A Missional Antimension

By Bp. Joseph Boyd (Ancient Church of the West)

Bishops were the only ones who could preside at the Eucharist in the early centuries. That is why deacons would take the Eucharist to those who couldn't attend on Sundays, rather than having multiple, seperate, local liturgies. In the 3rd and 4th centuries, prebyters, who were respected elders and teachers in the community, much like a Church council or vestry today, were increasingly empowered to stand in the gap and officiate the Eucharist, as episcopy became concentrated in the cities and every town and village church no longer had its own bishops.

As episcopacy became more and more hierarchical, priests became increasingly necessary to make sure the people had access to the sacraments. And so the college of presbyters started to act, without the pastoral authority, as bishops had functioned in the earlier centuries. Bishops then started to act as magistrates and governors had functioned before, presiding over diocesan regions, rather than over individual churches, and interacting with an Archepiscopal head who was the spiritual counterpart to the temporal king or emperor.

But how to picture the process as a development within the Church, and preserve the original understanding, rather than allow constant innovation and departure from the earlier theology? The answer was to show that the presbytery was empowered to act on behalf of the bishop and shared jointly in his particular ministry and consecrated apostolic identity. Thus, priests are seen to share in the bishop's priesthood, not receive a priesthood of their own. They are only valid in as much as the do the will of the bishop. This reality is shown in both the ordinal vows, but also in the Trinitarian theology that is central to the three-fold ministry of the Church.

This is why the Eastern use of the Antimension is a brilliant solution to a rather perplexing problem, of showing this theological reality. It is consecrated as an altar would be, with a small relic enclosed, and signed and sealed by the Bishop. It is not a corporal, but was designed to be a portable altar, with all of the important icons incorporated to show the theological reality behind the liturgical actions of the Mass.

In our East Asian situation, where we cannot establish and consecrate church buildings, and where altar stones are hard to transport, and where we must "go from house to house breaking bread," we have adapted the Eastern practice of consecrating these altar cloths to preserve the theological reality of One Church, One Bishop and One Eucharist, bound together in the unity of the sacramental presence of Jesus Christ. They picture the Church, as both permission and mandate to realize the sacramental mission, and also as a way to remember and celebrate the key moments within the Economy of Grace and the purchase of our salvation through the Work of Jesus Christ Our Lord!