Pervasive Irony?

"...the pervasive irony that Ricoeur sees emerging through the task of interpretation." Rowan Williams, "The Suspicion of Suspicion:Wittgenstein and Bonhoeffer."
    "Verbal irony" is when words are used to express an opposite, or unexpectedly different, meaning from what they literally mean. An obvious and common use of verbal irony is uttered every time a priest hands out a piece of bread and says, "the Body of Christ". Taken literally, the words are nonsense. Used liturgically for 2000 years, they work to evoke a strangely resilient presence. Does this amount to a massive exercise in self-deception, or a classic example of "dramatic irony," where the audience knows the meaning of what is happening and the actors do not? The "audience" in this case would seem to be the church, which discerns a presence where others see only bread and hear only some very peculiar worlds being spoken. Even more, it is God who is the "audience", and who alone truly perceives the reality of whatever transpires.
     I am not speaking from the perspective of a detached observer, who examines the phenomenon of religion from afar and pronounces it meaningless. That would constitute analysis, or possibly ridicule, but not "irony". Irony requires that one be engaged with the play, whether as actor or audience. Perhaps this is what Paul Ricoeur means by "Second Naivite", that we know we are part of a "play", but we allow ourselves to suspend disbelief enough so as to experience the reality which the play is seeking to express.
     Irony requires humor and empathy, and (ironically) some degree of commitment. If we can't identify with the characters and the plot, the play will collapse, because there will be no incentive to watch it. When the church engages in Eucharist, it had better be prepared to both laugh and cry. I'm pretty sure that God is doing both.
    The irony is "pervasive" because it extends all the way into the funny bone (and tear ducts) of God, which (as we know) are body parts God does not possess. Irony that extends into the non-existent? My, that is pervasive...