There is a long-standing tradition of Maasai men in East
Africa never to eat in the presence of Maasai women. In their minds, the status
and condition of women were such that the very presence of women at the time of
eating was enough to pollute any food that was present. But here in the
Eucharist we were at the heart of the unchanging gospel that I was passing on to
them. They were free to accept that gospel or reject it, but if they accepted
it, they were accepting the truth that in the Eucharist, which is to say in
Christ, “there is neither slave nor free, neither Jew nor Greek, neither male
nor female."

    They did accept it, but it was surely a traumatic moment
for them, as individuals and as a people, that first time when I blessed the
cup, or gourd in this case, and passed it on to the woman sitting next to me,
told her to drink from it, and then pass it on to the man sitting next to her. I
don’t remember any other pastoral experience in which the "sign of unity" was so
real to me.