J.D. is washing dishes to get ready to prepare Mr. Bird. (No Tofurkey this year). But we found a small turkey at Trader Joe's that was supposedly free-range. Thank you little turkey. I'm reminded of this Gibran passage on Eating and Drinking:
Then an old man, a keeper of an inn, said, 'Speak to us of Eating and Drinking.' And he said: Would that you could live on the fragrance of the earth, and like a plant be sustained by the light. But since you kill to eat, and rob the young of its mother's milk to quench your thirst, let it then be an act of worship. And let your board stand an altar on which the pure and the innocent of forest and plain are sacrificed for that which is pure and innocent in humanity. When you kill a beast say to him in your heart, 'By the same power that slays you, I too am slain; and I too shall be consumed. For the law that delivered you into my hand shall deliver me into a mightier hand. Your blood and my blood is naught but the sap that feeds the tree of heaven.' And when you crush an apple with your teeth, say to it in your heart, 'Your seeds shall live in my body, And the buds of your tomorrow shall blossom in my heart, And your fragrance shall be my breath, And together we shall rejoice through all the seasons.' And in the autumn, when you gather the grapes of your vineyard for the winepress, say in your heart, 'I too am a vineyard, and my fruit shall be gathered for the winepress, And like new wine I shall be kept in eternal vessels.' And in winter, when you draw the wine, let there be in your heart a song for each cup; And let there be in the song a remembrance for the autumn days, and for the vineyard, and for the winepress.
2 comments:
John 6:48-66
Ah, eating, sacrifice, and the sacred. Eating should be more meaningful for a lot of us than it is.
In my tradition, communion is frequently done on a weekly basis to try to emohasize its importance and centrality to our worship life. We do a sip of wine and bite of bread. Sometimes I think that's wrong and we're missing the point. We should cover the alter with a tablecloth, put potluck dishes on it and sit down and eat together.
I always liked what Dr. Clark had to say about the above Bible passage. The word Jesus uses isn't so much "eat" as "gnaw", "gnaw his flesh . . . drink his blood." Of course that makes us nervous. It's why a lot of his disciples had left him by the end of that passage.
That does indeed fit the theme.
I reread the passage in John. "Gnaw" certainly does add a level of the graphic to it. It sort of brings home the actual act more.
Hope you had a good Thanksgiving!
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