Christ Episcopal Church
	Riverton, New Jersey
	A piece of the Lord be always with you. Different societies have different ways to greet each other: Bowing, waving, kissing, hugging, shaking each others hands, rubbing noses. The early church also had its own greeting, for the Apostle Paul tells his audience to: “Greet one another with a holy kiss” the kiss, the exchange of the peace. This greeting was so important that St. Paul exhorts his correspondents in five of his letters to do so. This action was already the traditional Christian greeting by the year 50, and indeed the way by which our spiritual forebears made each other known to each other, sort of the equivalent of the handshake of a secret society or perhaps a password. As former Drew Seminary dean Leonard Sweet points out in his book Postmodern Pilgrims, “The kiss was an insider sign and seal…and this ‘holy kiss’ was a distinctive mark of the early Christians. The practice must have originated from their experience with Jesus himself.” However, the holy kiss was more than a means of mutual identification on the street, for as Sweet continues: The kiss symbolized to the ancient Christians the transmission of the Spirit – its passing on and surpassing power. Following the consecration of the Eucharist, the priest spoke the words pax vobiscum [peace be with you – the equivalent of the Hebrew Shalom aleichem], after which the members of the body of Christ would kiss one another. Thus they became one in the spirit, enabling them to receive the eucharistic body of Christ and ‘one body and one soul’ and be incorporated into [Christ’s] Spirit. So the Peace was a piece that contributed to unity of the congregation that occurred during the Eucharist itself. This unity was by no means a given. Rather it needed all the positive reinforcement it could get, as these assemblies were made up of a wide diversity of people, perhaps more than any of us have ever experienced. So this exchange became, according to Sweet, “A way of symbolizing to rich and poor, men and women, clean and unclean, old and young, morally pure and morally not so pure, that they were loved by God beyond anything they could imagine and that God’s Spirit played no favorites”. So the members of these early churches became vectors of Christ’s redeeming love, and in the process, acting upon his Great Commandment to ‘love one another as I have loved you’. Sweet’s contention is bourn out by Gospel accounts of the first Easter day. The resurrected Christ shares God’s peace in the context of Holy Communion. The two men whom Jesus accompanied on the way to Emmaus as found in Luke 24, did not recognize him until he sat at table with them and blessed, then broke, the bread. Jesus then departed from them, and they raced back to Jerusalem to share the news of this extraordinary meal with the disciples. As they did so, our Lord appears and says to them: Shalom aleichem, Peace be with you, and Jesus’ resurrection was then witnessed in the offering of the Peace. St. John the Evangelist also offers an account of Jesus gift of peace to the disciples (John 20:19-23) recounting the appearance in the upper room on the first Easter evening. There, through the locked door, Jesus greets them with ‘Peace be with you’, shows them the marks of his crucifixion and then “he breathed on them and said to them, "Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained." So among his earliest acts as resurrected Christ, our Lord connects the Peace, the Holy Spirit, and the power of reconciliation along with the Breaking of the Bread. This then has become the basis of what the order of our Eucharistic liturgy seeks to recover -- for the Peace comes right after the Confession and Absolution. So we are forgiven, and we offer forgiveness to others in return. Note as well that it comes before the Offertory, so that those who need to have the need may “first be reconciled to your brother or sister, and then come and offer your gift” (Matt. 5:23-4). The power of this sense of reconciliation at this point of the liturgy is powerfully illustrated in Bob Libby’s The Forgiveness Book. He had a fight with an old friend, a fellow priest, in a very public venue. The rift would not heal in spite of an equally public apology. Several months later he reports, “I was standing in the back of the cathedral. The bishop declared, ‘The Peace of the Lord be always with you.’ ‘And also with you,’ we replied. I turned to the right, left, and then the rear – and there stood Gerald. He was as uncomfortable as I was. The same thing happened two months later. This time, however, when we faced each other for the third time, it finally happened. We broke into laughter and almost into tears. Then we threw our arms around each other. ‘The Peace of the Lord be with you Gerald.’ ‘And also with you, Bob.’ Historically, the Peace (Pax) has been a part of the Liturgy since the first Easter. It remained part of the Eucharist in our tradition until the second Book of Common Prayer (BCP) in 1552 (it was in 1549). With the exception of the unauthorized Anglican Missal, it began a cautious reappearance for Episcopalians in 1966, and by 1976 its use was reauthorized in what would become the 1979 edition of the BCP. While it was not greeted with universal enthusiasm, the passing of the Peace is now virtually universal, not just for Anglicans throughout the world, but with Roman Catholics, Lutherans and United Methodists as well. It enables us as we prepare to gather around our Lord’s table for that most sacred meal to 1) greet each other, friend or foe as well as acknowledge the stranger as a Christian, and equal, and as one who is loved by God; 2) share and practice Jesus’ reconciling love with each other; and 3) discover, discern, acknowledge, rejoice in that we are all part of the one body of Christ of which we are all members. It is in the sharing of the peace of the Lord that makes us closer to God, by being connected with each other. As we practice sharing the Peace, of course as Episcopalians we want it done decently and in order, to quote St Paul (I Cor.14:40). So turn to your left, your right, forward and behind and greet your neighbor in the pew by offering that Peace. You may shake hands, or hug or kiss – if you are uncomfortable, or a bit far away from your closest neighbor, feel free to wave or bow, making some eye contact in the process. But regardless of whatever outward form it may take, offer some gesture of charity to those around you. But the Peace also should not be an empty rite, not only because Episcopalians are so often accused of such things, but because this is a sacred exchange. To avoid this, perhaps using Isaiah’s prediction that “a little child shall lead them” is appropriate. When our daughter Katie was little, she tended to conceive of things in a very concrete, tangible way. So when she shared the peace with us she would say “A piece of the Lord be always with you”. That’s piece, P-I-E-C-E, as in a piece of pie. So perhaps when you greet your neighbor, you can share God’s peace by offering a piece of the God within you to them, as they share that same peace (and piece) with you. May a piece of the Lord be always with you, and everyone who enters through our doors, always and forever! AMEN.