Corpus Christi

This is what I would have said, had I been following my script more closely, and not given way to too many humorous asides at the St Ninian's Corpus Christi celebrations yesterday!

The other day, as I was sitting in my office I saw a rather large flock of birds. They swooped down and perched on the roof top opposite my window. They chattered noisily. Then just as suddenly as they had landed, and as a group, they flew off!

It strikes me that even we humans move along in clusters of groups. I often marvel at these groups. They may be based on different ages or interests or work but even we humans move like a group. This is not just a herd-mentality. It is something far more. There are groups for moments of laughter or sadness. There are groups for moments of great excitement or the utmost dejection. There are groups heading for a goal or sometimes, like some of the churches I have worked in, just listlessly wandering along. But there is always a group. Falling out from all groups in the world to which one might belong - that is in truth nearly impossible. One moves from one group to another over the course of an entire life time.

Corpus Christi - this Feast of the Body of Christ refers to both the Body of Christ made present in the Eucharistic sacrifice as well as to all those people, men and women, boys and girls who are brought together in groups all over the world in a communion with Christ. A fellowship with him which lasts not just for a single moment, but, whether we care to know or feel it or not, for an entire lifetime and on into the life that knows no end.

For each time that we meet to celebrate the Eucharist, we not only proclaim Christ's suffering, death and resurrection, but also the suffering, death and resurrection of the members of the people brought together in His Name. His suffering is our suffering. His death is our death, and his resurrection is ours too. And there are those of you who in your own lives and in the lives of your families and friends have known that suffering, that death and that gracious and joyous resurrection.

And when we meet to celebrate the Eucharist, not only do we proclaim that Jesus Christ is the Way, the Truth and the Life of the World. We also dare to proclaim that our celebrating the Eucharist together is also a model, a vibrant example of the way, the truth and the life of the world can be. And there are those who have followed in the joy of that communion of way, truth and life – faithfully, doggedly, without hesitation; and there are those who don’t even know where to begin, but who simply want to cling on to a distant hope, to a far-off aspiration, to a God they barely know exists. And in the clinging on, in the aspiration, sometimes we may be surprised by joy.

And also, every time we meet, not only do we proclaim that Jesus Christ is the living bread given for the life of the world. We also proclaim that we and all our fellow Christians everywhere are examples of lives given in service to the world. And there are those who so constantly and faithfully offer their lives in such vigorous service to others, that their hopefulness, their devotion, their love can never be extinguished. Yes, there are those who hold out in their own hands to others the possibility of a communion, a life-giving communion with God.

I believe, when looked at in all these ways, that to be more truly the Body of Christ in the world of today is a hard calling. Can we say as individuals who make up that body that we bear ourselves as responsible for spreading an abundance of life? Can we say that we are beacons of light for those who grope in darkness? Can we say that we are warming and illuminating rays of truth for those shadowed by the clouds of gossip? Can we say that we are clear signs of creative life amidst rotten and difficult situations? Can we say that we are the clear, running waters yearned for by the people who inhabit this earth?

Are we the very springs of life who may experience a great communion with God and share it with others? Can we make our lives and the lives of others more beautiful by building up a simple trust? A simple, humble trust, which points at every moment to God who can only give his love. Yes, I want to say today that the Body of the Lord Jesus Christ is all this to the people on earth.

And in every age, God has sought a communion with his people. He led his people out of slavery. In a waterless place, He gushed forth water from the hardest rock! In a place of wilderness and hunger he offered them the life-giving bread from heaven. And when the time was fulfilled, the Body of Christ his only Son, was pierced so that streams of Living Water could quench the thirst of all peoples of this Earth and triumph in the work of building a communion of love.

This communion of love of which we are all part has a life-giving Spirit. And it has it so that we Christians can be rays of light amidst darkness, bearers of truth and justice amidst untruths and injustices and, most of all, eternal hope and life amidst the cycles and counsels of despair and death.

Is that where we are? Or is the truth somewhat different?