Memory Loss

The news today brings hope to those with friends or relatives suffering from various forms of dementia, especially Alzheimer's Disease. That debilitating condition of memory loss and character change is often treated with assorted mood changing drugs which further degrade the person who is suffering, and make the experience of those caring more demanding. 
Memory loss strikes at the root of our personalities, as we are constructed of the things we have done and said, the experiences we have been through. Like multiple layers of bricks in a building, each layer of our memory is built on the one beneath. But when memory loss takes over, layers all over the place seem to disappear, and sometimes the sufferer seems to be in a place 50 years ago.
But the good news is that researchers in the US have identified ways to reproduce the very neurons in the brain whose decay seem to be the root cause of the problems. It will take time & money to move towards a treatment, but there is at least a chink of light in the pervading darkness.
We all too easily suffer from memory loss in the life of our faith, so Jesus specifically told us to do things to remember him.  St. Paul gives us our earliest record of what happened at the Last Supper. 'For I pass on to you what I received from the Lord himself. On the night when he was betrayed, the Lord Jesus took some bread and gave thanks to God for it. Then he broke it in pieces and said, “This is my body, which is given for you. Do this to remember me.” In the same way, he took the cup of wine after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant between God and his people—an agreement confirmed with my blood. Do this to remember me as often as you drink it.” ' (1 Corinthians 11.23-25)
It is vital for our faith in Jesus that we do not speed up the degrading of our trust and faith in Him. If we forget what he has done, we forget also who we are as His friends and family, and lose a grip on his forgiveness and mercy. So remembering Jesus in bread & wine if God's remedy for our spiritual Alzheimer's Disease.
I have to remind myself, 'Keep taking the medicine!'
Best wishes,
Richard