Christmas Cedars

Today marks the fiftieth anniversary of the first footsteps on the moon. Two members of Apollo 11 – Neil Armstrong and Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin landed in the Sea of Tranquility while the third, Michael Collins, orbited in the command module. Moments after their landing, Aldrin radioed back to Earth, “I’d like to take this opportunity to ask every person listening in, whoever and wherever they may be, to pause for a moment and contemplate the events of the past few hours and to give thanks in his or her own way.” Then Buzz Aldrin — an elder at the Webster Presbyterian Church in Webster, Texas — switched off the radio, opened small plastic containers of bread and wine and read quietly from the New Testament. In an interview after they returned safely to the Earth, the astronaut reported, “The very first liquid ever poured on the moon, and the very first food eaten there, were the elements of communion.”