Bridge of Reason

It’s known by different names in different traditions; the Lord’s Table, the Lord’s Supper, the Eucharist, the Breaking of Bread, Holy Communion. Mormons call it ‘the sacrament’ which seems strange since it is a sacrament but, even in Mormonism, it isn’t the only sacrament since they also have baptism, as well as rituals of anointing. In my church we call it communion and I regard it as very precious. I was interested, then, in what the Jehovah’s Witnesses do with it, how they regard it. To Jehovah’s Witnesses it is a ‘Memorial Meal’ and, while Christian churches celebrate this sacrament frequently, Witnesses mark it annually, on the Jewish Passover which, in 2015, will be Friday April 3rd. My wife and I went to one of these celebrations once and saw that when the elements were passed around no one partook. This is because only the 144,000 are regarded as having a heavenly hope and, therefore, only they can partake. But that is not the only thing that is puzzling about this peculia...

  Utah has become the first state in the USA to reinstate the firing squad to administer the death penalty. This is sometimes called fusillading, from the French fusil , rifle. This story has several layers, from the shortage of drugs for lethal injections, to the question of which method of killing a human being is most humane, to that of whether, as European society believes, execution is simply a barbaric throwback we don’t want in the 21st century. It is this last view in Europe that has created the shortage of drugs that European countries refuse to export to America. Fusillading as a form of execution has usually been practiced in a war setting, guns being the most easily available weapon for the job, and being the quickest and most humane method available in the circumstances. In America, apart from the Civil War, for which figures are unavailable, it is estimated that 142 men have been executed by this method since 1608. Utah’s record is most striking. Forty-four exec...

Some deceptions are so obvious as to be audacious, like the Jehovah’s Witness teaching that Jesus returned invisibly in 1914 when he failed to turn up physically, as predicted. Or the Mormon claim that Jesus walked the Americas following his resurrection and spoke to a boy in a grove of trees in 1820. Others are so subtle as to pass you by if you don’t know what you are seeing, what you are hearing. Easter this year of 2015 is the weekend of 3 rd to 5 th April. The March Ensign magazine of the Mormon Church, as you might expect, anticipates Easter, and the momentous events of that first Easter, as will Christian publications around the world. Well, not quite as will Christian publications. The Christian Easter The focus of every Christian on Good Friday is Golgotha, the place where Jesus bore the penalty for the sins of the world, suffered crucifixion, and died. The events surrounding that defining sacrifice are also in mind of course. The Last Supper, at which the new cove...