The Table of Remembrance

I took my mother to a Maundy Thursday service at a local church. It's a traditional time to remember the Last Supper but for us nonconformist Protestants, the service varies. Wildly. I started to say widely but I do think wildly is the better choice.

We went forward twelve at a time to share in a simple communion service. I wish I had a great story of a wild Maundy Thursday messy foot washing or living last supper where someone fell asleep.  It's fitting- if we are remembering the same night, the disciples fell asleep after their meal. That was after the last supper they would ever have with the teacher they adored.

Did they know it was their last supper?

Tonight this pastor had us close our eyes and think of a past meal. Where were we? Describe the room, the food, the conversation. All wonderful prompts to savor again a shared feast.  I wanted to remember a time that featured my mother's extraordinary pie crusts.  But as hard as I tried, it was the image of a picnic bench by a river that finally wrestled my attention into submission.

I remembered not the sound of family conversations but the noise of city traffic and our frantic silence.  I don't see a familiar dining room or well worn table but instead, a city picnic bench, along a sidewalk that winds along a wide river.  The dinner is from a local grocer with unusual and healthy raw salads and a soup without meat.  It is spring and once again, Washington D.C. has burst with cherry blossoms. They float down around us like pale pink feathers.  It's a warm April day, near Easter.  It is the day we have been given of the diagnosis of cancer. 

In her meditation, tonight's pastor referenced a quote by Kathleen Norris that I will have to paraphrase. Ms. Norris' thought was that any sharing of food points to the final meal. The sharing of bread and wine, or pizza and beer also can be a reminder of what we all can anticipate. Not the Last Supper but the wedding feast of the Lamb.  We gather around the table of remembrance over and over- to refresh the story in our minds, to ponder the sacrifice. And when we ponder our stories,  there is often a table, or a picnic bench, in those stories as well.

My mother remembered a particular Easter spread we shared with her extended family and if I thought long enough, I could probably reconstruct the foods in my head. Jello salad with shredded carrots or perhaps crushed pineapple- molded into fluted domes and perched on a single leaf of iceberg lettuce. Scalloped potatoes and the inevitable ham, which if served at this particular cousin's home, was festooned with maraschino cherries ringed with a pineapple slice.  There would be sweet potato casserole and green beans and my mother's glorious pies.

Just writing that brings back murmurs of conversation, the feel of hefty amber glasses with their fancy diamond pattern, the clink of company silverware, the nervous energy of our hostess, the snores of satisfied men an hour later.  I remember.  Those people come alive again and I am back in childhood- one of the sweet memories. A moment to savor.  

And another meal to anticipate. For it wasn't the disciples' last supper with Jesus after all.  And it wasn't the last time I will break bread with all the people I love, who no longer live in this reality. The glory of Easter is the remembrance that this life is temporary. These meals are over and done so quickly.  But we can remember.


And in that memory, we can look forward with joy.

Now we see things imperfectly,

like puzzling reflections in a mirror,

but then we will see everything with perfect clarity.

All I know now is partial and incomplete,

but then I will know everything completely,

just as God now knows me completely. 

I Corinthians 13:12