This Sunday, we will transfer the feast of Corpus Christi from June 19th. Established in the 13th century at the urging of a nun named Juliana of Liège, the feast draws our attention to Jesus’ request that his followers continue to commemorate his life and self-giving by reenacting the last meal he shared with his friends—when he broke the bread, poured the wine, and said, “Do this in remembrance of me.”

June 22 is almost as difficult to preach on as last week’s Trinity Sunday, rightfully known as one of the “curate’s Sundays.” For me, today is hard because this is the day when many June observances intersect, and I’ve long been reluctant to participate in what we call “special days” or “months”: Indigenous Peoples, World Refugee, Mother’s and Father’s Days; Black History, Asian Heritage, Pride Month…

Of course, I support recognizing the struggles of people whose lives and cultures have been marginalized and erased. In fact, this part is easy. Jonathan could have connected the Trinity with Father’s Day, as I’m sure many have done. I will recite special prayers, include a land acknowledgement in the bulletin, and celebrate how far we have already traveled, which is also not difficult to do (and for this I am thankful). Remember our recent Pentecost service, in which so many languages were spoken as a reflection of the current make-up of our congregation? Recall that for decades, we have been affirming gay parishioners and staff; and in recent years, we’ve hired several female and ethnically diverse clergy. We have joined a variety of social justice causes since the 1950s. And today, I could conclude by inviting you to read more books, sign up for another initiative, recite a Eucharistic prayer from the Arctic, wear a themed colour, and consider it done.

But here’s what I wrestle with. 

First, these days may tempt us to think that, by marking the calendar or including a prayer or pin, we’ve “done our part.” It becomes ritualized self-congratulation. But acknowledgement isn’t justice, and awareness is not transformation.

Second, these observances tend to borrow from traditions that are not our own. A smudging ceremony used without understanding, a rainbow reinterpreted for our purposes, a story retold without relationship are all examples of colonial behaviour: taking what we find moving without asking to whom it belongs, or what it costs.

Third, I worry that these efforts flatten complexity, and the very people we seek to honour can become caricatures. To make it seem that all Indigenous people belong to the same culture, all refugees have the same reason to flee, all gay people are proudly outspoken, etc. would simplify what should not be simplified. That, again, is the logic of colonialism: organizing the world into digestible categories and deciding what’s best for the people who are being controlled.

So no, I don’t like “special days.” But I do care deeply about the people they try to honour. And that’s where today’s feast—Corpus Christi—offers me a way forward.

Corpus Christi, which celebrates the institution of Communion, invites us not to sentimentality but to imitation. Jesus says, “This is my body, broken for you. My blood poured out. Do this in remembrance of me”—not just as a ritual but as a life pattern. Every time we receive bread and wine, we are invited into self-giving; not as its symbol but reality. It is giving ourselves away that draws us into God’s life and empowers healing for all.

There is a story in all four Gospels—the only miracle, apart from the resurrection, that appears in each—where Jesus takes a few loaves and fish, blesses and breaks them, and distributes them to feed thousands, with leftovers. Perhaps the disciples remembered this when they sat at the Last Supper, or at the table in Emmaus. Our Eucharist today follows the same pattern: thanksgiving, blessing, breaking, distributing, and reverently saving the leftovers. Jesus’ followers began doing this almost immediately after his death—first formally documented in 155 by Justin Martyr—and our worship has focused on it ever since. But notice: neither that first-century picnic, nor the Last Supper, nor our own communion relies on God making something from nothing. Following Creation, God’s miracles have mainly come through what we already have, and as such, have often gone unnoticed.

A parishioner once told me about being stranded in a closed airport for 24 hours with no food available. Passengers, seated on the bare floor of a shuttered terminal, began pulling out the snacks they had brought—some more, some less—and sharing. Everyone ate enough to get through the night. Perhaps Jesus’ feeding of the multitudes worked like that, or even like our parish potlucks that always result in too many leftovers. And to me, the miracle was not even that Jesus made a small lunch stretch; it’s that God chooses to unify infinitely diverse people through shared grace. Just like our Communion, where people of every age, background, and colour gather at the same rail. 

So when we ask, “If we don’t participate in token recognition, then what do we do?”—the Eucharist itself gives us the answer. We continue in the pattern Jesus taught: not that of heroic self-sacrifice, but persistent, relational self-giving. And we may begin small, starting with thoughts and words.

Instead of a calendar of acknowledgements, what if we offered attention? What if we noticed the stereotypes reinforced in the media we consume, the jokes we laugh at, the assumptions we make? What if we diversified the images we see, and challenged the ideas we hold of what is beautiful? What if we caught ourselves making sarcastic remarks about gender expression or accents, or dismissing others with thoughts like “they scare me,” “they must be lazy,” or “they owe it to me”? And what if we responded not with guilt, but with the honest, compassionate reminder to ourselves: “I’ve been socialized to think this way. But I am free to learn a new way of thinking.”

That’s where transformation begins, as empowered simply by this kind of an intentional, moment by moment self-discipline and commitment to noticing. For example, my son recently told me that dodgeball at school had become a way of rewarding aggression by praising the boys who threw hardest, and allowing them to do so even outside the game. He felt uncomfortable, but was reluctant to say so, because he’s already being socialized to think that boys are supposed to be tough. That led to conversations—with him, my partner, and eventually the principal. To be sure, neither dodgeball nor patriarchal stereotypes will disappear tomorrow. But if enough small conversations happen, if enough people name what they notice, things may begin to shift.

Have you ever had, or offered, a conversation that opened someone’s mind, or your own? It is through such moments that justice becomes real. That is where God shows up. Today’s communion anthem is Ubi Caritas, “Where charity and love are, God is there.” Since the 13th century, Corpus Christi has been a time to reflect on Christ’s presence in the sacrament. While Anglicans don’t tend to think of the Eucharist in terms of the literal body and blood, we do affirm that Christ is truly present with us in that moment. But what kind of love signifies that “God is there” or “Christ is present”? It is not the romantic kind of love that we’ve been shown in the movies, nor simply a feeling or an attraction, but the mess and mercy of real love as an action: of a self given again and again. Not grand statements or symbols, but small acts of tenderness, self-awareness, and courage. That is what saves the world.

So I ask again: what if, instead of fitting people into categories, we lifted them up in relationships? What if, instead of collecting causes, we allowed ourselves to be truly moved by the people in our lives, the biases we challenge, the changes we resist? May we give thanks for everyday miracles, invite all kinds of people to our tables, and put their needs before our own. Amen.

Questions to Consider

1. What emotions or assumptions do you personally bring to “special days” like Pride, Indigenous Day, or International Women’s Day — is it obligation, celebration, discomfort, or something else? How might a church observe these days but avoid tokenism or cultural appropriation?

2. Have you ever experienced someone offering self-giving love to you in a way that helped dismantle your own sense of entitlement, or alleviated isolation? What made that encounter transformative?

3. How can our congregation move from symbolic gestures to sustained, just relationships across differences — perhaps through book groups, partnerships, changed liturgical habits, financial support, quiet shifts in language use?

4. What role can ordinary conversations—at work, with kids, on the street—play in creating change? Have you experienced or initiated one that opened someone’s mind?