The other day while driving back from Head Office with Sharron we started to talk about the Eucharist and particularly about the bread and the wine. In particular I was asking if the bread and the wine are in themselves symbolic? By that, I mean did Jesus deliberately choose bread and wine for the significance we have assigned to them over the centuries (the bread and wine signifying Christ’s body and blood), or did Jesus choose bread and wine because they were the ordinary everyday foods that were around in 1st century Palestine and easily accessible to all?

As ever, I am thinking aloud, but in that thinking I am wondering and asking if we have missed the point over the centuries.

Was Jesus saying that particularly in the bread and the wine are my body and blood; or was Jesus saying in the normal everyday things you have around you are my body and blood?

We have traditionally gone with the former which has resulted in Christians paying particular reference to bread and wine as we celebrate and remember what Jesus has done. In this was the celebration becomes one of remembrance but seems to me to be restricted to just two things. At this point I think of Christians in the middle of the desert, or in parts of Africa, or indeed in many parts of the world where bread and wine are just not available or are not part of the everyday diet of people. How can Christians in those places partake of God if they do not have any bread and wine for the Eucharist?

It strikes me that if bread and wine are essential that is not very good news for those that have no access, and maybe never will have access, to bread and wine.

On the other hand, maybe Jesus was saying that in the normal everyday stuff you have around you you can find me. Could he have been suggesting that in our staple food, the food that normally sustains us on a daily basis, that we could enter in daily communion with him. If this is the case then the Eucharist could consist of fish and rice, maize, sauerkraut, sushi, or whatever the normal everyday easily accessible diet happens to be.

I wonder if, in the Eucharist, Jesus is saying ‘I am accessible to you, I am here in the everyday – you don’t need to look to hard, you don’t need to struggle to find me, you don’t need anything special, I am here in your normal everyday!’

That sounds more like good news!