When the news got out that my father had died, the platters of lunch meat and the casseroles began to arrive at my mother's door, borne by friends who could only hold them out, unable to find anything to say. There isn't anything to say, and the food was of considerable pragmatic value: none of us, my mother especially, felt like cooking, and the house was full of people -- relatives, neighbors, other friends -- who needed to be fed. And food is the most appropriate gift, because it is perishable, as are we. In medieval times the body was called wyrmes mete, food for the worms. And since what we eat becomes us, we are sharing our physical substance, the very real mystery at the heart of Communion.
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