The first food
and drink consumed on the moon was the reserved sacrament of communion.
At first, it was kept secret.
To mark the 40th anniversary of the first Apollo moon landing, Bosco
Peters has posted the details of this Christian act of worship 235,000
miles from the earth.
The First Communion on the Moon is now one of The Episcopal Church's
'lesser feasts and fasts', he writes.
On Sunday, July
20,1969 the first people landed on the moon..
Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin were in the lunar lander which touched
down at 3:17
Eastern Standard Time.
Buzz Aldrin had with him the Reserved Sacrament.
He radioed: Houston, this is Eagle. This is the LM pilot speaking.
I would like to request a few moments of silence.
I would like to invite each person listening in, whoever or wherever
he may be,
to contemplate for a moment the events of the last few hours,
and to give thanks in his own individual way.
'Later he wrote:
In the radio blackout,
I opened the little plastic packages which contained the bread and the
wine.
I poured the wine into the chalice our church had given me.
In the one-sixth gravity of the moon, the wine slowly curled and gracefully
came up
the side of the cup.
Then I read the Scripture,
I am the vine, you are the branches. Whosoever abides in me will bring
forth much fruit.
I had intended to read my communion passage back to earth,
but at the last minute Deke Slayton had requested that I not do this.
NASA was already embroiled in a legal battle with Madelyn Murray OHare,
the celebrated opponent of religion, over the Apollo 8 crew reading
from Genesis
while orbiting the moon at Christmas.
I agreed reluctantly Eagle's metal body creaked.
I ate the tiny Host and swallowed the wine.
I gave thanks for the intelligence and spirit that had brought two young
pilots to the
Sea of Tranquility.
It was interesting for me to think: the very first liquid ever poured
on the moon,
and the very first food eaten there, were the communion elements.
NASA kept this
secret for two decades.
The memoirs of Buzz Aldrin and the Tom Hanks Emmy-winning HBO mini-series,
From the Earth to the Moon (1998),
made people aware of this act of Christian worship 235,000 miles from
Earth.