Friar John's Ruminations

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Friday, May 08, 2009

Baptism, Eucharist, and the Hospitality of Jesus: On the Practice of "Open Communion"

Anglican Theological Review ,  Spring 2004   by Farwell, James

The opening of the eucharistic table to the unbaptized is a practice inspired by the radical hospitality of Jesus. Too often, however, the practice of open communion is adopted casually, without the systematic theological reflection called for by something so central to ecclesial identity and mission. Among the issues the practice raises are (1) its reliance on the claim that Jesus would not have shared a ritual meal with his disciples alone, (2) its departure from the paschal ecclesiology at the heart of contemporary liturgical renewal, which links baptism and eucharist to a post-Constantinian understanding of mission, (3) its failure both to appreciate the pastoral value of longing, and to avoid a modernist commitment to the immediate gratification of individual desire, (4) its naive assumption that boundaries are necessarily inhospitable, and (5) its taking the place of genuine evangelism and public ecclesial witness. This essay, while not an exhaustive argument against open communion, addresses these critical issues.

It has become commonplace, in some circles of the Episcopal Church, to argue that communion ought to be offered to the unbaptized in public worship as an expression of the radical hospitality of Jesus. A handful of high profile parishes, in conscientious defiance of the canons of the Episcopal Church that restrict communion to the baptized,1 have undertaken the practice and inspired a number of other parishes to do the same. While the actual practice of offering communion to the uiibaptized does not appear to be widespread, its profile is high enough to have warranted a resolution before the 74th General Convention asking for the appointment of a task force to consider the serious ecumenical and theological ramifications of this growing practice.2 The topic was recently on the agenda of Anglican liturgists who meet annually with the North American Academy of Liturgy. The Episcopal Church is not alone in reconsidering the traditional restriction of communion to the baptized. Recently, scholars and pastors of the Presbyterian Church (USA) devoted a vigorous session at the annual meeting of the American Academy of Religion to this topic, and Methodists have long discussed whether Wesley meant by his claim that the Lord's Supper is a "converting ordinance" that the table should be open to all.

Read the rest here.

2 comments:

Hoosierpalian said...

Have we made it so difficult to be baptized that it is necessary to begin offering communion to the unbaptized? If the Eucharist is merely a ritual meal performed solely in Christ's memory, perhaps all ought to be invited to share. But if we hold that the Eucharist is the gathered Christian community's sharing in Christ's sacrifice, I think it is not too much to ask would-be communicants to make a public commitment to the faith in baptism. Some argue that we should, but we no longer have the strenuous catechumenate of the early church. So are we truly making it so hard to be baptized? The Ethiopian eunuch in Acts didn't think so.

Frair John said...

Apparently, there are people who think that expecting Baptism and being a Christian are hurtles far to high to impose in order to be "welcoming."

A good deal of this comes from that lack of formation that is discussed in the "Reform of the Reform" post.