What is wrong in christian church. Is the sacramental bread or host used in the eucharist holy?

Where is a big point of things that are stupid and very bad in the church. Where do we understand Jesus wrong.

Is the sacramental bread holy? And how deeds weight more then holy items.

This year(15) is seemingly a strong year for tiny grashoppers. There is always a few types of insects who have a strong year. Insects come in cycles. I do not mean an overpopulation, I just mean that there are more grashoppers then usual of a certain type of grashoppers, very small ones or I don’t know, it might also be a little fly or something I only see there is a type of small insects this year that jumps away only a small distance or flies away only a small distance when you put your hand over the ground. Whatever they are, they want to live. Just as we want to live and God wants them to live and experience life. So they are also included into the things we have to protect and care for. That is our task.

So now some people that I know want to mow the lawn. And whatever much I ask them not to do it their only and ever repeated argument is “The lawn has to be mowed”.  For these grashopper insects this means death because they are not able to fly away. And even though I can live with mowing the lawn usually it is not right in a year that is the year of animals that can not fly away. In other years the animals will fly away when the mower comes but these animals just can’t. so it is just this special year and only these three month of summer that really forbid mowing the lawn.

But these friends of mine take an asthetic pleasure in the lawn if it is neatly cut. And they do not admit it to themselves but they put this asthetic pleasure over the lives of these hundreds of tiny creatures. But I say the pleasure of giving these small animals room to live is greater then the asthetic pleasure. The reward you get from God for taking care for them is much bigger because God takes more pleasure in these animals then in a neatly cut lawn. It is as Jesus said take your talents, a talent was a coin in Jesus times, so he actually said: take your coins(or riches) that you have gotten from God and multiply them. He wants us fo make fruitfull that what God has given us. In in this case we have the lawn that the grasshoppers need to live and we can give them life. But that is only if we decide not to waste these talents for our own pleasure.

And now we come to the christian church. There is a major point where the christian church is on the brink of going wrong and acting stupid. One of the most holy things in christian church are pieces of bread given out to the community. This is, or should be a symbol of giving. Giving bread to things means giving life. Giving an opportunity to live. A very strong and beautiful symbol. And following this idea of giving room to live to others is absolutely what we have to do to come to heaven (nirvana, jannah). It is the idea of making our riches fruitfull in the way God (Ishvara, Allah) wants it. So what God wants us to do is that we make our riches fruitfull by using them to give live, give room to live.

If your life is in danger because you starve then the decision not to kill a duck for example is a difficult thing because in that situation your godgiven life depends on killing the duck. But in the case of the grashoppers all you have to overcome is your craving for asthetic pleasure. That is nothing that you depend on to live but for the graoshoppers it is life or dead. so in this case you are sacrificing hundreds of little creatures for very little asthetic pleasure. That is wasting your talents or riches. Because you do not make them fruitfull to give room to live but instead use them all for yourself. so the real pleasure would come from taking the garden that God gave you and using it to give room to other creatures of God. And this is also an acting that brings you closer to God.  It is a beautiful present to give. And since it is so easy to do for we are not in danger in this situation it is an easy bread to give. If giving something comes at such a low price take it. If it is so cheap to give something take the opportunity to give it.

A tabernacle, a shrine for the host or altar bread. The holy bread in christianity.

This is a carriing device to carry the holy bread on processions. Looks very impressive but don’t be decieved the holy bread is not holy compared to your neighbour or the doing of caring things.

That is what the bread in church should be the symbol for. Giving live, giving food, giving room, giving possibilities to be more caring because doing these things is the way to God. But this is not always done in the christian church. And that is where the church can easily go wrong. In the church they sometimes really think that the bread itself is holy. They think that if the priest speaks a certain formula of words in this moment the bread changes and becomes a holy thing. And they go to great length of treating this holy piece of bread with all necessary solemnes. It is put into golden dishes, and a shrine that is made for the purpose of containing the holy bread. This “holy” bread is called host or altar bread, the shrine for containing the bread is called tabernacle and on christian processions you can see them carrying one of these pieces of bread in a golden carrying shrine called the monstrance or ostensory. So I’m not making this up, they really bow afore a piece of bread as soon as a priest spoke the holy words over this bread. And they believe that the bread becomes a part of Jesus christ himself and that if you eat this special bread that you come closer to God with eating it. Ah well. Why do they believe that? Because Jesus gave out bread to his deciples and asked them to eat it and said to them “this is my body”. And then he gave wine out to them and asked them to drink of it and said then “this is my blood”. And also around this time he asked them to repeat this in order to celebrate the memory of him. So now in church the priests and bishops live by the rule that if a priest speaks this story the bread in front of him is cahnged and becomes a part of Jesus and that if you then eat the changed bread that you become more holy. But it is not in the eating of magic bread that you become holy. It is the “giving of bread”, the giving of room to live, the giving of help and comfort that makes you holy. These steps make you come closer to God (Allah or Ishvara). So if you eat the altar bread but then go home and deny the grashoppers to use your ground to live because you want some asthetic pleasure for yourself then this is wrong. So let the giving out of bread be a symbol to you. A beautiful symbol but yet only a symbol. For it is giving with which you take part in God. I see that people really want to have holy items and if the bread in church would not serve this purpose then they would go and take some other items like whatever beautiful stones or statues or something. But the point is you do not really depend on these things because the truth that you are going to is much higher and also very secure. So we like to have “holy items” and for fun this is ok, but it may never be misunderstood as being something really holy. Actions, actions can be really holy.

An image by Poussin that show idolaters praising an idol in form of a bull in biblical times.

In the Bible there is over and over talk of a type of religious practice that is very wrong. And that is if you do not do the will of God or Allah but instead praise a statue. This is called idolatry or idolism and the statue is called idol or tin god. So Idolatry is giving praise to a symbol or statue instead of honoring the ways that you should life by. This is named over and over again as a typical but wrong type of religion. So if you praise a bread as godlike or holy but on the other hand do not honour the ways of good living through caring for your neighbours and giving them room to live, then this becomes idolatry. So the living creature should be honoured, and not a piece of bread. For some christians might believe that the host, the consecrated wafer that is given out in the eucharist, the celebration of giving out holy bread, some will believe that this bread is more worth then an insect because they think the host bread is a part of God but this is shurly not true in this way. The living creature is of more worth then the piece of bread. And it is the neighbouring creature that you have to bow afore instead of bowing afore a bit of bread. Otherwise it would be idolatry.

So I started with grashoppers or insects but the main message is first that you have to be there for the things around you and especially when it costs you nearly nothing. And second however holy a golden shrine might look and however much we wish to have the feeling that a thing that we hold is something really precious don’t be decieved. The chance to give to others, helping them, investing time, making them comfortable and make it easy for them to be caring themselves this is the precious thing. Not a bread not a shrine not an altar. The only really holy and precious thing is the neighbour or animal or nature and deeds of being caring. So don’t be impressed to much by things that look really precious and go for the really precious thing.

So if you see christians on a procession carring a piece of bread in front of them in a precious golden device. You may join the procession because the message of cristianity is generally a good one. But understand it as a symbol. And do not make the bread your idol, instead bow afore your neighbour and neighobouring creatures. The same is true if you see a statue of Buddha or the Kaba shrine in Mekka.

It is a good thing to give out this bread in church. There are some other aspects that make this giving out of bread a good thing which I don’t want to talk about right now. But in general hold the neighbouring life and caring deeds as more holy. And you should not use the rule that only who is part of the church is allowed to eat the host bread. Everybody should be invited to this bread.