At an earlier time in ministry, when I lived in rural South Carolina and Virginia and preached within a few hundred miles from my home, I used to do almost all my traveling by car. These days, I’m more familiar with airports than highway rest stops. Since we were a team of preachers and were trying to be guided by the gospel mandate, we always traveled and preached “two by two.”
The car rides could be boring, especially in rural areas where radio reception was poor. But conversation with a partner and community mate tended to be even better than they were at home, probably because we had more time for uninterrupted talk and silence together.
Almost always some significant part of those conversations would be about events in our community, or our family: a recent celebration, a member’s health concerns, interpersonal tensions, the quality of our daily community prayer, the arrival of a new member or departure of one of the regulars, a parent’s death, etc. I always found those reflective conversations both enlightening and broadening. I would realize, from another person’s perspective, the significance of recent events we had both experienced. Those conversations gave me a perspective, a new way to look at the familiar and to notice what, at first, I had failed to appreciate.
Luke tells us that two of Jesus’ disciples were walking to Emmaus; a distance of 7 miles from Jerusalem. One is Cleopas and his companion may very well have been his wife. The feast of Passover had ended–not on a joyous note with Jesus crowned King of the Jews and the Romans put out of the country, but with his ignominious death. There was a lot to talk about and the journey was long enough to provide reflective time for the two to voice their shattered hopes. They tell the “stranger” who had joined them what had happened to Jesus, and then add, “We were hoping that he would be the one to redeem Israel….”
It sounds like the “we” included more than themselves; the whole community of disciples had hoped in Jesus and were now thoroughly disappointed. The two were describing a shattered community that had lost their charismatic leader and, judging from these two disciples, the once-followers of Jesus are now scattering, returning to their homes to pick up the pieces of their lives.
These disciples were travelling together and were engaged in a conversation that touched deeply into their lives. Luke describes succinctly the kind of conversation they were having and what they were doing at the moment Jesus drew near — they were “conversing and debating.”
We were told as kids not to talk religion and politics when the extended family got together on Sunday afternoons. But that stricture usually broke down and the conversations got “interesting”–sometimes hot! I remember one such exchange when two uncles got into it: one owned a small plumbing business, the other was a union laborer. I listened to them as they argued about the merits and disadvantages of unions and I learned a lot from their two different perspectives.
The disciples were “conversing and debating” and then, after laying out the “facts” to their newly-arrived traveling companion, they closed their mouths and listened to what Jesus had to say. As a result they learned to look at what happened in their lives from another perspective. There is a good life lesson for us here; whether we have a debate going on within ourselves or with another. (Perhaps, we might even be laying out a lament to God about what “we had hoped.”) After we get things off our chest, we then do what the disciples did– stop and listen. Who knows what new insights of faith we might come to!
At first, what appeared to the two disciples as a life-shattering tragedy for them and the community of Jesus’ followers, after listening to their new companion’s perspective, their eyes were opened to the new life God was offering them. God had brought life out of death–something only God could do. And what an unusual way to do that!–through the suffering and death of Jesus. The two disciples’ eyes were opened when Jesus broke open the Scriptures for them and then when he “took bread, said the blessing, broke it and gave it to them.”
The breaking of the bread. When the early Christians gathered on Sundays for worship, they didn’t describe what they were doing to the neighbours the way we do today, “I’m going to Mass,” or “I’m going to church.” What they most likely said was, “I’m going to the breaking of the bread.”
It’s like today’s Emmaus story. The two disciples described to their new companion the suffering they witnessed Jesus go through and their own resulting dejection. What we learn from the whole gospel story and have had stressed for us during Holy Week, is that Jesus didn’t come like a tourist to walk around, converse with “the locals,” look at the natural sights and Jerusalem’s architectural wonders — and then leave before pain and the collapse of his project began.
Instead, he made the whole human journey, just like us, all the way through suffering and death. If I’m going to put my faith in Jesus, God-made-flesh, then it will have to be in one who knows my human joys, but also my struggles — completely. That’s what I’ll think about today at the “breaking of the bread” at our Eucharist, Jesus with us — with us all the way!
If I forget who Jesus is for me and how much God loves me, I hope my eyes will be opened again at the breaking of the bread. I hope that, like the two on the road, if my eyes are “downcast,” when I see the bread being broken I will again experience the risen Jesus walking with me in my pain, opening my eyes to see life where, at first, I may only be seeing death.
Once their eyes were opened the two returned to the others in Jerusalem who, Luke tells us, were “gathered together.” There, in the community, the news is shared that Jesus was indeed alive. This Emmaus story is opening our eyes to what is happening at our liturgical assembly today. We road travellers come together: perhaps life has our eyes downcast because, in one way or another, our hopes have been shattered by loss, abandonment by a loved one or friend, financial set back, disillusionment with our church, or a feeling of God’s absence in our lives.
We gather with our community, among them are some who model faith for us, despite their difficult situations. If we have been downcast, because of the witness of the lives and words of those in our faith community. our own hope glimmers, as it begins to come back to life. Our celebration today is like today’s gospel scene: our community’s members are witnesses to the life of Christ in their midst; we also hear the Word proclaimed and opened for us. (Let’s hope the preachers did their homework and prayer beforehand!) After hearing the Word speak to our lives, we voice petition, which express our world and church’s need. Then we go to the altar to praise God for what we have heard. Once again we behold Christ in “the breaking of the bread.”