In All of Space and Time

Oct 7

Oct 7 In All of Space and Time

A World Communion Sunday Sermon

When I was in seminary I decided to spend some of my hard earned… student loan money to do a bit of school organized travel. I went to Israel/Palestine and Rome. We did a lot of traveling around the US when I was a child, we drove to California and Florida. What was so different about those two trips in seminary is the way the past and the present weave themselves together into one place. Bits the Roman Empire, sit next to Baroque sculptures, and what’s left of Mussolini’s Rome. The Government of Israel has spent a lot of time and money excavating ancient tells, revealing cities, walls, towers, around the country, ancient Jerusalem peeking out from modern. It can be jarring when you are used to completely modern cities found in the united states.

While traveling while seeing this places, there were some that seemed… special. We stopped at an altar in the ancient city of Dan and there was something special about that place. It was the ancient stories we tell, it was years of sacrifices in that place, it was the many who arrived to worship in that space. It was the space.

There are many ways to describe it. The god Odin in Neil Gaiman’s American Gods on their way to the House on the Rock. Describes it as thus:

“This [the House in the Rock] is a roadside attraction. One of the finest. Which means it is a place of power.”

“It’s perfectly simple,” said Wednesday. “In other countries, over the years, people recognized the places of power. Sometimes it would be a natural formation, sometimes it would just be a place that was, somehow, special. They knew something important was happening there, that there was some focusing point, some channel, some window to the Immanent. And so they would build temples or cathedrals, or erect stone circles, or… well, you get the idea.”

“There are churches all across the States through,” said Shadow.

“In every town. Sometimes on every block. And about as significant in this context, as dentist’ offices. No, in the USA, people still get the call, or some of them, and they feel themselves being called to from the transcendent void, and they respond to it by building a model out of beer bottles of somewhere they’ve never visited, or by erecting a gigantic bat house in some part of the country that bats have traditionally declined to visit. Roadside attractions: people feel themselves pulled to places where, in other parts of the world, they would recognize that part of themselves that is truly transcendent, and buy a hot dog, and walk around, feeling satisfied on a level they cannot truly describe, and profoundly dissatisfied on a level beneath that.”

Thin Places
As I think back on those travels around the United States, there were and there are places that draw people, that are sacred because they are. The Celts called them Thin Places, the places where the Divine connects to earth
where Heaven touches
where the light breaks in.
The Dome on the Rock, on the spot of the Temple Mound, the ancient Jewish Temple has been a place of worship for thousands and thousands of years, long before the Jewish people had an established religion, long before they had settled in the land. There is something about that place, something about that hilltop. Something that has lead people. Perhaps it is a place where heaven and earth meet.

I also think, although I’m not sure there is a much written about it, that there are places that we, humans, make thin. There were house churches started in Rome, that became more established churches, that still exists today. There are 1800 years of prayers in those places. While they may not have been sacred before, they have become so. The veil between us and the Divine has been worn thin with prayers and devotion with hopes and fears and community and feasting.

Communion: A Thin Place
Which brings me back to us, today. Sometimes I think we miss the sacred places. Perhaps they are just roadside attractions that we drive right by. Maybe we have built so much on top of them we have made so much noise around them that we no longer hear them call to us, we no longer sense that there is something special here. I don’t think we have to miss it.

I have a slightly more expansive view of thin spaces because I believe our Eucharist, our communion, our time at the altar is a thin space. While I don’t think that it’s always been given a good wrap, rituals are important. They are more than the routine that someone keeps. Our ritual of showing up every week and of gather at the table shape who we are.

Here’s the thing there are similar words spoken around the world when people come to the table. And there are similar words spoken throughout time when people come to this table. If you had your very own Time and Relative Dimension in Space–Ship that would travel through time and space and translate all languages into something that you’d understand, we’ll call it a Tardis for short, you would find that the early church participated in the ritual of communion in a way that you would understand.

A little different, but a lot the same.
You would find them gathered, greeting other with peace and love, pouring wine, breaking bread. You would find Roman Christians in small house churches, then larger churches, then cathedrals, praying the prayers, breaking the bread, building community. The ritual is sacred because we make it sacred because 2000 years of prayers have made it sacred for thousands of years we have been wearing thin these moments of communion. They are a time and a place where God breaks in,
where the light shines through,
where Heaven and Earth meet,
if even for a moment.

And it connects us to those who said the prayers before and with us around the world, and who will say them long after we are gone.

Our Communion is with more than just this gathered body, we celebrate world communion Sunday to remind us that we are in communion with all who gather around a table today who say the prayers in new ways and tell the ancient stories. And we are in communion with those who prayers established this ritual who passed it to us, with all of creation, all that has been and all that will ever be. World Communion Sunday reminds us that we are stepping into a holy and sacred moment that has been prepared for us that connects everything and that we are preparing for the generations to come.

So Beloved Community, you often hear of ways that you can do more, participate in the justice and mercy of this faith in a broken world. Today I have a different call:
Take a moment,
calm your hearts,
quiet all that you have built around you.

Listen for the call that invites you into this moment, into the community, into the sacred.