  Spiritual
This week: Breaking Bread, Building Community Edited by: Sophy New Year  
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Hi, I'm Sophy New Year ~ your editor for this edition of the Spiritual Newsletter.
The Rev. Scotty McLennan, author of the book Finding Your Religion, compares humanity's innate need for spiritual searching to climbing a mountain. In his view, we are all endeavoring to climb the same figurative mountain in our search for the divine, we just may take different ways to get there. In other words, there is one "God," but many paths. I honor whatever path or paths you have chosen to climb that mountain in your quest for the Sacred.  |
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Breaking Bread, Building Community
Cakes and Ale, Lammas, Agape Meal, Bread Dance, the Eucharist, Passover Seder, Iftar, a Pooja Meal; by whatever name it is called, breaking bread or sharing a meal together is a common ritual across spiritual traditions. All religions, races, and communities, in all places around the world, break bread together as a symbol of hospitality, love, gratitude and community. Here are some examples:
Bread and wine have long been used in Jewish religious practices, which formed the foundation of their use in Christianity. The most common of these is the Shabbat ritual, during which bread and wine are blessed and received as gifts from the bountiful earth provided by God, harkening back to the manna from heaven from the Exodus story. A ritual cup of wine is filled and blessed. Later two loaves of challah bread are placed on the table, uncovered, and blessed. This bread represents the double portion of manna the Israelites were able to gather in the desert while fleeing Egypt, as recounted in Exodus, so they would have enough for the Sabbath without having to gather any that day. The blessing praises God for bringing forth bread from the earth, again using it as a symbol of all food. More ritual is mandated before and after the consumption of bread than any other part of daily life. “In Judaism, bread symbolizes joy, gathering and faith, abject trust in God, ultimate redemption and an absence of arrogance. The fluffy, yeast-risen challah that many Jews eat at every Friday dinner and every Saturday lunch to commemorate the weekly Sabbath is a generations-long tradition of bread baking — grandparents to grandchildren, parents to children— as a way of tangibly observing the rituals of a Jewish life.” (Golodner – The Flavors of Faith: Holy Breads)
Christians share the bread and cup of communion during worship services. The sharing of bread and cup is central to my spiritual community’s worship. It began in the ministry of Jesus, who, in a society marked by rigid social separations invited all sorts of people to be reconciled to God and to each other around the supper table. We, who are many and diverse, also become one Community as we share one loaf. In other Christian congregations, the "communion" meal is more traditionally experienced as a remembrance of Jesus' sacrifice and death, commemorating his life and ministry which ended with the cross.
Muslims practice fasting during Ramadan, and break the fast at sunset with a meal called the Iftar. The fast is typically broken with dates and either water or a yogurt drink. After maghrib prayer, they may share a meal. Iftar can be a social event, involving family and community members, or just a friend or two. It is common for people to host others for dinner, or gather as a community for a potluck. It is also common for people to invite and share food with those less fortunate, as the spiritual reward for charitable giving is especially significant during Ramadan.
These are just a few of the ways the breaking of bread, the sharing of a common meal, are part of a vast array of religious and spiritual traditions. In addition to the spiritual aspect of sharing a meal, there is a physiological component to it as well. An important neurotransmitter involved in our relationship to food is Oxytocin. You have probably heard of it commonly referred to as “the bonding chemical” as it creates and maintains a chemical connection between individuals. Oxytocin is released by a mother and child while breastfeeding, when a human and their dog look into each other’s eyes, when two people hug each other. It is also released when herd animals eat together. We humans function in community, in tribes, in nations, in teams, in religions, in groups; in herds. For creatures that depend on being part of a group for safety, food and survival, it makes sense that evolution created Oxytocin as a mechanism to form community.
There are so many spiritual aspects of breaking bread together, whether in a religious or non-religious setting. When we share a meal, we remember events and people from the past, we celebrate our common heritage, we feel gratitude for our sustenance, we connect to the earth (the source of our food) – perhaps we even connect to a higher power. We also chemically form bonds with the people around us. This is nourishment so profound it cannot be expressed in grams of protein, antioxidant values, or calories – it is a much deeper dimension, a deeper meaning, a deeper feeling and even a deeper healing.
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Below you'll find some spiritual offerings from other WDC members. Please let the folks know if you read their piece by leaving a thoughtful comment or review. I realize I post mostly poems, but that is because it is tough to find other types of spiritual writing on the site (most are poems). If you have something you would like me to highlight, please do share it with me, thanks!
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Here is a response to my last newsletter "Spiritual Newsletter (July 27, 2016)" about What Your Legacy Will Be:
From THANKFUL SONALI back on Jan 4 
My Mom wrote a 'moral will'. She left behind SO many papers, I'll have to search a lot to find it! In the meantime, here is what I wrote to her: "To Mom, C/O God" .
Thank you for sharing this - I have heard of "ethical" wills too, wonder if they are similar?
      
From Quick-Quill 
I want my eulogy to read "She was a good Christian mother, taught her kids right from wrong and what to do to make heaven their eternal home. A loving wife and loved a good story, both to read and write. As a author she knew how to hook a reader and keep them hooked to the end of the story.
Thats the legacy I want people to remember me by. Not much but its my priority.
Lots of great things to aim for with this - good luck!
From Vaughan Jones - ONE Scribe 
The legacy that I'd love to leave is my discovery of the religious fallacies that prevail in the world, put in place by the "powers that be", to control us, the truth in the oneness of being in the physical sense with mother nature and the Uiverse, i.e. our actual life state being that of spirit - our original source being - not physical. Raising my fellow humankind to look at the truth and not at the illusions set in place for us.
An interesting endeavor ... 
From: Jay O'Toole 
Thank you for posting my poem, Sophie!
Poetry has been a great release for me over the years, especially through the uncertainties of the teen years and the many uncertainties, that we face, even as adults.
The Lord Jesus Christ has been my greatest strength, my greatest Friend and my greatest Guide throughout life. (I don't wish to ever push my beliefs on anyone else, but these beliefs certainly have been of inestimable value to me.) He has been The Rock for me in a life of many uncertainties.
Many organized Christian churches leave me cold, but I certainly respect others, who gain great benefit inside of those walls. To me a relationship with Jesus is more important than four walls. That is one relationship I cherish with my whole heart.
A copy of the King James Bible was presented to me at age six with my name inscribed in silver on the front cover. That gave it a new level of significance for me. The poetic ways of wording the message in the KJV have always been a great source of inspiration to me.
Thank you for sharing!
Please keep your comments and suggestions coming! Until next time! Sophy New Year |
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Spiritual: August 24, 2016 Issue [#7817]
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