Mars Hill Communion: Lip-Service Via Metaphor

This season especially, I'm reminded of the dual nature of 'Christianity' (or of 'the young church-planters' lip-service paid to Catholic sacraments').

Two Types of Church-Members: The Ignorant and the Stupid (Tamer: the Unschooled and the Educated)

The Ignorant are they whom Santa Claus serves. Nothing wrong with being ignorant, as long as your are '-gnorant' enough to live the way you want to.

The message that I want to give to they who do not dig for the truth--they for whom I am willing to dig up the truth (as so many other MythMen are willing)--is this: the very words you hear about supernatural things are not to be repeated (except maybe in church).

I know that the Bible says Jesus 'commanded his disciples to go out and make disciples of all men,' but as he lived he constantly told people 'to NOT report his miracles to others'—because 'one does not "test" one's God,' (which 'reporting him to others' would have done, as the people would begin to think of him as a miracle-machine).

Failure to correctly apply those two teachings ('Secrecy' and 'Mission') is what causes me to call "the Educated" (i.e. the grown-ups) 'The Stupid.'

Oh! Turn On the Light AFTER You Put In the Bulb!...

Telling new minds of 'the supernatural' without implying the secrecy is like handing them all loaded guns and then--without any warning--telling them to 'go and play.' (Well, not such severe consequences, but sort of the same effect on the bodies of their souls.)

But it turns out that the common Catholic church isn't that much better. I'm thinking specifically of two of its sacraments: Communion and Confirmation.

Catholic Confirmation is the ritual one goes through to become a 'certified' Catholic. It's said to be 'when you learn the truth behind The Truth,' but I don't see it.

The misunderstanding that sparked the flame (on the pile of firewood that Mars Hill has been building) was 'the reason for Christmas' which the priest gave the children at a Christmas-mass this year. I'm not angry about it; I just feel that its focus is slightly-misplaced: the priest said that 'Christmas is celebrating the gift of Jesus from God,' as if Jesus were sent UPS-International to the manger from Hank-Williams-Jr.-in-the-Sky.

God Sends Nothing Direct

God didn't 'deliver sin unto Adam and Eve'; Adam and Eve reached beyond limits God set, and so were flushed like the refuse they were willing to ingest—just as you end up flushing Christmas dinner (though some of that undigested stuffing might still be good!)

But some of that 'undigested stuffing,' becoming cognizant of its creation-status, built itself up and provided us with a good example of "staying true to yourself despite more-powerful falsifying-factors" and "letting the powerful do what's right-by-them."

That's what Christmas celebrates: the birth of 'soon-to-be-cognizant dumpster-stuff' ... a celebration of the idea that divine masterpieces can start small.

But divine masterpieces are a lot of work—both for their constructors and their future-owners. That brings me back to Communion and Mars Hill's lip-service.

Reliving the Sacrifice, Renewing the Covenant

In Jesus's day, meals were the only real "contracts"—words spoken over salt were parts of a pledge signed by ingestion.

So, many "Bible Christians" take Communion's "do this in memory of me" as sort of a 'think about me while you eat this and drink this'; but it's more than that, as we can see reviewing its actual meaning.

Reading the above link, you can see that it's not 'remember me when you do this,' it's "offer yourself as I do"—contract renewed.

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