The Beauty of Authentic Community

The cup of suffering has many shapes and a variety of contents. In our tradition, the cup has a special significance. It is a communal cup, meant for sharing. Abandonment at a time of suffering is the deepest of tragedies.

Each time we pass the wine of the Eucharist, we are reminded of our communal relationships and our responsibility to the whole body. We are reminded that our sharing is to continue in our picking up the burdens of the larger community.

Draining the cup of suffering is the final test of our sincerity in claiming discipleship. We can expect no right- or left-hand seats of honor, no prerogatives of power or monopoly on truth, no thrones, no outsiders. But we can have the privilege of holding one another, broken and bruised, in the embrace of our circle, of keeping watch with the dying or keeping vigil with the condemned, of walking alongside the exiled and the weary, of standing at the foot of the cross, not in despair or in bitterness, but open to the miracle of pending resurrection.

And, finally, of waiting hope fully for our own welcome into life.

Wholeness at last!

—Joan Puls, Seek Treasures in Small Field