Not Having Communion “Too Often”
In many Christian traditions, the Eucharist is celebrated at least weekly. Fundamentalists, on the other hand, celebrate the Lord’s table with about the same frequency that they change their oil.
The basic idea behind these long spaces of time is the notion that having the Lord’s Supper too often will remove the specialness of it and cause Christians to treat it with the same flippancy as everything else they do during a normal church service. It is unclear whether the frequent repetition of other activities such as offerings, sermons, or telling your children you love them also makes them mundane and unappreciated.
There is some variance between different fundy churches in this matter. The frequency can vary between monthly, quarterly, bi-annually, and “Whenever the Pastor feels the Spirit move and gets a hankering for matzah and Welch’s.” Who needs all that self-examination and remembrance anyway?
If you believe that saying grace over every meal (including the bag of popcorn you consume while watching The Sound of Music) is always meaningful but also think that having Communion once a week will trivialize its practice — you might be a fundamentalist.
Posted by Darrell
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Always bugged me. Still does. Then again, I’m still stuck with it. (for now)
It is messed up though, how it’s looked upon as something we “don’t need to do that often.” Despite it being Scriptural (Mark 14:24 and 1 Cor 11:24 TR [yes the TR]), it’s still avoided, as it is seen to be Roman Catholic influenced to do such! Since ya know, the RCC apparently came up with this whole fandangled idea…or not quite.
I meant on the Eucharist being Scriptural and so on. My bad. Hope that made sense…
Epic LOLs! One of your most incisive posts yet.
Yup
Well put! Somehow taking weekly offerings didn’t detract from the “specialness” of it. Weekly communion, along with the self-examination, confession of sin, and assurance of pardon, definitely rates as one of the things I love best about the church I go to now!
It never really bothered me…
Maybe because I’m a horrible Christian and don’t pray before I eat, right after I wake up in the morning, or right before I go to sleep, etc.
(I’m not attacking people who do this, only the belief that these things are necessary for my salvation. I write my prayers in my journal.)
This could also be caused by preachers wanting to recycle their sermons. We have communion monthly and he themes the message for that day around it. I bring a notebook and take notes, so I know he recycles a lot of stuff. If he did that every week more people would notice.
In the church I grew up in, we usually paired communion with “feet washing” afterwards. Talk about awkward. Was that just a southern thing?
How about not understanding Communion as covenant renewal? This is a total non concept in IFB circles.
Bravo, Lizzy F. Writing your prayers in a journal is a great idea.
I keep a prayer journal sometimes, especially if I’m going through a struggle.
Does it really matter how often a church has communion? I don’t know how many churches do this, but after the sermon and before communion, my pastor always explains from the Bible the importance of communion. I learned a lot that I never knew about how serious communion is. I’ve never heard that it was done infrequently for a specific reason.
I think the main reason is not wanting to be like the Catholics.
ding ding ding!!! We have a winner!
Anyone know where this trend started? Obviously, the tendency to avoid being like Catholics in every respect possible is especially pronounced in fundyland, but Communion was still a huge deal to the Reformers and the churches they started.
I love how they “take the Bible literally”, except when it says “wine”, in which case exegetic acrobatics must be performed to render the meaning of “wine” as “grape juice”.
Woo my PCA church that had communion every week… you know, like it was… important or something…
That’s one thing I loved about Mass. The Eucharist was the centerpiece of the service, just like Christ’s sacrifice is the center of our worship. Imagine my shock when I found that a lot of Protestants treat it the same way!
I am very surprised that some Baptists only take communion once a year at a special service. The fundy church in my town had a special Tuesday night service for communion. I think they had it on Tuesday so that no stray outsiders might be tempted to attend that night’s service.
I attended a church where the pastor only allowed communion once or twice a year for that very reason. He chose to offer it on New Year’s Eve at midnight, and on “Resurrection” Sunday (can’t say Easter there) at the evening service.