"Dinner Church" Is News to Us
Many religions combine faith and food, and church dinners have an extensive tradition in American history, but Dinner Church? That’s new to us.
St. Lydia’s is a Brooklyn place of worship for Progressive Lutheran Christians where dinner isn’t an accent to the main event, it is the main event. Emily Scott, its pastor and founder, has been quietly hosting prayer-centric dinners—meals that double as religious services—in willing New Yorkers’ homes for nearly five years. This spring, though, she will open a ground-level space with a kitchen in Brooklyn. Every meal, from soup to nuts, will center around prayer. Below, Scott gives us the details.
What’s the history of church dinners?
This was an original church practice in the Christian tradition. For four centuries Christians gathered to share a meal. There was definitely prayer over bread, prayer over a cup. We’re picking up a very early tradition, not reinventing it, but maybe reinterpreting it for 21st century context.
What inspired you to start Dinner Church?
My colleague and friend Rachel [Pollack] was the one who coined that term. I moved here for a job in 2007, and was just trying to make friends. I needed to get to know more people and create a network for myself. I worked in a church. Some people who I spoke to who were like, “Oh, cool, tell me more about that.” I hadn’t found a faith community here. I started inviting people over to my house… and realizing there was such a craving for home-cooked food. All over the United States, we’ve lost that practice of sharing a meal.
Who is welcome?
Everybody. We are welcoming especially of LGBTQ people. It’s a table where people from all different walks of life come together. People of other faiths are welcome. It’s first and foremost about sharing a meal.
How does it work?
Everybody who comes to St. Lydia’s takes part in getting ready for the meal. Getting napkins or setting the table, it’s like going over to somebody’s house for Thanksgiving dinner. It’s kind of a way of being hospitable. We have a different lead cook for each week. They decide what they want to cook, and our community coordinator makes sure they have groceries.
What do you eat?
All our meals are vegetarian, which is an effort to accommodate as many people as possible. We’re getting pretty good, I think, at gluten-free and dairy-free. Last night we had a simple root vegetable soup and hearty bread. It tends to be pretty seasonal, so we’ll have big salads in the summer. One cook, in the autumn, especially, he cooks lots of things that have dried fruit. It’s aways really delicious. Another person brought an African stew with sweet potato and peanut sauce. There’s a lot of variety in what people make. There’s one woman from Iran; she and her mom make Persian food.
Do people notice or talk about the food?
New York has a real foodie culture, and my sense is that we’re gathering around the community, and not necessarily around the food. The food creates the platform for people to connect. The food itself is not fetishized. It’s not about getting really intense about mushrooms! It’s about what’s happening around the table as opposed to what’s happening on the table.
What’s the structure of the night?
People like [to] come early and cook in the kitchen, hang out with people. That’s kind of the beginning of the service; that’s quite lively. We have an opening song and prayer, with music, done in kind of a removed area. We sing some more, and people are lighting candles [on the table]. It’s a nice moment of marking that space and making it special. I sing a Eucharistic prayer over the bread. We tell the story of Jesus sitting at the table with his friends. I break the bread and I pass it around. Then we sit there and eat dinner. As folks are finishing up, I stand up and introduce the scripture passage for the evening. I’ll preach a pretty informal sermon. I stick pretty closely to my experience. There are three or short reflections from people, of their own experiences. A poem is read. Then we bless the cups at the ends of the meal, everyone holds up glasses of grape juice.
Who does dishes?
Cleanup is part of worship service. We’re building worship together, we do a final hymn and offering. Then people go home. There’s an old understanding that work is prayer, connected especially to the monastic tradition. Giving something to God. The fact that we do that work in the community is really important. It draws community together. You might get to know someone you don’t know, and introduce yourself to someone who’s washing dishes [next to you].
Who funds it?
We have a not-for-profit status. We have donors and congregants. We take an offering at the end, a free-will offering. There’s no sense that people are being asked to contribute a certain amount. You’re covering the cost of tonight’s dinner.
What’s the story behind the name?
St. Lydia was in the Book of Acts; she was remembered for hospitality, and was the woman who hosts apostles after they got out of prison. They went to her house and hung out there. She would have hosted these dinners.
[via DNAinfo]
