0.5. Communion

Going to church was very natural to me. My family went two or three times a week, and skipping church was not an option. Most of my friends went to church too, and so did all of my coworkers when I worked at Camp Wesley Woods, a Methodist church camp.

Most of the kids at camp were Methodist too. But the camp would give scholarships to needy kids outside the church, and we hosted a lot of groups from organizations such as the Boys and Girls Club. Most of them were Christian but many of them had never been to church.

Thomas, though named after an Apostle, was one of those kids. While praying as a group before embarking on a caving adventure or horseback riding, I'd look up to see him glancing around, unaware of what was going on. The rest of the kids, like me, methodically closed their eyes and lowered their heads because it was what they knew to do. The bible lessons confused Thomas. He usually forgot that we had to bless the food before each meal. He was there to ride horses and climb rocks, unaware of the camp's purpose of influencing young people's spiritual lives.

On Thursday nights toward the close of the week, we took communion. To many kids, communion is a part of their normal church service, and though they don't always understand the symbolism, they understand that they are supposed to eat some bread and drink some grape juice and then pray. Like applauding after a concert or speech, it's almost involuntary.

My co-counselor passed out small pinches of bread to each of our campers. I held a small cup of grape juice and followed his lead. "The body of Christ, broken for you." The kids sat in silent reverence, waiting for me to come around with the grape juice to dip the bread in. "The blood of Christ, shed for you." Communion by method of 'intinction' is unfamiliar to some kids but they generally get the idea by looking around and seeing what other people are doing.

Unfortunately, Thomas was first in line. As he received his bread, he promptly stuffed it in his mouth, so that when I came around with the grape juice, he had nothing to dip. He put his hand in the chalice and slowly looked up at me and whispered, "What do I do?" I laughed and pulled his sticky hand out of the juice and moved on to the next camper, but it didn't hit me till later how funny a tradition Communion really is, to someone who has never experienced it before.