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Humble Access - Part One

We do not presume to come to this thy Table, O merciful Lord, trusting in our own righteousness, but in thy manifold and great mercies. We are not worthy so much as to gather up the crumbs under thy Table. But thou art the same Lord, whose property is always to have mercy; Grant us therefore, gracious Lord, so to eat the flesh of thy dear Son Jesus Christ, and to drink his blood, that our sinful bodies may be made clean by his body, and our souls washed through his most precious blood, and that we may evermore ever dwell in him, and he in us. Amen.

Anglicans have always loved this prayer. It is a part of our service of Holy Communion. We pray it together kneeling before the Table before we receive the Body and Blood of the Lord. I have heard it derided by some as groveling and unnecessary, but now that I am relearning liturgy as a Reformed Episcopalian, I don’t think I’d like to do without it again. It is part of Cranmer’s great gift to the English Catholic tradition. I taught on this prayer a couple of Tuesday evenings ago and thought I’d like to “tease out” just a few points in a series of entries here. Forgive me for spending this entry on just the first four words, but they are the ones that occasioned this teaching and are most emblematic of what I find most challenging and beautiful about Anglican spirituality.

“We do not presume….” That says an awful lot. I’m a product in many ways (some good, some not) of the Free Church tradition and life-long charis-mania. It has been so often glibly asserted that “the veil has been removed” and so we are free to barge in on God on the basis of his not being so angry anymore and us all being such good chums now. The ways we pray and worship now are all up to us. Forget that the witness of Scripture and Tradition show us that God is to be approached solely on his own terms rather than ours. The important part is that we all feel good about coming. Even in the prayer book tradition we Americans have certainly made coming more user-friendly. Less intimidating, more inclusive. Our approach has been streamlined into an admirable efficiency and welcome.

But the liturgy calls us to slow down before the approach. We’ve already confessed our sins and received absolution; this prayer isn’t about sinfulness, as we’ll see as we go along. We’ve been welcomed to the Table as those reconciled to God and one another. We’ve offered ourselves wholly and holy. The mood is no longer penitent but decidedly celebrative. But we stop and kneel at this prayer and recognize that even the redeemed are invited by grace not by right. It is not our Table, but God’s. It is not to receive, primarily, that we come, but to commune in worship. And we do not come flippantly. We do not come with that sense of entitlement with which Americans approach so much these days. We don’t come by our own invitation, by our own pattern, to our own tastes, on our own terms, with our own dialect. His presence is a royal and holy presence and yet we, in our frailty and humanity are invited to come. And we do come…but we do not presume.

You Are Not Alone

A few years ago my friend Jaci gave me a St. Paul medal from a Roman Catholic shrine in Massachusetts. It was a simple medal with the saint’s likeness on the front and on the border the words “St. Paul, Pray For Us”. Now, I was a non-catholic then and am an Anglican now, so you can guess that a Roman saint medal was not a normal accessory for me! But I was, at the time, a very lonely minister in a Pentecostal denomination longing to make the journey into a more orthodox communion. I had often felt quite misunderstood and isolated even within the congregation I served. I put the medal around my neck and, as I prayed, immediately felt the presence of the Lord minister something very important to me: I was not alone. I made aware of the great “cloud of witnesses” to which we are joined in the Spirit, who intercede for us in Christ. I was made aware of the inseparable unity of our Faith and the prayerful company of heaven with whom we are “seated in the heavenlies through Christ Jesus”. Yes, Saint Paul pray for us! I wore that medal through a very difficult period of my journey, not in a superstitious effort to gain the specific attentions of St. Paul specifically, but as a reminder that my earthly isolation was illusory – I was not alone. This road has been well-travelled by holy men long before me.

All Saints' Day (Saturday) is a wonderful opportunity for us to be mindful of our unity as Christ’s Body. I am connected inviolably with every other Christian both in heaven and earth. We belong to one another. We are not alone! Saturday (and ‘round here on Sunday) we’ll pray:

O Almighty God, who hast knit together thine elect in one communion and fellowship, in the mystical body of thy Son Christ our Lord; Grant us grace so to follow thy blessed Saints in all virtuous and godly living, that we may come to those unspeakable joys which thou hast prepared for those who unfeignedly love thee, through the same thy Son Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

On the morning of my ordination, a wise and holy priest stopped me, looked me dead in the eye, and said to me, “When the bishop laid his hand on your head that was Jesus laying his hand on the head of John, and from John through the Church down to you. Remember that!” I felt deeply the pulse of that prophetic moment. We are not alone. We are the Church of Jesus. We are connected deeply and mystically so that Christ himself may work in and through us. Over the next few days and into next week, feel yourself among the company of heaven.

You are not alone.