In particular, Goizueta examines four central features of the fiesta: [1] its expression of communitas; [2] its "subjunctive mood"; [3] its integration of play and work; and [4] its function as a liturgical action. I will focus here more on the positive side of these four features rather than the possible shortcomings which Goizueta also probes (1999:91).

With regard to communitas, Goizueta emphasizes the role of the fiesta both in leveling social distinctions within the community and in asserting the identity of that community over against the larger society. In these respects the fiesta functions "subjunctively", projecting how the people "would have it" with regard to their own society against the background of the "remembered past" and looking toward a "hoped-for future." Part of this subjunctive projection involves the confluence of work and play--the preparation and clean-up essential to the celebration--which challenges both overly escapist notions of play and overly pragmatic notions of work (1999:92-94).

Finally, as a public ritual of worship, the fiesta is liturgical in nature, responsively celebrating the community as the recipient of God's prior grace. This grace is the sheer giftedness of creation itself and our lives, particularly as that is revealed in God's own self-gift in Jesus Christ whose Cross stands at the center of many fiestas. Thus the communitas which the fiesta subjunctively projects in the integration of work and play assumes a Christic and Trinitarian theological anthropology that celebrates the goodness of life, the dignity of the outcast, relationship within community, and unswerving hope grounded in grace (1999:91-92, 95-96).

The kind of analysis that Goizeuta undertakes with regard to the Latin fiesta can also be made in a more general way with regard to the theology and celebration of the eucharist. Unlike Goizeuta, I will begin here not with how the eucharist actually is celebrated, but with it's theological significance and then work back to what that implies for a better celebration. First, in terms of communitas, the eucharist is a communal feast, an eating and drinking together as a community in which the ecclesial Body of Christ forms itself and reproduces itself through the making present and communing with the Body of the risen Christ, establishing thereby an identity over against the larger world (De Lubac 1949:253-4, 266-7; Bouyer 1955:75-76).

Second, the eucharist functions subjunctively in proclaiming and giving a foretaste of the ways things ought to be, against the remembrance of Jesus' death (Leithart 1997). As a ritual meal of eating and drinking, the eucharist forges a tie to this world as the place in which God's reign is realized, the transformation of this world in and through human action, and the establishment of peace (Schmemann 1973:11-46). In particular we see a confluence of work and play, the mundane and the refined in the joining of bread with wine. Bread is basic sustenance but requires the establishment of human economy--subsistence agriculture--as well as the cessation of conflict and employment of human labor (Kass 1994:121-122). Wine, on the other hand, is a cup of playful celebration but requires some degree of technological sophistication, extended peace to age and mature, and the opportunity to relax and enjoy. The eucharist, therefore, projects a communitas in which such labor and celebration are valued, along with the peace to engage in them and the leisure to delight in them (Empereur and Kiesling 1990:117-118).

Finally, the eucharist is, of course, a liturgical action of worship that, with thanksgiving, repeats the feasting and table-fellowship of Jesus himself, calls his people to Christ-likeness, and looks forward to the final establishment of God's reign (Wainwright 1971:91-93). It is in Christ, as totus Christus, that the communitas of the subjunctive eucharistic economy becomes a proclamation of Jesus' death. And as a proclamation of that sacrifice, the eucharist is also our sacrifice in which we are united to Jesus' own self-offering and therefore must be the communitas characterized by self-offering love of one another (Thurian 1961:76-107).

While what I have outlined regarding the eucharist is, I think, theologically correct, it is not necessarily what is embodied and communicated by our actual celebrations in every instance. This is true not only when the Body is divided by conflicts, inequities, and jealousies, but sometimes in the very form of the celebration itself. While I have participated in various liturgical traditions, my own tradition is that of Reformed Protestantism, particularly Presbyterianism (and rather traditionalist Presbyterianism at that). It seems to me, however, that the shape of the typical Presbyterian eucharist often appears to undermine the theological significance and power of what the eucharist is supposed to be. This can be suggested in several ways.

First, there is sometimes little evidence that the eucharist is an action of the assembly with and through the presiding minister. The people may well remain passively in their pews, be provided with no liturgical responses, and keep silent during the entire ritual. This belies a focus upon individual benefits and participation rather than a notion of communitas.

Second, many traditional Presbyterian churches do perhaps express something of relaxation in God's presence by serving communion to the people as they sit in the pews. Nevertheless, other aspects of the subjunctive character of the eucharist as work and play in community can be blunted. The gifts are not always brought to the table from among the people and so inadequately signify the work of human hands. Since there is usually no exchange of the peace and by remaining in the pews, the relaxation enjoyed does not often express the conviviality of people intermingling in peace or celebrating together at rest. And when grape juice rather than wine is used, the material medium of joy and leisure is absent.

Finally, the note of thanksgiving and a sacrifice of praise--a celebration of God's grace in Christ Jesus--is at times eclipsed by the penitential tone of the liturgy, meditations upon our personal unworthiness, and the encouragement of an introspective spirituality. While none of these things are, in themselves, improper at all times and places, they do little to project forward the kind of worshipping community we are to be in light of the reign of God and in active service to one another.

In conclusion, then, I found Goizeuta's analysis of the fiesta to provide a thoughtful challenge to recognize the festal nature of the Christian eucharist and to examine the practical ways in which we may fall short in ritual embodiment of that celebration.