On being bread
While waiting for an exercise class to begin yesterday, I got talking with someone who said she had given up bread for Lent. This is because she especially enjoys bread and hopes that not eating it for a few weeks will help her lose weight. I like bread too, but I'm not giving it up for Lent. Today's prayer/poem at #BigRead14 is called 'Bread' . You can listen to Amy Boucher Pye reading it, or look at the words, or preferably do both. I think poetry needs to be heard as well as silently read. I tried reading it aloud, allowing my gut responses to colour the interpretation. This resulted in a long pause after the first three lines: "Abba Jesus, you ask me to follow. Let me follow you as bread." I think I'd expected the prayer to be about receiving or giving bread. The idea of being bread came as a bit of a shock. "No Jesus, I don't want to follow you as bread" was my initial spontaneous response. Then I avoided thinking about...