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The origin of communion meal recalls the table fellowship Jesus shared with his disciples, and in particular, the Last Supper on the night before his death as well as his appearances to the disciples during meals following his resurrection. Throughout its history these Biblical events have been central to the Church’s worship life.

In the sacrament of Holy Communion, also called the Lord’s Supper or Eucharist, meaning “thanksgiving,” Christians hear, taste, touch and receive the grace of God revealed through Jesus Christ in a unique way. Communion is:

* A joyous act of thanksgiving for all God has done, is doing, and will do for the redeeming of creation;

* A sacred memorial of the crucified and risen Christ, a living and effective sign of Christ’s sacrifice in which Christ is truly and rightly present to those who eat and drink;

* An earnest prayer for the presence of the Holy Spirit to unite those who partake with the Risen Christ and with each other, and to restore creation, making all things new;

* An intimate experience of fellowship in which the whole church in every time and place is present and divisions are overcome and

* A hopeful sign of the promised Realm of God marked by justice, love and peace.

The broken bread and poured wine represent the crucified and risen Christ. The wheat gathered to bake one loaf and the grapes pressed to make one cup remind participants that they are one body in Christ, while the breaking and pouring announce the costliness of Christ’s sacrifice for the forgiveness of sin. Some churches provide non-alcoholic and gluten-free elements. As we grow increasingly aware of the rich cultural diversity of the church, the use of elements other than bread and wine is becoming an issue for global ecumenical reflection.

The Book of Worship and The New Century Hymnal contain several liturgies for the celebration of Holy Communion. In addition, many liturgies from ecumenical and global sources are frequently used. At the heart of the service are Jesus’ words about the bread and the cup from the Biblical account of the Last Supper.

A variety of practices are found in the United Church of Christ, including the sharing of a common loaf or the use of individual wafers or cubes of bread and the sharing of a common cup or of individual cups either at the Table or in the pews. Intinction (dipping the bread in the wine) is also an acceptable practice. Care should be taken to ensure that the full meaning of the sacrament is communicated by the way the elements are used and served. The pastor presides at the Table, normally assisted by elders or deacons.

In many Christian churches baptized children and even infants are able to receive communion. In the early church Communion was served weekly, a practice continued and encouraged by the Protestant Reformers. Gradually the frequency of communion decreased in many Protestant churches. This trend is now being reversed. While no one pattern prevails, many congregations are moving toward monthly or weekly communion.

During the last century the Catholic Church has admitted children to First Communion between the ages of seven and eight. The First Communion precedes the Confirmation during the early teens. It is the Catholic parish priest who has the responsibility of seeing that the baptized children of the parish are properly prepared to make their First Communion. But the parish priest does not make the decision when the child is psychologically ready for First Communion. Only the parents really know this, and they have the final decision as to when their child has his First Communion.

Holy Communion is at once a sharing with the risen Lord and a sharing with the human community in which he dwells. So for children as well as for parents any real sharing in and with the Christian community will press for sharing in the Eucharist, both to celebrate the bond of unity that is already there and to deepen it.

I want write more about style, just continuing from the last article and with next suggestion.

Suggestion 7: economy of style. Think back to the old man on the barge from an earlier blog: “On a sleepy, sunny afternoon I was sitting on the banks of a canal, when a barge came chugging gently towards me.” You can see it in front of you. But if I were to ask you, what colour was the barge, you would probably stop and think, “Well, I don’t know! Does it matter?” Writing gives the immediacy of real experience – but is able to do so in just a few words, without irrelevant detail. You can see the trees shimmer in a Monet landscape – but a photograph can be flat and dull, because the camera does not pick out the essentials as the painter compels the eye to do. In the same way, when your mind is fed only the essentials, you achieve a heightened sense of reality. Very little is needed to make you feel that “I am there”. The reality which you have created as a writer is different for every reader, but everyone gets excited and interested. Economy of style helps create the excitement, the “you are there”.

To say it again, the remarkable thing is that you do not need to define much in writing a story. You need only to put in the bare necessities. Poetry has the greatest economy of expression. For me, the best of all is Shakespeare who can contain in one phrase what others might require a whole page to express so clearly:

´Young men’s love then lies
Not truly in their hearts, but in their eyes´
(Romeo and Juliet).

In a nutshell, good writing uses the anti-bikini technique. The bikini technique draws attention to the important parts without revealing what they are, whereas the anti-bikini technique reveals the important points whilst ignoring everything else. So should good writing.

Suggestion 8: word painting. “To begin at the beginning. It is spring, moonless night in the small town, starless and bible-black, the cobblestreets silent and the hunched courter’s-and-rabbits’ wood limping invisible down to the sloeblack, slow, black, crowblack, fishingboat-bobbing sea. The houses are blind as moles…” These are the opening lines of the greatest work ever written for radio, “Under Milk Wood” by Dylan Thomas, who lived by poetry and died by drink. You can do it, but you have to very careful not to turn into Rider Haggard!

Suggestion 9: consistency of style. This probably happens naturally for descriptive passages or accounts of events. But take care, because basically you wouldn’t expect to hear a chunk of Robbie Williams in the middle of a Beatles song.

Suggestion 10: careful use of types of spoken language. Let’s think particularly about conversation and how to write it. In my books I very often use conversation to carry the story along. There are of course many types of spoken English. For example, to play the piano in Pidgin English, as spoken in the depths of New Guinea, goes like this: “Big fella’, black and white, bash him in the teeth!” Or as another example, at scientific conferences, most people speak IBE, “International Broken English”.

The way in which people speak places them immediately with respect to their degree of education – and, in British society, their social class. “Dunno, mate!” is not what the Archbishop of Canterbury would reply if you asked him where the bus station was. But the old guy mending the plumbing might well say “Dunno, mate”. He would not say “Well, I am awfully much afraid that I cannot recollect the location. It’s not in my Bible” – which is what the Bishop might reply. For me, the best way to write conversation is to hide under the table and just let your characters speak. Listen carefully to what they are saying and take it down as fast as you can. For fun, you might try to write down a conversation that you have overheard. For example, in the bus in England the other day I heard two women arguing: “But it’s my turn to sleep with Peter.” “No it isn’t. You had him last night”. “That’s not true!” “Yes, he slept with you!” Actually after a bit it turned out that Peter was a cat, but you see my point.

There’s lots of other things to write about. For example the “Time Line.” How do you sort out the writing when the story line diverges, and two different things are going on at once, but in different places? You certainly have to make sure about the sequence of events and remember who knows what and when.

And no article today about writing can end without mentioning the Harry Potter phenomenon. The Harry Potter phenomenon shows that people love books and that they love them more than ever. It’s cool to read if you’re a teenager. That’s great for us writers. A wonderful world opens out before you as you open a new book. And if you can write yourself and put some people into a wonderful world which you have created, that is a happy experience!

(Originally published at GoArticles and reprinted with permission from the author, David Field).