Keeping the Festival without the Feast?

In many ways, this current pandemic has served to reinforce our Lenten devotions. The isolation pushes us towards the disciplines of solitude and quiet. The restrictions on going out encourage us to shop less and eat more simply. The imminent danger of the disease brings to our mind the reality of our mortality and our dependence on God. I am in no way arguing for the goodness of the disease, rather because of the great tragedy of our current situation our penitential disciplines have been aided.  

The same cannot be said for a festal season. The high feast day of Easter is approaching and all of the external restrictions which have supported our Lenten worship now seem to impede our ability to celebrate the resurrection. The most significant instance of this is the barrier that remains for us to commune together at the Lord’s table. We will not be able to gather in the church on Easter Sunday. Most will not able to receive the sacrament of Holy Communion. This is a real sorrow and will become a potential impediment to our ability to keep a holy feast.  

The festivals of the church are not primarily opportunities to indulge our carnal desires. We do not feast just because it is enjoyable. The feasts of the church are a celebration of the Kingdom of Heaven which has come among us. The resurrection of Christ defeated death and the devil. Christ’s incarnation, life, passion, death, resurrection and ascension have worked a change in the world, and the feasts of the church are a recognition of that fact. The world has been remade. Therefore, those things which were corrupted in the fall and only communicated death to us, are now, once again, conduits of God’s love and pleasure. The eucharist is the archetype of this reality. Bread and wine become the means by which Christ is truly present among His people. Alexander Schmemann wrote, “Eucharist is thus the feast of the Church or, better still, the Church as the feast, as rejoicing in Christ’s presence, as anticipating the eternal joy of the Kingdom of God.” The feasting we do in our homes and communities ought to be a type of the eucharistic feast. We feast aright when our celebrating is an acknowledgment of the heavenly reality present among us. This is why the great feast days of the church are always commemorated by a Holy Communion service. The benefit of eating good food and enjoying good fellowship is predicated on the reality proclaimed at the Altar in the sanctuary. Otherwise our decadent spread is only dust and ashes. 

How then, can we celebrate Easter if we have not partaken of Holy Communion? What recourse do we have if we awake tomorrow to the end of Lent and prepare merely to observe others partake of the feast? 

First, acknowledge that your inability to commune physically does not absolutely preclude you from receiving the grace of God through Christ. I remind you that you may commune spiritually in the unity of the Body of Christ. Fr. Patterson and I have both written to you regarding the reality of your ability to commune by way of the worship of the Church, and our prayer book makes clear the same. 

Second, your clergy are committed to communing the parish during the season of Easter. Even though the whole parish may not be able to gather on Easter, Eastertide is forty days, and this is ample time to make the Eucharist available to the whole parish. 

Third, you have the opportunity to make the celebrations of Easter day little mirrors of the heavenly feast if you will consecrate yourselves and the time to the Lord. Our fasting during Lent was, in part, to prepare us for the feast of Easter. In the words of St. Thomas Aquinas, “At the Easter festival the mind of man ought to be devoutly raised to the glory of eternity, which Christ restored by rising from the dead, and so the Church ordered a fast to be observed immediately before the Paschal feast; and for the same reason, on the eve of the chief festivals, because it is then that one ought to make ready to keep the coming feast devoutly.” We fasted so that our celebrations in Easter might be worshipful. We put off food or some other pleasure for a time in order to remind ourselves that it is only good in so far as it communicates God’s love to us. It is not good in itself. Therefore, we can now take to ourselves, once again, the good things of creation in recognition that they are instruments of God’s love. In so doing, we will keep the feast devoutly.

I conclude with an excerpt from a sermon by St. John Chrysostom for Easter. In light of the potentially somber feast, hear the words of this great Church Father and be comforted. We are meant to celebrate the reality of the resurrection. Let us do so wholeheartedly. 

“If anyone is devout and a lover of God, let him enjoy this beautiful and radiant festival.

If anyone is a wise servant, let him, rejoicing, enter into the joy of his Lord.

If anyone has wearied himself in fasting, let him now receive his recompense.

If anyone has labored from the first hour, let him today receive his just reward. If anyone has come at the third hour, with thanksgiving let him keep the feast. If anyone has arrived at the sixth hour, let him have no misgivings; for he shall suffer no loss. If anyone has delayed until the ninth hour, let him draw near without hesitation. If anyone has arrived even at the eleventh hour, let him not fear on account of his delay. For the Master is gracious and receives the last, even as the first; he gives rest to him that comes at the eleventh hour, just as to him who has labored from the first. He has mercy upon the last and cares for the first; to the one he gives, and to the other he is gracious. He both honors the work and praises the intention.

Enter all of you, therefore, into the joy of our Lord, and, whether first or last, receive your reward. O rich and poor, one with another, dance for joy! O you ascetics and you negligent, celebrate the day! You that have fasted and you that have disregarded the fast, rejoice today! The table is rich-laden; feast royally, all of you! The calf is fatted; let no one go forth hungry!

Let all partake of the feast of faith. Let all receive the riches of goodness.

Let no one lament his poverty, for the universal kingdom has been revealed.

Let no one mourn his transgressions, for pardon has dawned from the grave.

Let no one fear death, for the Saviour’s death has set us free.”

- Fr. Deems