God? In this tasteless wafer?

Feast Sunday, Resurrection Sunday, Easter we celebrate! Yet, when many of us walk down the aisles of our Churches we will be handed a small piece of something that has little of any reminder that we are experiencing a feast. It actually tastes more like cardboard or Styrofoam. Fortunately, we can wash it down with a little wine. Some may be fortunate enough to have bread that tastes like a feast. The question, though, has nothing to do with the culinary value of communion bread.

The question is: Is God really in this tasteless wafer (Or Wonder Bread)? However, this isn't a theological question. The question has nothing to do with transubstantiation or Presence or rememberances. The real question is: Where is God? Can God be contained in a wafer and wine? Or in a Church? Or in nature? Or in anything for that matter? So where is God? I'm not really sure. But, I can share with you where I've experienced God.

The experience of God was palpable last week when Peregrini gathered at Fair Trade Cafe around a table of pasta, bread and wine. We didn't say any magical words. We asked lots of questions about God and of God. We opened ourselves to one another. We had fellowship. We had communion.

Ok, so Church isn't important? Not sure about that. I think Church gives us a language around which to formulate questions. It gives us some benchmarks with which to sort through the possibilities in community. But, Church is not in the building. Church is where the people gather and share in the communion bread of life. Church is where people are present to one another and where people open themselves to the possibility that God is Present to them.

God? In this tasteless wafer? Come to think of it I was looking for a miracle in Easter. As I share in Easter communion this week my visual image will be sitting around the Peregrini table with laughing and story telling friends, eating bread and drinking wine.