Standing shoulder to shoulder
with people we may or may not know, the leader invites us to stand and to
recite the words of our ancient faith. Nearing the end of the Apostles’
Creed we declare our belief in the universal Church and then we glide through these
words: ‘the communion of saints’. There is never, in my experience
anyway, a chance to stop and think about what we just proclaimed. If I was
making a new custom for the church liturgy it would be this one:
“I believe in…the
communion of the saints [SILENCE]”
In our hurriedness to get to
the next item in the worship service, or because we have said it together so
many times, we are at risk of failing to appreciate the glorious thought we
proclaim. Because of our true faith, because we belong to this universal
gathering of believers we know as the Church, we are bold to declare our
ability to commune, communicate, experience community with all of the others
whom God has ‘gathered, protected and preserved’ from the beginning of time
until its end.
To say these words is to
enter into a holy reunion with someone you love, to enter into what Samuel J.
Stone calls ‘mystic sweet communion with those whose rest is won.’
And as we call to mind the shapes of their faces, the sounds of their
laughter, the smells of their favorite scents, the quirks of their unique
spirits, we become one again with them in Spirit.
“Oh happy ones and holy!
Lord give us grace that
we,
Like them the meek and
lowly,
Oh high may dwell with
Thee.” (Stone, The Church’s One Foundation)
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