{"id":38395,"date":"2017-10-04T15:57:50","date_gmt":"2017-10-04T20:57:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/?p=38395"},"modified":"2017-10-06T11:24:58","modified_gmt":"2017-10-06T16:24:58","slug":"eucharist-or-eucharistic-considering-dinner-church","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/2017\/10\/04\/eucharist-or-eucharistic-considering-dinner-church\/","title":{"rendered":"Eucharist or Eucharistic?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A few weeks ago, with the start of a new semester (and academic year), I had the students in my Introduction to Christian Worship class fill out 3 x 5 cards with information about themselves so that my teaching assistant and I might know them better. The last question that I asked was, \u201cWhy are you in this class\u201d? Besides the obvious, \u201cIt\u2019s required for my degree program,\u201d I had two students respond with \u201cSo\u00a0I can learn more about dinner church.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-38399 aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/1333864_orig.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"270\" height=\"152\" \/><\/p>\n<p>I must admit that I knew vaguely about \u201cdinner church,\u201d also known as \u201cdinner party church.\u201d To address the students\u2019 interest in some fashion, it was clear that I needed to do some homework. Fortunately, the internet is abuzz with examples of Christian communities around the world engaging in this practice, from St. Lydia\u2019s (affiliated with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America) in Brooklyn, NY, the generally acknowledged founder of \u201cdinner church\u201d and the newer \u201cwaffle church\u201d (<a href=\"http:\/\/stlydias.org\/worship\/\" rel=\"nofollow\">http:\/\/stlydias.org\/worship\/<\/a>), to more recent experiments. In most cases, these meal practices intentionally include the observance of the eucharist.<\/p>\n<p>St. Lydia\u2019s leadership designed the worship-centered meal to imitate what they believed to be early Christian practice. \u201cWe bless our meal with the earliest known Eucharistic Prayer called the Didache, drawn from the second century. Our pastor . . . chants the prayer. The congregation sings a response during the blessing, then shares the bread saying, \u2018This is my body\u2019\u201d (<a href=\"http:\/\/stlydias.org\/worship\/dinner-church\/\" rel=\"nofollow\">http:\/\/stlydias.org\/worship\/dinner-church\/<\/a>).<\/p>\n<p>Other dinner churches are more casual. Paul Nixon of The Epicenter Group and author of <em>Weird Church<\/em> (Pilgrim Press, 2016) notes that in some cases there is only the \u201csubtlety of symbolic act.\u201d He contends that \u201c[i]f there are no words spoken, it isn\u2019t technically Communion for the liturgy police at denominational headquarters\u2014and so it\u2019s legal in every tradition, with or without clergy. And yet the symbols are so powerful, that once we are in on the meanings, how necessary are words? Who is to keep Communion from happening?\u201d (<a href=\"http:\/\/epicentergroup.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/WHAT-IS-DINNER-CHURCH-1.pdf\" rel=\"nofollow\">http:\/\/epicentergroup.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/WHAT-IS-DINNER-CHURCH-1.pdf<\/a>).<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-38400\" src=\"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/dinnerchurch-may15-web.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"527\" height=\"351\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Closer to home for me, a United Methodist church plant in Grafton, MA, called \u201cSimple Church,\u201d operates on a dinner church model, though it is looking to expand its offerings with \u201cpancake church\u201d to be intentionally invitation to children and \u201cpizza church\u201d for youth. The church\u2019s leadership, which borrows or rents sites for its gatherings, currently seeks to establish affiliate \u201cSimple\u201d churches that utilize the conceptual and liturgical resources of the Grafton community.<\/p>\n<p>Simple Church defines itself as a \u201ceucharistic community\u201d since its worship is built around the \u201ceucharist ceremony,\u201d which is \u201cintended to be a radically participatory act of thanksgiving where we recognize our unity in Christ and the gift of creation through communal acts of worship, conversation, and eating good locally grown food.\u201d The first part of the eucharistic ritual consists of a brief rehearsal of the \u201cbread\u201d portion of the institution narrative followed by the passing of bread to each person with the words, \u201cThis is my body, this is our body.\u201d The action then shifts to the several tables where those in attendance sit to eat bread and hot soup. One of the leaders reads a passage from the Bible and encourages conversation on the scripture reading for the day at each table. Then, after singing together, a leader recounts the \u201ccup\u201d portion of the institution narrative. A cup is passed with the words, \u201cthe cup of forgiveness,\u201d and individual glasses are filled. Glasses are raised together in a toast with the word, \u201cThanks.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>For those of us sympathetic to the \u201cliturgy police,\u201d this may seem less eucharist and more eucharistic, less sacramental meal and more fellowship meal. Undoubtedly, those who lead and participate in dinner church see this as the \u201creal thing.\u201d What do you think?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Considering &#8220;Dinner Church&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":75,"featured_media":38406,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3117,1081,19,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-38395","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-new-scholarship-new-ws","category-church-reform","category-mass","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Eucharist or Eucharistic? - Home<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/2017\/10\/04\/eucharist-or-eucharistic-considering-dinner-church\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Eucharist or Eucharistic? 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