John 19:25), walked (fled) to Emmaus on that first Easter evening, their hearts were filled with uncertainty. They were sad, disappointed, and traumatised by the experience of Jesus’ murder and still the restless hope for the reports, by some women, that Jesus was alive.
We too are experiencing a time of great uncertainty, fearful of the impacts of this pandemic that sweeps the world and horrified by its catastrophic consequences, especially on most of the population that lives some at high risk and some in a highly vulnerable situation. And yet, as paschal (eucharistic) people, we are people of words and actions of healing and truth. We carry the hope of our faith that God is with us all, even in the dark shadows of this journey.
There is light inside the tunnel, not just at the end of it. Faith is an experience in the dark, John of Cross recalled. As we walk this painful path, Jesus comes beside us, and we know that one day, when this pandemic end, we will be able to get together again to break bread, with our hearts burning, like that couple on the road to Emmaus. Sometime after that, even with the doors locked, because they were afraid of the Jews, in fact, fearful of suffering the same fate as Jesus, he entered and offered his presence, his peace (John 20:26). Nothing can separate us from the love of God (Rom 8:38–39).
The pandemic also made us understand better the meaning of Church, and we revisited the spirituality and experience of many Christians in the first centuries but also today who gather at home, in small groups, not in buildings we call Churches. We were reminded that Christianity is fundamentally about loving God by loving your neighbour, making yourself close to those in need, and accepting that we, too, need someone’s presence. The Community is the house of God (ἐκκλησίᾳ τοῦ Θεοῦ) and is the first sacrament of the Risen One in our midst. It might be in the temple, but it is definitely at local homes. And also in the virtual communities built during these past two years. It is the place of horizontality. Nobody is more significant than anyone — what a challenge today (Mt 18:1–4), a place of safety, care and transparency for all people (Mt 18:5–11), a place of celebration, the feast goes on, my Bishop would say, because we did not remain in the one place, we go out to find what was lost and when we see it we celebrate together (Mt 18:12:14), a place of insisting on people and believing in them, of connecting and walking together (Mt 18:15:18 ), place of praise and liturgy that makes it happen because we are the body of God in this world (Mt 18:19:20), place of unconditional forgiveness of ourselves and others (Mt 18.21–35).
Naturally, physical presence, hugging, touching, looking, sighing, looking (sometimes staring at), and body language can never be replaced. For many cultures, this is ontological. But, in these pandemic times where the exercise of love for the life of all people is to remain physically distant, for those who can, it challenges our Christian doctrine and traditional theological perspectives. Who knows, it is an excellent opportunity to “go into deeper waters” (Luke 5:4) to do theologies outside the established norm and tradition and to reinvent oneself, exercising ways to remain faithful to the faith of the real presence of Jesus, the Risen One, in the community thinking new ways of being a community. We are already on the way. Just recognise it as legitimate. There is no going back.
The idea and reality of a global village have been introduced previously.
The Global Village is the concept coined by Canadian sociologist Herbert Marshall McLuhan to explain the idea that technological advancement tends to shorten distances, recreating the social situation that occurs in a village on the planet. By electronic means, people would be reconnecting in a globalised world. The concept was first proposed in the 1962 paper “Gutenberg’s Galaxy” (later expanded in “The Means of Communication as an Extension of Man”, 1964). In this context, McLuhan spoke mainly of television.[9]
This concept applies perfectly in our reality due to the advancement of technology. Unfortunately, this reality of the “global village” exists in an unequal world and is experienced by a privileged group of people with access to technology. But the fact is that this virtual community exists. We need to reframe and extend our concept of community faith to include it. A few years ago, churches and traditional groups had criticised certain Pentecostal and Roman Catholic Charismatics groups for exercising this freedom to reframe the concept of community and the way to live the sacraments and transport it to the virtual world through television programs, radio, and Internet broadcasts. Now we are all in that environment. It’s good that we can always change our minds and adapt our practices.
Back into the Emmaus narrative, I finish sharing some insights on Eucharist as diaconia and mission:
A crucial theological concept and a critical life experience for believers is that God always takes the initiative and comes to meet us where we are, no questions asked or no behaviour required, so it is not by merit, but by grace and love we meet; He delivers himself because God is love and passion (1John 4:19; Hosea 1–3:11). So, we are called to do the same, as by “we” I mean Christians who bear witness to the kingdom of God. God’s gift of himself is unconditional in a twofold sense: He does not set conditions or accept constraints. We must develop ways of making disciples for the Kingdom of God by helping (revealing) to them they are loved, welcomed and community is a safe place to be. Discipleship is also about empowering people and communities to strive for transformation and struggle against inequality and violence (in the times of Jesus and currently).
One important step here is to acknowledge that we took the initiative. We were church even with our temples closed and could not celebrate Eucharist face-to-face. To go and make church (a community of believers and followers) present where the need is, where the most vulnerable requires love and diaconia (service). It is part of the theological assumption that organised people (community — the sacrament of Jesus resurrected) change society and other people. This is why much of the discipleship training process has this element as structural to the methodology and aims. Jesus is an excellent example of an organiser and a model for leadership and management.
The story of the couple on the road to Emmaus (Cleophas and probably his wife Mary) shared in Luke’s Gospel (Luke 24:13–35 — the points below are related to this story) is a teaching on how to celebrate Eucharist and to be the God’s Church to God’s world:
1. Approach those in need: take the initiative to be where people’s needs are. Moving out of my comfort zone is a requirement to be a disciple. Following Jesus is demanding but rewarding.
2. Match the pace: Pay attention to the community/people’s reality. Join their context and walk in their rhythm, careful not to trespass. Try to become acquainted, be a friend. Show a desire to journey together. Company is vital on the journey.
3. Be interested/aware of the local context: when churches establish discipleship training programmes, the first question is, “what is going on”, and “What are you discussing as you walk along? (cf Luke 24:17). A big part of discipleship programmes is understanding (revealing) the context in which the church and people are inserted and how the global context influences it. Being part of one communion is very helpful in exchanging experiences and information to foster more profound and lasting disciples for the kingdom of God.
4. Be ready to be silent and listen: the voice of the context and people are essential. Discipleship requires silence to listen to each other deeply and in loving care. The methodology of the training programmes always has integrated spaces for mutual listening and dialogue. This is an excellent way to listen to what God reveals to his children. Transformation, peace and reconciliation are achieved through a proper process of silence, dialogue and mutual listening process.
5. Read the Bible TOGETHER and do theology for transformation. In Luke’s story, Jesus takes up the disciples’ story (memory is critical in discipleship, and we live by memory) and interprets it in a way they do not expect. Imprisoned as they are by the ideo-theology of the Empire (the dominant who want uniformity and are silencing people and raping the earth) and of comfortable, corrupted religion, Jesus offers them a new perspective on the nature and mission of the Messiah they have been promised. And He does so by starting with the things they already knew but had forgotten or had been “prevented from understanding” by the dominant ideo-theology. They had been waiting for someone else to solve their problem the same way as the Empire (as had happened in the past). Many people were trained in this passive expectation from the cradle. Someone — someone more powerful, more educated, more mature and with more experience — would lead them and solve their problems. Here, it is not simply a question of reading, studying and interpreting Scripture but of asking: which interpretation, to what end, using which texts? Is Jesus the Good News for everyone?
6. Hospitality (another or an additional way to experience Eucharist): to be welcoming and to establish safe and welcoming places are an essential part of Christian spirituality. Discipleship training takes this matter seriously, particularly in a hostile world of intolerance and violence. Jesus (still unrecognised) and the couple had already shared the journey, the sadness, the doubts and the discoveries (learning and unlearning). Now the disciples decided to be faithful to their faith and shared their table and house. The gestures of welcome — and the gesture of Jesus — finally help them open their eyes. Here, “opening their eyes” is a metaphor for understanding and obeying (listening within) their faith. The clear intention of sharing (understanding deeper and analysing) context, reading the Bible together and sharing the table (building community) is to collaborate, to create a space of hospitality, solidarity and commitment: to life, to the path (the way of living) and people (and nature).
7. Bless (say and undertake good words — actions) and stay in communion: Paul, in his letter to the Corinthians, when reprehending the community about the lousy way they gather to celebrate communion, recalled that there are “many among you ill and infirm, and a considerable number are dying” (cf. 1Corrinthians 11:30) because the community “are eating and drinking without discerning the body” (cf. 1Corinthians 11:29). The effort of making the “witness” reality is a big part of the work done by the churches in the region. We are very concerned about joining the work for justice and peace as a calling and the result of the Eucharistic celebration: a reminder that it is there already, but it is still to be achieved, and we need each other to do so. We need good words and actions (blessing — say good things), and we must share our lives and resources to strengthen our hearts for the journey.
8. Be aware of the power of sharing context, reading the Bible and worship TOGETHER as a sign of discipleship. We are known as disciples in the mission and love each other and the world as good stewards of the creation, learning and teaching how to share.
Most of us are working hard to turn violence of any kind, inequality, poverty, sadness, disconnection, depression, individualism, fear and the inability to recognise the love of Jesus (and Jesus himself) at the start of the walk to Emmaus (our daily walk, journey) into an Easter pilgrimage and arrive (all of us) at the Eucharistic table. How is it possible to realise that the way to Resurrection is only possible when we accept to return to Jerusalem (to (and in) community, joy, and dynamism, but also the conflicts, to the Cross, to our everyday life) and not flee from it? The fourth-century Church Father Evagrius Ponticus (he should be read), taking up the reflection of the Johannine community, says that the way to the encounter (the recognition) of God is in the encounter with oneself (the self: our purest, barest truth) and not with the other: the road to love to God, and our brothers and sisters (1 John). The training and strategic plans from all provinces possess this objective very clearly.
The sad bodies of men and women, newly and courageously back on their feet, return to Jerusalem: to the conflicts, crises, and the pilgrim community. They return to rebuild another possible world full of new relationships. That is what the Eucharist is about. The dark night of the people becomes the dawn of resurrection. “Even the darkness is not dark to you; the night is as bright as the day, for darkness is as light to you (Psalm 139).
We come back to our Church, a community of believers, to do God’s mission, to love the neighbour as we love ourselves, and to be a living testimony of the love and mercy of God to all.
How beautiful and infinite are Your names, Lord God.
You are called by the name
of our deepest desires.
Plants, if they could pray,
would invoke in the images of their most beautiful flowers
and they would say that You have the softest fragrance.
For the butterflies, You would be a butterfly,
the most beautiful of all, the brightest colours,
and Your universe would be a garden …
Those who are cold call You Sun…
Those who live in the deserts
they say Your name is Fountain of Waters.
The orphans say You have the face of a mother …
The poor invoke You as Bread and Hope.
God, the name of our desires …
As many names as our hopes and desires are …
Poem. Dream. Mystery.[10]
[1] Paulo Ueti is a Latin American Theologian and Biblical Scholar working with Anglican Alliance and the Theological Education in the Anglican Communion Office (2020).
[2] Aquino, T. “De Deo scire non possumus quid sit, sed quid non sit” (STI 9.3 introd.)
[3] The Lambeth Conference is one of the 4 Instruments of Communion in the Anglican Communion.
[4] Marks of the Anglican Communion Mission: Proclaim the good news of God’s Kingdom; Teach, baptise and nurture new believers; Respond to human needs with love; Seek the transformation of the unjust structures of society; challenge all types of violence, and seek peace and reconciliation; Strive to safeguard the integrity of Creation, sustain and renew the life of the earth
[5] Constituição Sacrosanctum Concilium. In Documentos do Concílio Vaticano II: constituições, decretos, declarações. Petrópolis: Vozes, 1966.
[6] Aquino, T. “De Deo scire non possumus quid sit, sed quid non sit” (STI 9.3 introd.)
[7] Jüngel, E. Dios como mistério Del mundo, Salamanca, 1983, 330.
[8] Alves, R. Creio na Ressurreição do Corpo. São Paulo, SP: Ed. Paulus, 2006. Page 51
[9] According to https://escolaeducacao.com.br/aldeia-global/ Accessed on 05/10/2020.
[10] RUBEM, Alves (org.). CultoArte: celebrando a vida — advent / Christmas / epiphany. Petrópolis: Vozes, 1999. Page 17