Harm in Waiting for 14

My friend Pr Stuckwisch commented recently on first communion practices in relationship to confirmation practices. On another blog, several pastors took issue with what Pastor had written.

One pastor made the point that we ought never change our practices unless they are shown to be contrary to God's word. His point was that our current confirmation traditions might not be the best, but it IS our practice, and we ought not change from it.

I agree with the principle: we ought always to avoid change unless it can't be helped. For example, I'm still having a very hard time with the new hymnal, and will for a long time. I hate change, especially at church. Like one of the Motley Magpie guys wrote: "But We Don't Do It That Way" is the laymen's protection against renegade pastors who want to make changes that they oughtn't.

But the question remains. Is our current practice contrary to God's Word? Does it cause harm?

I think we underestimate the harm it does to people when they are not allowed to commune until they are teenagers. But beyond the waiting period, does our current practice do any harm?

Yes.

What does it teach me about my worthiness?

Seven years ago we were attending a friend's ordination. The communion announcement in the bulletin said that anyone with doubts ought not commune. It just so happens that that same morning I had gone to private confession and confessed doubts which Pastor had forgiven, and yet the doubts were not automatically and instantaneously overcome. Pastor had also said that no one can ever be free of doubts until he assumes room temperature; that's what the sinful nature is, a doubter. So if having a sinful nature (with its doubts) makes us unworthy to commune, then no one could commune. I really struggled during the ordination service with whether it would be okay to commune. [Would I desecrate the holy things? Would I bring harm to myself?] But I finally decided to rely on Pastor's word that the Supper is strength and life and is given even to me who is unworthy.

But that day sent me into a tailspin. How do I know I'm worthy? How do I know my faith measures up? After all, we are told that children are not worthy to commune because they don't have the right kind of faith. Children can't reflect upon their faith. Children might not be able to properly "discern the body" and thus may eat to their judgment. Children cannot examine themselves.

Well, how do I know that I examine myself properly? How do I know that I am properly discerning the body? How do I know whether my faith is mature enough?

I asked these questions. My friends (some of whom were pastors) assured me that my faith was the right kind of faith. They cited proof of why they knew I was worthy. I'd been confirmed. I attended church every week and longed to hear the Word. I could recite the catechism. I could reflect upon my faith. They were sure that I could "discern the body" (whatever that means).

Every assurance somehow or other pointed me to myself.
Which only made the doubts greater.
Which only made the sense of unworthiness deeper.
Which only served to make me fear the Sacrament.

My pastor, however, kept pointing me to Jesus and His promises and what He had done and what He wanted to give in the Supper. Whenever I argued and sassed back at him about my unworthiness and my doubts, he would point me to Jesus. But he couldn't be right. He couldn't! That's just contrary to what's taught in Missouri Synod: that I can be unworthy because of my age or my maturity or my knowledge or my understanding or my ability to reflect upon my faith. And if I can be unworthy for these reasons when I am 10 yrs old or 7 yrs old or 4 yrs old, then I have no confidence that I am "beyond that" just because I'm middle-aged now.

Eventually I came to the conclusion that the "judgment" of sickness or death (which some people say will come to some Christians, based on 1 Corinthians 11) was something I was willing to endure so as to be able to receive Jesus' body and blood and the forgiveness therein.

I figured I was the only one who had ever contemplated such things, who had ever struggled with such thoughts. But then I was talking to a young friend who had had the same fears. He said that from the time of his confirmation until about 5-6 years later, he was always afraid to commune. He did anyway. But it was unsettling because he was sure he wasn't communing "worthily." After all, if young children aren't capable of communing worthily, what makes me any more worthy than them? The only way my friend got over his uncertainty was when he had a new pastor who stubbornly pointed my friend's eyes away from himself and his "faith" to look instead at The Faith -- the truth of what Jesus did to redeem him and the promises attached to the elements of the Sacrament.

Those who are harmed by the practice of 8th-grade confirmation are not just those who are barred from the Supper.