Unfortunately (that's not an appropriate phrase because this has nothing to do with fortune and all to do with laziness, but i digress) i have not written this post yet. Which is also not an appropriate phrase as by the time anyone is reading it that statement will be false. So if a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to hear it does it make a sound? Or if a blogger makes a statement, which is invalidated once it is read does the time-line apply to the blogger or the reader? Perhaps we should just pretend this entire first paragraph never happened.
The point is that some of my ardor over this subject has waned, from the time that i originally plotted this entry. So perhaps as you read it, you could supply a touch of fervor from your end?
(That might be the most ludicrous introduction to a serious post i've ever written by the way.)
Last Saturday i attended a wedding. The ceremony in and of itself was quite nice overall. The bride and groom were delightfully (slightly nauseatingly) in love (there were frequent mini make-out sessions during the reception). i had a date to the reception (two actually) in the form of a marvelously down to earth girlfriend and her adorable four year old son (age is estimated cuteness is not). We sat with another high school friend and her husband and son during the reception. There was dancing and food, and i realized that either i am older than i once was or the macarena has lengthened through the years (i blame the high heeled boots).
There were no stressing calls from home. It was a bit of a struggle not to obsessively check on things, but i managed to let go and let God for most of the night and things were fine. (Control freak who has trouble believing that the world is okay if i leave for an evening, me? Never..... okay, yeah that's totally me. Sorry God. Thanks for forgiving me.)
The high school girlfriend told me i looked nice, and i believe her.
Overall it was a very good evening, with only a few things marring it (one of which is the theme of this post).
The first was the fact that a few of my dresses were suddenly too fitting on me (sigh must start exercising) so i played the part of Tasmanian woman donning and doffing clothing frantically in the few minutes before (and a few minutes after) my dates arrived.
Another was the fact that they took communion at the wedding.
Now it's confession time- during the ceremony i was being pretty heavily convicted.
See, i had spent some time prior to the event kind of judging the bride and groom. It was a hasty seeming wedding; they'd only known each other since the spring. The bride was divorced and had told me at one point in the past that she didn't believe that divorced people should remarry. To be honest i hadn't met the groom and didn't know the proposal story, and i resented the fact that my numerous phone calls to talk to her and find out what was going on between the Facebook engagement announcement and the actual wedding had been for the most part neither answered nor returned.
So during the ceremony, i looked at this couple getting married, and felt horribly guilty because i, as her friend and attendant at her ceremony, had been judging them. i sat in my pew seat and prayed in apology.
Suddenly, they announced that they would be taking communion and that they wanted all of us to as well. The pastor announced that in the Methodist church anyone who knew Jesus could take communion.
Now yes, i also believe that if you know Jesus you can take communion. Also, i get the symbolism of the ceremony and have seen it done beautifully in at least one prior wedding.
There was a difference this time however. This time, i was one of the people sitting in the pew panicking because i wasn't comfortable doing it but felt like there was no choice. This got me thinking about how many other people there likely were in that church feeling the same way.
i didn't want to take it for a few reasons. For one, i've heard pastors repeatedly charge us not to take communion unworthily. There's a Bible passage about not making an offering without first making things right with your brother. There i was sitting in the pew feeling i had wronged two good friends of mine, and now they were asking me to take communion with them. Secondly, there was another reason i did not feel right taking it (which i won't get into here). Regardless, i sat there squirming.
My date whispered next to me, asking if i was going up. i responded that i didn't think we had a choice. She also appeared reticent. Later she told me that she was Catholic, and had not gone to confession.
We were only two people there, and i am certain we were not alone. In the end, this certainty was proved when the girl next to my friend told us she was not going up and we could go around her. That gave us the courage to stay put as well. We became the awkward half a pew who didn't go forward, as opposed to the one person- and there was strength and solidarity in the group rebellion.
After this experience i really thought about the subject. Had the pastor made the caveat aloud, stating that if you were not comfortable you could remain in the pew, perhaps the pressure would have been alleviated. Should i ever get married however, it is my firm belief that i will opt not to observe the ritual at all.
What is beautiful and meaningful for the bride and groom has the potential to be humiliating and uncomfortable for the observers. To admit in such a situation that you do not want to go up is to insinuate that you don't know God, or to make yourself stand out. Now i know that isn't the intent, but having been the one uncomfortable i realized that this could be the reality. Peer pressure may drive them to violate their consciences.
Neither should those who aren't Christians be partaking in this Christian ritual. It has the potential to offend the beliefs of those who feel it should be offered only to a select group, from both sides.
Those are my thoughts- perhaps scattered as they may be. What do you think- am i over-thinking things.
Please no one be offended by these ruminations. It's just my musings.
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