covid and the common cup

Covid and the Eucharistic Common cup – an Anglican position
Abundant caution following the arrival of the covid pandemic in 2019 understandably saw the implementation of restrictions to slow and hopefully prevent the spread of the disease, including withdrawal of the common cup in the Eucharist. While many reverted to communion in one kind, we have also experienced widespread use of individual cups. Should communion in one kind or the use of individual cups now become the norm?
Absolutely not!!

1. Communion in one kind. 

The Anglican Church is both Catholic and Reformed.  The 16th century saw restoration of communion in both kinds to the laity. This was emblematic of wide scale and essential reform from an overly clericalised mediaeval view of the Church in which the laity played a passive role in service of a clericalised institution. Reference to this reform can be found in article 30 of the 39 articles of faith – for those so inquisitively inclined!  I long to receive again communion in both kinds in my local Church, inclusive of use of the common cup.

1. Individual Cups

First a precursor.  Is it true that 21st century health scares make it more prudent to deny the common cup?  It is obviously true that medical science has advanced the understanding of disease, but there is no evidence that we are now more prone to infection than previous times.  Past exceptions and pandemics did not alter the norm.   (When leprosyʹs prevalence was the cause of much fear, the common cup continued, but those infected were expected to receive communion in a separate part of the building).
I consider there to be two reasons why use of the Common Cup reflects belief at the core of our Christian identity and therefore why the use of individual cups should not be normalised.  These reasons run at greater depth than purely pragmatics:  disposing of single use plastic cups, properly sanitising multiple glass cups, setting aside a tray of wine filled cups that appear to have no connection to the rite of consecration, disposing of wine remaining in little cups etc.

1. The words of Jesus

ʺThe cup that I drink you will drink and the baptism with which I am baptised you will be baptisedʺ.  And again:  ʺThen he took a cup and after giving thanks he gave it to them saying drink from it all of you for this is the blood of the covenantʺ. And again, in the Gethsemane Garden: ʺIf it is possible let this cup pass from me, yet not want I want but what you wantʺ.
These words are plain, instructive, and directive. It is not possible or desirable to disentangle the use of the cup in Communion from the sacrament of grace it facilitates. A sacrament is an ʹoutward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual graceʹ. In this case the common cup is a sign of communal participation in the covenant of life, binding those gathered at the Lordʹs table. Receiving a piece of the broken bread or drinking from the cup is not to be reduced to personal or private communion with ʹmy Jesusʹ. It is to be a recipient of grace in the context of ongoing witness, service and sacrifice to the broken world which God in Christ came to redeem. It is even more than that.  Archbishop Desmond Tutu was fond of saying ʺwe cannot be human aloneʺ. Wonderfully, in the Eucharist more than any other moment of life, as we take from the broken bread and share from the common cup, we celebrate our common shared humanity in Jesus, who gifts us with his divinity.

1. The universal nature of truth

We have just celebrated Trinity Sunday, a sublime yet still mysterious truth about God and the world made in Godʹs image.  As the disciples and early members of the Christian community grappled with what they had experienced anew of God in Jesus and the outpouring of the Spirit they came to the astonishing realisation that the singularity of God is best known in relationship – love.  Nothing can or does exist alone. Everyone and everything relates to and is part of everything else. It is as true of God as it is of the created order. It should hardly be surprising that creation reflects its creator.  Rather than modern science and Christian faith being in tension with each other, or worse, incompatible, the reverse is true, contemporary science has finally caught up with foundational Christian thought – everything exists in relation.
At the table of life, more than any other place, we want, we need, to celebrate as truly as we are able the reality at the core of our being - life in communion.
For all the above reasoning, the Common Cup is a central element in our Anglican ʹsonglineʹ.  It should not be and cannot be easily abandoned.
Of course, its ongoing place in our life may be experienced differently.  It may be that some form of intinction is widely adopted. Certainly, there should be a clear understanding that a person conscious of passing an infection of any kind should refrain from the cup on that day.  At the very least the common cup should be available to all and its merits taught, even if a different option is made available. 
This is not a small matter. It goes to the very heart of what it means to be a member of the Church of the triune God.