Making a Can of Campbell's Soup Sacred

Each week when I attend the Eucharist at Christ Church I take a can of Campbell's soup or some other object such as peanut butter, Ivory soap, macarroni and cheese, etc. and place it in the food baskets at the rear of the nave. These items are then distributed through the congregation's social needs ministry to the homeless. Living in downtown Indianapolis, I meet the homeless and many of our city's more or less professional panhandlers on a daily basis. But my option is to help through this ministry of my church.

When the monetary offerings and the wine and bread are brought forward to the altar just before the eucharist, the food baskets are also presented. Often, when I am kneeling at the altar rail receiving communion, I can see my donated can of Campbell's soup and I marvel at how it has made the trip from the soup section of Krogers to sharing sacred space with the Holy Body and Blood of Christ.

There is nothing magic about this trip. It is simply the dedication of an object--any object--to the purposes of Jesus: feeding the poor, taking care of the least of these.

In other blog postings I have written about how I walk a lot. That is one of my options, which I enjoy very much, as a person who chose not to own a car. Sometimes I find disgarded coins--pennies and nickels mostly--on the sidewalk. I take these coins home and put them in the piggy bank on top of the refrigerator. When the piggy bank gets full I sort the coins and bank them. Then I write a check for the same amount to some cause that I care about--often Episcopal Relief and Development for tsunami or other victims or to the Gay Men's Health Crisis in New York City for HIV/AIDS persons. Often I marvel at how an almost worthless lost coin can find new nobility and worth by moving from the sidewalk to the piggy bank to the bank and finally to the purposes of these organzations.

All of this reminds me that simple things can take on sacred meanings. Even Campell's soup. Even lost pennies.