Spirit of Christ Community and eating and drinking into mission and community!

Jonny Baker speaking on ways into small missional communities talked about eating and drinking together as one way into community among other ways:

“Interesting things can happen when people eat and drink together.”

Each week we gather  to partake of the Body and Blood of Christ as spiritual nourishment to strengthen us for the week ahead.  When I named this blog “Let us break bread together” I  had no idea how much food would play in  my ministry. At Sojourner Truth Ministries we called it Truth Café. Now at Spirit of Christ Catholic Community we gather once a month for a potluck after worship. if someone is not able to bring a dish to share at our potluck, we welcome them to help prepare and we all participate in this setup ,eating, conversation and cleaning up of the area.

Last  Sunday we gathered at Corrina Bakery to talk about what our church means to us and how do we share that message with others.  We discussed the roles that each of us will take on to build our missional community here in Tacoma. We learn about the diverse gifts that our members have to share in the life of our church. We believe that we live a community where there is openness to “Taste and see the goodness of the Lord” in Tacoma

I know that some of our people are not only spiritually hungry, but sometimes physically hungry, we have members for whom the food bank is a necessary safety net. Despite this our community gathers food to donate to My Sister’s Pantry a local food bank.  We take seriously that all can serve and give to worship, learn and serve Christ!
Eating together helps builds community and a strong sense of church as the Body of Christ. We gather to break bread together over laughter, discussions on church and community and our mission. We are exploring the idea of  having a monthly Café on a week night with art, music, prayer and  community as a extension of our communion table.  The greatest blessing is that after a liturgy focused on the presence of Christ in bread and wine, we don’t rush away from worship back to our isolated lives,  but spend time basking in the presence of Christ among us.

 

We know that our community is called to be a multi-racial, spirit-filled, radically inclusive, sacramental church here in Tacoma and that we seek to that in a ecumenical manner influence by the World Council of Churches document on Baptism,Eucharist and Ministry. Discerning how our presence might sustain people with spiritual and physical nourishment in a time when so many people live in social isolation.  We are creating a missional community, in which we invite people  who have been been made to feel out of places in other churches to find room at the Table for them at Spirit of Christ Catholic Community.

As you read Jonny’s ways into missional community,know it does not require lots of money  or people to break bread together ,but it does take willingness to get out of the building and be Church in the community.!