Julia wrote:
>> Kinda like the Methodists using grape juice for Eucharist instead of wine?
Marvin wrote:
>I'm not sure--was the grape juice decision a response to a shortage of
>wine?
It wasn't when I've experienced it in a Catholic ceremony at least a few
times.
>I thought it was a concession to the tee-totalling faction of
>Christianity which holds that any alcohol, even for eucharistic purposes,
>is to be avoided...which in my opinion *is* ironic, because it seems to
>takes the attitude that says, "Ok, wine was good enough for Jesus, but
>we've got to be better than that." :-/
Yeah, a faction whose arguments sound pretty much like how their arguments
sounded 60 or 80 years ago. Of course, I did hear someone claim that the
alcoholic content in any wine that old Jesus was drinking was not that high
. . . that it would have only been sorta-kinda-a-little-fermented grape
juice . . . but verisimilitude was not the thing I saw being pursued.
Usually, when grape juice was used instead of wine, it was because it was
all kids under ten or twelve having Eucharist. By junior high school it was
regularly wine, and my reaction the first time I drank that Eucharistic
wine might also indicate why in our case it was exchanged for younger kids:
I swallowed it, but I made a face because it tasted NASTY to my
unaccustomed palate, and I could very easily have spat it out from surprise
if I'd been younger or more impulsive.
But I think that's different from the Methodists, if they use grape juice
in ALL ceremonies.
Gord
