I take the Eucharist with gratitude

by Letters Editor · September 18, 2014

From Deacon Godfrey Solomon, Cape Town

A number of letters have been published in The Southern Cross expressing opposition to the practice of allowing Holy Communion to be received in the hand. I have also had occasions of being confronted by those supporting this view. The benefit of these encounters is that one is drawn to reflect on and defend one�s position. So I write this letter to answer the question, �What does it mean to me to receive Holy Communion in the hand?�

” I express in the gesture of my outstretched hands a humbling: like a beggar I acknowledge my utter reliance on God,”

Firstly, I believe that in the Eucharist I receive the whole Jesus: his humanity and his divinity. That a human being may receive the divine is, of course, an awesome notion. God is the Transcendent One: the Jews of the Old Testament feared that seeing God face to face, they would die. How is it then that I, flesh and blood, could touch the living God?

The answer is, of course, this: solely because of Jesus Christ, the �God-Man�. Though divine, �he did not cling to his equality with God� but took on flesh and blood. Hands formed in the womb of Mary, sharing her flesh, would soon immerse themselves in the world, stretching out to heal and bless all who sought him, touching even leprous flesh, rubbing a paste of spittle and mud on blind eyes.

Those hands, nailed to a cross, had broken bread and shared it with the words, �This is my body: take, eat.�

Now, liturgy is the enactment of what we believe: my hands speak the language of my heart. I express in the gesture of my outstretched hands a humbling: like a beggar I acknowledge my utter reliance on God; through my outstretched hands I communicate a welcome to Christ into my whole being, body and soul.

Jesus stretched out his hands to broken humanity: for a moment I am joined with those privileged few who actually reached out and touched the Master.

And I walk away filled with gratitude that God has dignified my humanity, and that my hands will now continue to do his works in the world.