25th April, 2020
​
My dear friends,                                                                                                                                                
           
            Thank you for all you are doing during the Coronavirus pandemic. It was very good to hear of patients who have recovered from Covid-19 and have returned home from the Nightingale Hospital, where St John volunteers helped care for them. At the same time, our hearts go out in loving sympathy to all who have lost friends and loved-ones during the pandemic. Please be assured that you are all in my daily prayers. If you would find it helpful to have someone to talk to, the Order of St John is operating a telephone chaplaincy service each day between 10.30-11.30 a.m. and 4.00-5.30 p.m. Several chaplains, including me, are taking it in turn to be available if anyone would like a little chat. The telephone number is 03330 154414.
 
            Dr Polly North of the Great Diary Project – see http://www.thegreatdiaryproject.co.uk – has been in touch. She would be very grateful to receive any diaries which people are writing during the Coronavirus pandemic, as a record for future generations of how we are coping at this time.
 
                              With kindest regards,
 
                                                                                    The Rev. Dr  ROBERT BEAKEN, County Chaplain.
EASTER 3 – 26th APRIL 2020.
 
Gospel reading: St Luke, chapter 24, verses 13-35.
If – once the Coronavirus ‘lock-down’ is over – you find yourself near Trafalgar Square in London with half an hour to spare, you could do worse than pop into the National Gallery and see a painting called The Supper at Emmaus painted by Caravaggio in 1601. You can find it on Google images.

​            The Supper at Emmaus shows Christ after his Resurrection at supper with Clopas and his friend in the inn at Emmaus. The table is covered with a white cloth and contains all they will need for their meal, including a roast chicken, water, wine, and a basket of fruit, which is about to tip onto the floor. In the centre, Christ is depicted holding some bread, his eyes closed as he says a prayer of blessing. To the right, Clopas – or it might be his friend, we are not sure, jumps up, his arms outstretched in amazement. The position of his arms is reminiscent of the crucifixion – Caravaggio is making a point. The man’s left hand seems to poke out through the canvas, drawing the viewer into the scene. To the left, the other man pushes himself up from his chair, his eyes staring in amazement at Christ.

            The painting doesn’t really make any sense unless we know the story from today’s Gospel. It is the evening of the day of Christ’s Resurrection. Clopas and his friend, who are clearly very much on the fringes of Jesus’ followers, are making their way home from Jerusalem, discussing what has happened to Jesus. On the way, they are joined by a man whom they do not recognise. It is Jesus, and Caravaggio shows him in the painting without his customary beard, to show that he looked different that evening. The three men fall into conversation about what has occurred, and the stranger explains the references to the Messiah in the Old Testament scriptures, showing how the Christ must die and rise on the third day. Clopas and his friend invite the stranger to stay to supper when they reach Emmaus, which is about two hours’ walk from Jerusalem. They ask him to say grace, and, as he breaks the bread and says the blessing, they realise that this stranger is in fact Jesus Christ, risen from the dead.

Caravaggio captures the moment where the penny has just dropped and the two men recognize Jesus. Seconds later, he vanishes from their sight, leaving only the broken bread upon the table. Clopas and his friend hurry back to Jerusalem, and impart the good news to the disciples.

            There are various things we can learn from this story. For a start, we see Jesus in his resurrection body. You will remember from last Sunday how we heard of him appearing suddenly in a locked upper room. Jesus had a real body; indeed, he invited poor, confused, lovable old Thomas to put his finger in the wounds made by the nails and the soldier’s spear. You don’t do that if you are just a vision. But Christ could appear at will in a locked room, ‘out of the blue,’ as we should say. Clearly something has changed: he has been transformed by the Resurrection. We see this again on the road to Emmaus: he suddenly appears and conceals his identity. A resurrection body is a real body: Jesus has proper fingers with which to tear a loaf of bread; yet his is a transformed body, as ours will be in heaven, rid of sin, pain and all that gets between us and God’s love.

            The second thing is that on the road to Emmaus, Jesus explained the Old Testament to Clopas and his friend, and their hearts burned within them. One of the ways – not the only way, but an important way – in which God helps us is the Bible. When we read it with faith, He speaks to us. We aren’t always aware of it, but He is warming our hearts, putting ideas and thoughts into our minds to guide and sustain us through daily life.

            Thirdly, there is the remarkable recognition of the identity of Jesus when he broke the bread and said the grace at supper. Now, to us, this is all strongly reminiscent of the Last Supper four nights earlier on Maundy Thursday, when Jesus broke the bread, saying [from the Greek], This is the body of me, which will be given up for you, do this to re-call me amongst you. And likewise he shared the cup of wine, which became his blood. 

But, I ask you to remember that Clopas and his friend were not present at the Last Supper, and it is unlikely that they had heard what happened in the Upper Room that Maundy Thursday night. And yet, they recognised Jesus in the breaking of bread. The point? Well, we too, were not at the Last Supper in the Upper Room, but like Clopas, we may recognise Jesus in the breaking of bread. Christ’s Real Presence, here and now, in the bread and wine of Holy Communion, changed upon the altar by the Holy Spirit into his sacramental Body and Blood, is a deep and wonderful gift of God to His people. Yet, belief in the Real Presence is a bit like faith itself: you either ‘get’ the Real Presence, or you don’t. Some people, I’m sure, think that I am making it all up. But, once the penny drops, we realise that we, too, may encounter the risen Jesus Christ in the breaking of bread.

            I want to end with a reflection of my own. Clopas found Jesus, seemingly hidden, in a stranger. We, too, may find Jesus in the men and women, the strangers, around us. All are created by God the Father; all, sadly, are marred by the Fall and by Original Sin; Christ died upon the Cross for all; all bear the unquenchable divine spark within them. We must love our neighbour as ourself, for in so doing, we love a little bit of Jesus.

            We see this most clearly in Caravaggio, the artist. He was a boozer; he appears to have led a rackety and licentious life. He had a violent temper and terrible pride, perhaps masking an insecurity. He once killed a man in a drunken brawl and had to flee Rome. And yet, he had a deep – if rather troubled – Christian faith, which he expressed in his beautiful paintings of Biblical scenes. Caravaggio shocked people by going out and getting ordinary people from the streets to pose for him as the Blessed Virgin Mary, St Peter, or St Luke. He had a strong sense of Christ as a real human being, as well as the Son of God, born at a particular moment in history. He shows us that Christianity is not about escapism: our human problems, weaknesses and bad memories do not go away when we start to follow Christ. Rather, our pilgrimage through life involves coping with them, with God’s aid.

             Christ is to be found – and served – in all men and women, whom God has created in his own image. And all men and women – like Clopas and his friend – may have their hearts warmed by the words of Holy Scripture, and discover their Risen Saviour, Jesus Christ, in the breaking of bread.