Church of the Brethren, Brethren Love Feast

15 South Mulberry Street
Hagerstown, Maryland 21740
301-733-3565

MISSION STATEMENT
The mission of the Hagerstown Church of the Brethren is to celebrate the love of Jesus Christ and glorify the
Lord by striving to live as Christ lived, experiencing the power of God's healing in our lives. We seek to nurture
our faith community through prayer, music and the proclaimed Word, while enthusiastically reaching out to
others with compassion, respect and love for everyone so that we may grow in faith and commitment together.

VISION STATEMENT
Journeying with Christ - Serving Our Neighbors - Uniting at the Master’s Table

History of Communion and Love Feast

As part of the Jewish observance of Passover it is
traditional that the youngest person ask several
questions, one of which is, "Why is this night different
from all others?" Brethren might well ask the same
question at the Love Feast service, when the familiar
smells of home cooking are combined with solemn
prayer and the challenging rite of feetwashing.

The Love Feast, including the feetwashing, has been God's special gift to
the Brethren. This gift was not given because we are more worthy or more
special or more loved. It is a trust which we have preserved for the rest
of Christendom, which is slowly rediscovering the blessings of this
service. Deacons have been a part of the Brethren practice of Love Feast
and Communion for as long as the record can be traced. Traditionally,
deacons have taken the lead in the physical preparations for these
services.

Communion is an ordinance established by Jesus the night before his
death, during the course of the Passover meal which he shared with his
disciples. In this Passover and the first communion service, both a
symbolic meal and an actual meal was shared. The earliest Brethren
understood the message Jesus gave loud and clear: "Do this in memory
of me."

The earliest Christian communions probably resembled the typical church
carry-in meal, with individuals bringing food for the Love Feast. The
genius of the early Christian movement was that its membership cut
across both racial and economic lines, the two chief lanes of segregation
in today's church. The first century church witnessed great disparities in
personal income in the society at large. The communion table was a rare
focus point for equality. The earliest Christians remembered in their
communion services not only the Last Supper, but the feeding of the
5,000, an event in which all ate and were satisfied. Representations of
communion in early Christian art consistently include symbols of that
particular miracle. For the poor of society, who rarely ate meat or ate well,
this sort of feasting was a clear foreshadowing of the kingdom as
expressed by both the Hebrew prophets and Jesus.

The administration of communion, however, did not always go smoothly;
this is seen in Paul's letter to the Corinthian church, where he accuses
the rich and leisured Christians of finishing the good food before the
poor people came from work (1 Corinthians 11:17-22).

The first century church manual known as the Didache, which purported
to be the teachings of the twelve apostles, and which preserves
important insights into the administration of the early church, records a
communion liturgy which includes language for the Love Feast.

The practice of the Love Feast continued past the first Christian century.
The pagan administrator Pliny the younger wrote to the emperor Trajan
about the Christians who lived in his district. Rumors were spreading
about the Christians, suggesting they were cannibals (because of the
symbolism of eating Christ's body at communion). Pliny reported that when
Christians gathered in worship they ate ordinary food. This is similar to
the practice of Brethren today, where ordinary food is prepared in
homespun fashion -to become part of a sacred meal.

During the course of the first Christian centuries the Love Feast was
combined with the meal known as the Refrigerarium, celebrated in honor
of loved ones who had passed away, and later in honor of Christian
martyrs who belonged to the whole church. This particular form of
worship belonged to the believers and could be celebrated without
benefit of clergy. As a result, when Christianity became a legal religion
under the emperor Constantine around the year 315 AD, the practice of
the Love Feast was stamped out by an entrenched clergy with the backing
of the state. Not without bloodshed.

Centuries later, as early Brethren read the scriptures, they sought to
restore the communion service as a commemoration of the Lord's Supper
because this was specifically commanded by Jesus. The elements in this
restoration included an actual meal and the bread and cup communion.
Furthermore, Brethren read in the commands of Jesus a clear message to
wash the feet of each other following the example of their Lord. The
complete Brethren Love Feast included a time of introspection and
preparation, the fellowship meal, the feetwashing, and the bread and cup
communion.

Brethren Love Feasts often lasted two to three days, and included not
only members of the local fellowship, but Brethren from far and wide. Host
congregations pro- vided housing and food for the guests. Barns were
cleared so all could sleep in comfort. Delicacies were prepared for the
other meals to be shared. Brethren often traveled from one Love Feast to
another, and people outside the faith sometimes gathered outside to
watch the proceedings.

Today Brethren congregations generally celebrate the full Love Feast
once or twice a year. Love Feast is celebrated on Maundy Thursday, the
evening before Good Friday. Many congregations also celebrate Love
Feast the first Sunday of October, which is World Communion Sunday. And
many congregations now share the bread and cup communion during
Sunday morning worship several times a year.

From the Deacon Manual for Caring Ministries, copyright 1998 by Association of Brethren Caregivers.
Used by permission.

Memories of Love Feast 1888

"On the Jacob G. Hershey farm, one mile east of Florin, along the railroad, by the Brethren in
Christ church, a few dozen members came to clean out the barn and put benches in the main
floors and put two large tents in the orchard for restaurants, two tables of 100 each, one for
women and one for men.

They made 660 snitz pies and they were all eaten. A large beef was killed. If any beef was left,
it was given to the poor.

There were six or eight hay wagons in the field for horses to feed on.

Many people came by horse power. The accommodation train stopped four times on the top
of the hill where the subway now is. They came to the feast from four counties. C. N. Hershey
was ten years old and counted 72 passengers that walked up the lane, at 10:00 a.m. Some
came in the afternoon.

It lasted one and a half days. Folks went home the second day. Twelve hundred people were
fed at noon and 1,400 for supper.

Those were the good old days when most people carried a smile and were sociable and didn't
worry about pride. Long to be remembered. "

-Written on December 4, 1963, when C. N. Hershey was 85 1/2 years old.
Submitted by S. Joan Hershey.

From the Deacon Manual for
Caring Ministries, copyright 1998 by Association of Brethren Caregivers.
Used by permission.