Keeping the Feast: Metaphors for the Meal

by Milton Brasher-Cunningham, Sara Miles (Foreword by)

Overview

Accessible spiritual narratives of the meal as Communion, plus recipes, by a well-known blogger, widely-traveled musician, and retreat leader "This is a book about what nourishes us: food, faith, family, and friends, and how all of those elements are essential ingredients of Communion-in fact how every meal of our lives holds an invitation to the Sacred Meal. As I say in the opening chapter, 'What the Gospel writers don't seem to scrimp on are stories of Jesus eating, or at least stories about Jesus and food. He eats, feeds, talks about food, and even calls himself the Bread of Life, right down to that last night in the Upper Room...where they sat around the table and he wrapped it all up with a meal—The Meal—as his ultimate metaphor.'"
—from the Introduction

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780819227898
Publisher:	Church Publishing, Incorporated
Publication date:	09/01/2012
Pages:	144
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 8.90(h) x 0.40(d)

About the Author

MILTON BRASHER-CUNNINGHAM is a writer, editor, chef, teacher, United Church of Christ minister, gardener, musician, husband, and keeper of Schnauzers, who lives with his wife, Ginger (also a United Church of Christ minister), in Guilford, Connecticut.

Sara Miles is a reporter and editor who lives in San Francisco. She is a contributing writer for Outmagazine, and a freelance contributing editor to magazines including "The Nation", "The New Yorker", and "Wired".

Table of Contents

Foreword Sara Miles vii

Acknowledgments xi

Preface: Come to My Window xv

Introduction: Family Dinner 1

Signature Dish 7

Ripple Effect 19

Daily Bread 31

Cooking Line 43

Soup Kitchen 57

Mile Markers 71

Striking Out 83

Comfort Food 97

Defining Moment 107

Afterword: What the Food Becomes

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

"Michael Pollan, Wendell Berry and Alice Waters, among many others, show us how central food is to our identity and culture, but it took Keeping the Feast by Milton Brasher-Cunningham to remind me what food is to the life, ministry, and even the enduring presence of Christ in the world."
—M. Morford, Books

“Food,
the church, and great writing. Can one ask for anything more? Milton has written my favorite book of this past year.”

—
Bill Kinnon, writer, blogger, television director

“If you’re lucky enough to know Milton Brasher-Cunningham, you’ll know what a miracle he concocts at his kitchen table. This book is the literary version of such a lovely banquet. It is full of grace, generosity, and thoughtfulness about the spirituality of eating. More than that—Keeping the Feast grants us access to the deep memory of what it is to be human community, made in the image of God, one meal at a time. This is a deeply satisfying recipe.”

—
Gareth Higgins, writer, peace activist, and Wild Goose Festival executive director

“As
Milton Brasher-Cunningham knows, and tells beautifully in this book, practice isn’t a solitary business. You can’t have a restaurant, or a church, alone. You need to stand the heat with other people, listen to other people weep, let other people pop fresh strawberries or little pieces of communion bread into your mouth. And doing this takes practice, too. Sometimes you need to spatter your sauté guy with hot grease and step on your organist’s toes and say sorry; sometimes you need to let the dishwasher teach you to poach fish or the teenagers teach you to do scriptural exegesis and say thank you. Always you need to cook for people you don’t know, pray for people you don’t like, and eat with whoever shows up."

—
Sara Miles, author of Take This Bread from the Foreword

Editorial Reviews

"Michael Pollan, Wendell Berry and Alice Waters, among many others, show us how central food is to our identity and culture, but it took Keeping the Feast by Milton Brasher-Cunningham to remind me what food is to the life, ministry, and even the enduring presence of Christ in the world."
—M. Morford, Books

“Food, the church, and great writing. Can one ask for anything more? Milton has written my favorite book of this past year.”

— Bill Kinnon, writer, blogger, television director

“If you’re lucky enough to know Milton Brasher-Cunningham, you’ll know what a miracle he concocts at his kitchen table. This book is the literary version of such a lovely banquet. It is full of grace, generosity, and thoughtfulness about the spirituality of eating. More than that—Keeping the Feast grants us access to the deep memory of what it is to be human community, made in the image of God, one meal at a time. This is a deeply satisfying recipe.”

— Gareth Higgins, writer, peace activist, and Wild Goose Festival executive director

“As Milton Brasher-Cunningham knows, and tells beautifully in this book, practice isn’t a solitary business. You can’t have a restaurant, or a church, alone. You need to stand the heat with other people, listen to other people weep, let other people pop fresh strawberries or little pieces of communion bread into your mouth. And doing this takes practice, too. Sometimes you need to spatter your sauté guy with hot grease and step on your organist’s toes and say sorry; sometimes you need to let the dishwasher teach you to poach fish or the teenagers teach you to do scriptural exegesis and say thank you. Always you need to cook for people you don’t know, pray for people you don’t like, and eat with whoever shows up."

— Sara Miles, author of Take This Bread from the Foreword

From the Publisher