The Sacred Meal by Nora Gallagher

I received this book free from booksneeze.com to review.  It is from the Ancient Practices Series, which includes topics such as tithing and fasting, and in this book, Communion.  I recently participated in a Bible study which briefly covered the Last Supper and it so intrigued me that I was very excited to read this book and get more in depth with the significance of modern day communion and how it relates to the Last Supper and ancient Passover.  This book attempted to explain why we take Communion and how it brings us closer to God, went over a brief history of it, and touched on the debate about whether the bread and wine really becomes Jesus' body and blood.  I found the book, quite frankly, disturbing.

This book, purporting to speak of Christ's resurrection and how we are to remember the sacrifice He made, describes some events that were very unsettling to me, and barely speaks about the fact that Christ rose after He died.  There was also very little Bible references, and some of what she said seemed to be even antithetical to Christianity.

Gallagher explains a few Communion experiences she had of feeling nearness to God akin to reaching a higher plane as in Buddhist meditation.  She talks of one time when she celebrated Ramadan with some Islamics, and participated in their standing up, falling to their knees, leaning forward, pressing their foreheads to the floor, rising to their knees and then repeating it.  She says "It was amazing.  It was the most bodily prayer I have ever experienced.  The closest thing I had done to it was during yoga."   Embracing another religion in such a way and feeling 'fed' after speaks to me of an 'all roads lead to heaven' belief, which clearly goes against the Bible.  But besides that, for all this wonder she supposedly experienced then, there is no mention of God or how she felt His presence or drew nearer to Him.  It was simply a feel-good experience.

She also states that "at the altar, we are invited into what Jesus called heaven."  She seems to imply that the bread and wine we partake of have special powers: "I see nothing wrong in the desire for magic; it's who we are" and that the Communion wafer "points to what has been and what can be but also opens your eyes to what is right now.  This will put you in the role of prophet."

Sentences like that left me feeling very disturbed and made me very turned off from the content of this book.