Eucharist in that hellish place!

I went out about 4.00 pm, wondering who God would put in my path. I went into a bar and met Anna, a bag lady, age 53. She started talking to me, took a loaf of bread out of her bag and a tin of tuna fish and asked if I'd like a sandwich. How much more easily the poor share of the little they have! So we sat at the bar eating bread, tuna and a banana….it was very dark and the music was loud. Anna talked. She cried. She said she was lonely and sad a desperate woman. She talked about men in her life who had used her and left her. She still works as a prostitute and she asked me outright if I wanted to team up and work with her. I didn't know how to respond, but in the end, I told her I was a minister. She didn't know whether to laugh or cry, but eventually decided to cry. Then after a shower of tears, she collapsed and, exhausted, fell asleep on the bar counter. I felt so helpless.
There was nowhere to take her -- no home -- no shelter open. There were only the streets -- always the streets. I just sat next to her, surrounded by all the noise and laughter of a bar, and felt so totally inadequate to help or to comfort. I left her a note with the address of the shelter and walked away.
In the darkness outside I pondered on how we had broken bread together and eaten together and talked about life and God. We had held each other. Eucharist has been broken and shared in that hellish place.
(I Hear a Seed Growing ~ Edwina Gately)