The Revd Dr Garry Williams, challenges a coronavirus-induced ‘cyber-supper’
While we are all locked down in our homes we should be longing to celebrate the Lord’s Supper together as a church, but we should not do so. Why not? Quite simply, because it cannot be done.
I have two possible forms of a locked-down Lord’s Supper in mind here. The first, considered at greater length, is a ‘cyber-supper’. By this I mean an online Lord’s Supper in which we synchronise by video call our eating and drinking in different homes, led by a pastor on our screens. In the second, a ‘household supper’, we celebrate in our separate households as and when we wish (or, if we have our understanding of the new covenant week right, on the Lord’s Day) and without any online connection. The issue in both cases is not whether a church that normally meets on the Lord’s Day in a home can legitimately celebrate the supper there. If a church meets in a home as its venue then obviously it can celebrate the supper in a home. The issue here is whether we can celebrate the supper as families or households either physically separated from the rest of the church yet connected online (the cyber-supper’), or simply on our own (the ‘household supper’). My understanding is that both these versions of the supper fail to reckon with what the true supper is. At their worst, such ‘suppers’ might foster some serious theological and pastoral misunderstandings.
