The Wave and the Table
by The Rt. Rev. Hector Monterroso
It begins with one person standing. Then another. And another.
Within seconds, an entire stadium is moving together. Or perhaps it begins with a chant, a drum, or thousands of Norwegian supporters pretending to row like Vikings. Complete strangers suddenly find themselves singing, clapping, and celebrating as though they have known one another for years.
There is something deeply human in those moments. We long to belong. We long to participate. We long to be part of something larger than ourselves. Perhaps this longing should not surprise us. As the Apostle Paul reminds us, we are many members, yet one body. We were created not for isolation but for communion.
Perhaps that is why stadiums can feel almost sacred. They remind us that human beings were never meant to live entirely alone. We were created for community and for shared experiences that draw us beyond ourselves.
Every Sunday, something equally remarkable happens in churches around the world. We stand together. We sit together. We sing together. We pray together. Sometimes we kneel together. Sometimes we exchange the Peace. Sometimes we walk together toward the Lord’s Table.
One of the great gifts of serving in the Diocese of Texas is seeing people from every corner of the world become one worshiping community. They arrive with different stories, accents, and traditions, yet they stand, sing, pray, and receive Communion together. For a brief but holy moment, they embody the vision of God’s Kingdom.
The early Christians called this gathering leitourgia, a Greek word meaning “the work of the people.” Worship was never intended to be a performance observed by spectators. It was always meant to be something we do together. The Book of Acts describes the first believers as people who gathered, prayed, broke bread, and shared their lives together. From the very beginning, Christian worship was communal.
In many ways, the wave in a stadium and the liturgy in a sanctuary remind us of the same truth: some things can only happen when people participate together. A wave does not happen because one person stands. A song does not move a stadium because one person sings. And the Church is not simply a collection of individuals occupying the same space. It becomes fully itself when God’s people pray, sing, listen, and respond together.
Every liturgy is, in some sense, a rehearsal for the Kingdom of God. Each time we gather, we practice listening to God and to one another. We practice gratitude, peace, forgiveness, and communion. Little by little, we become the people God calls us to be.
The World Cup will eventually end. The songs in the stadiums will grow quiet, and the flags will be folded away. Yet the deeper longing revealed in those celebrations remains. It is the longing to find our place within a story greater than ourselves.
Perhaps that is why the joy of a stadium can feel strangely familiar. It reminds us that we were created for something more than individual achievement. As Paul reminds us elsewhere, we are “members of the household of God.” We were created to lift our voices with others and to participate in a story greater than ourselves.
The stadium teaches us that people long to belong. The sanctuary reveals that this longing is, at its deepest level, a longing for God and for one another.
Perhaps that is one of the hidden gifts of the World Cup. For a few moments, strangers stand, sing, and move together as one. In those moments, we catch a glimpse of something for which we were created from the beginning: not merely to watch life from the sidelines, but to participate in a communion that ultimately finds its meaning in God.
The wave rises and then passes.
The table remains.
And every time we gather around it, we remember that we belong—to one another and to God.
