At First Christian Church, we celebrate the radical love of Jesus Christ by having a radically open communion table. This means that everyone – without exception – is invited to participate in the sharing of Communion (also called The Lord’s Supper or Eucharist).
This “open table” approach is born out of a desire to follow the example of Jesus Christ who offered grace to all who sought it without first asking them to make any declaration of allegiance or faith and without first demanding any action such as baptism. It was after this initial point of grace that Jesus made calls to deeper allegiance, faith, and ritual actions.
Likewise, we see communion as a point of grace for anyone who is seeking to experience the grace of Christ and we will welcome anyone – ANYONE – who desires that grace.
At our communion table, all means all.
Parents and caregivers of young children, you are more than welcome to include your child in the celebration of communion, but the choice to do so or not is up to you. If you do, we encourage you to offer simple words to explain an important aspect of the meal such as, “This bread and juice remind us that Jesus loves us very much.”
We recently asked some members of our community to describe what the open table means to them and to the world beyond our doors. Take a look at the video below to see what they said…