On Sunday morning, October 26, following the AURAFORM presentation of the Sanctuary Concept for St. Thomas’, I lightly touched Barbara Hays, our Junior Warden, on the shoulder and said, “Thank you”. Barbara responded, “For what—I didn’t do anything, I just showed up”. Indeed, thank you again Barbara…for “showing up” is so essential to the fullness of our life together as a spiritual community.

In the last couple of weeks the leadership of the parish, have been hosting “Thank you” receptions in the homes of our members. These receptions have been simple gatherings, in homes that folks worked hard to clean up, make tidy to welcome each of you, provide a bit of food and something to drink. It has been an extraordinary reminder how important it is to cross over the threshold into the intimacy of another’s home; that it is a vulnerable gesture to welcome people you don’t know well into the space you name as ‘home’…and it is a place of vulnerability to be welcomed! Without exception, each reception has resulted in the simple and wonderful gift of life, seeing the Christ in one another…celebrating a great thanksgiving between and among us, which the word Eucharist means—thanksgiving.

As a sacramentally centered community, the spiritual journey of our lives is shaped by this simple thanksgiving for all of life. Even the final words we say at the end of Holy Eucharist, just before “Thanks be to God’ at the dismissal, are the following lines:

Send us now into the world in peace, and grant us strength and courage to love and serve you with gladness and singleness of heart; through Christ our Lord, Amen.

We all have our pet peeves about things that irritate us during worship. Crumbs floating in the chalice; singing all six verses, incense, no incense, noise before the service starts. Admit it, there’s something! One of my pet peeves is about this post-communion prayer—specifically; that often we don’t act like it matters very much. We use this time to gather together our belongings in preparation for leaving the church. Find the umbrella. Find the kids. Sometimes we receive communion and then leave before the post-communion prayer, dismissal, or postlude. We need to get to the Guild Room or beat the rush to the restrooms or to brunch.

Still, I’m distracted that we think so little of the post-communion prayer that we let ourselves be sidetracked by other needs, instead of focusing on this final—and crucial— prayer. Why is it so crucial? Because the post-communion prayer intends to express the meaning of the sacrament we have just received together. It reminds us of what we’re to expect in our daily life as God’s people. This prayer is at the heart of a prayer of petition, in which we present our needs during the week to come, asking that God’s will be done. “Send us… grant us…” Whatever happens to us in the week to come, this prayer reminds us, happens to a people, a community, “accepted as living members” and “fed…with spiritual food.”

• We’re not alone even when no one else is there.
• We’re not “lone rangers” acting in isolation, but God’s people, sent as community to do God’s will in a needy world.

God’s will, we’re reminded, is to be recognized “in peace”—we act for the sake of peace, and for the sake of God’s peaceable kingdom. Peace, however, is not expected always to come easily, for we begin by praying for strength. We go in peace not as God’s weaklings, but strengthened by divine love.

And yet the kind of love that God gives us for strength is a love that calls us into those risky places where God’s will gets done—those scary places where love is most needed, those places that may not even want our love, but to which God is calling us to bring God’s peace. So we pray for courage. The courage not to back down, not to wait until later, not to let somebody else do it, not to fear, whatever cost in involved for us.