This entire season reminds me of the need to break bread together. Certainly in the eucharistic sense, but also in the hospitality and communion with one another. Last night, we had someone over for a meal for the first time in over a month. There was a certain unease and awkwardness, but the joy exceeded the whole adjustment. We hope to begin slowly and cautiously having folks over again. It’s certainly one of the most urgent needs of our time. It’s part of a larger concern I’ve expressed elsewhere.
The inimitable Johnny Cash recorded a great piece that encapsulates this sentiment. He did not write the original words, but like many songs Cash sings, they just become his. I did a little recording of it a few years back and recently the song came to my attention again.
The striking line in the song speaks to what breaking bread truly is:
It’s not the barley or the wheat
It’s not the oven or the heat
That makes this bread so good to eat
It’s the needing and the sharing that makes the meal complete
There is something happening in the practice of breaking bread that takes us beyond the mere description of the elements. It’s not the tastiness of it that makes it complete, but the ritual of sharing and desiring it.
The Table of Fellowship, as Bonhoeffer describes is a rich table meant to satiate our spiritual needs and bind our wounds. When we eat bread together, we are becoming more and more human in our appetites and affections. Bonhoeffer notes in his Life Together:
The table fellowship of Christians implies obligation. It is our daily bread that we eat, not my own. We share our bread. Thus we are firmly bound to one another not only in the Spirit but in our whole physical being.
May we all eat again as one soon. May we all break bread!
I hope you enjoy the tune:
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