Take This Bread: A Radical Conversion

I just loved this book. Sara Miles describes an approach to church that is very refreshing. Connecting food and eating with he Gospel is so much what Jesus Himself seemed to be about. He ate with the roughest elements of his society, no one was excluded from His table and the food was free. I have always felt that the church needs to be much more inclusive. Where a lesbian, worldly, atheist can find God, we need more places like that, more churches that make such people feel welcome.

This is the story of unlikely conversion: A radical lesbian activist, who spend much of her youth involved in people's uprisings in Mexico & Central America, one day walks into a church, receives communion, and is transformed. She becomes filled with the idea of "sharing the body," which for her becomes a command to feed the people. Which leads her to setting up a weekly food bank in the church, and then to helping others in the city start new food banks as well, challenging her congregation, those in her neighborhood, and even those who visit the food bank to expand their ideas of community, service, and comfort.

What I appreciated most about this book was the author's meditations on what it means to "be the body of Christ," and show more sharing in that call with those whose religious beliefs differed significantly from hers. (And vice versa!) It's a thought that I've been mulling over all summer, and it's helping me be less reticent expressing my beliefs around those with more conservative views (Pretty much everyone.) show less

I was handed this book and asked to ponder it, and it is a very good book for that purpose. Sara Miles was raised an atheist and grew to be a lesbian, a mother, and a globe-trotting journalist through war-torn countries. Her conversion to Christianity, and her fervent activism, still comes across as a genuine surprise to her, something she works to understand through her writing.

What I found fascinating was her deep exploration of what is meant by communion. That it is not something intended for a select few, after baptism (as I was taught), but something for everyone to celebrate in, no matter their faith, because we all share in humanity together and there is holiness in that.

I did feel like the book was too long, but then, there was show more a definite circulatory to her tale. She began by describing her early adulthood work in the restaurant business and the horrors of working with the public, and comes back around to working with the public in its most, well, dramatic and hurting form, really, as the poor and suffering line up to get food from the church pantry that she runs. She doesn't shy away expressing the racial biases she developed, as certain groups acted certain ways (from my experience working with the public, such sentiments are very realistic, sadly) but she is very open about the fact that she is a work in progress and that she is trying to do better. Note that the book was published in 2006 and some of the language is now outdated.

In all, an interesting book that seeks to provide food for thought (pun very much intended) and succeeds in that. show less

An unlikely Christian (lesbian, single mother, political radical, atheist) has a dramatic conversion experience when she walks into an Episcopal church out of reporter's curiousity, takes communion and finds her soul completely overwhelmed. Soon enough, she has a vision of a truly open table that serves food to all and convinces her parish to allow her to open a food pantry which turns away no one. This memoir describes the religious, spiritual, financial and tangible challenges she faced as well as her conviction that doing something useful (feeding people in her case) is communion. Her tone is often irreverant in a traditional sense, observing at her pantry "Jesus didn't have to deal with the f***ing Russians" for example but is never show more irreverant in the deeper sense. Her story could be read by many Christians engaged in long discussions about "right" and "wrong" and process as a useful reminder of Jesus's radical ministry of loving the outcast and his call to "feed my sheep". This memoir, in the end, is about how one unlikely person found a way to create Beloved Community with other unlikely people in a very real way. show less

Inspiring, honest, and deeply moving, by the end of Sara's story you'll love this lesbian, left-wing atheist as much as any of the other Christians of God's flock. It's hard to remember a book I enjoyed more.

On a whim one day, Sara walked into a church, ate a bit of bread, sipped a bit of wine, and underwent "a radical conversion." While never overcoming her skepticism about God, she nevertheless embraced the church ... but the Christianity she embraced had no use for angels or worship or dreams of eternity. It quickly came to mean real concern about real people. Take This Bread is about real hunger, and Sara's struggles to establish a food pantry to care for the poor, elderly, sick, deranged, and marginalized of San Francisco.

Both show more light-hearted and deeply meaningful, this is a book that will toy with the full range of your emotions. show less

A fascinating and thought-provoking account of Sara Miles' journey to Christ, mediated through food, feeding, and the Eucharist. If ever someone was pre-disposed to ignore Jesus and his church, it was Miles, with a devoutly atheistic upbringing, complicated sexuality and relationships, and knowing know Christians. But God drew her to himself, and her faith found expression in the most direct way, following Jesus' command to the disciples to "feed my sheep", starting nine food pantries around poor neighbourhoods of San Francisco.

As a journalist for many years, she writes beautifully, weaving her many experiences together. Through them you can see God moving to draw her to him, and then draw her deeper into a discipleship often with show more cost.

Recommended for anyone interested in the spiritual life, including to those sensing a call from God to new vocations. show less

An atheist finds God through what she considers to be the essential idea behind the Christian act of communion: feeding the hungry. Really interesting story, if perhaps overlong and a bit humble-braggy at times. What struck me most was her reluctance to tell her family and non-Christian friends about her conversion, and when she finally did, how they pushed back and asked how she could possibly believe in a religion that [insert atrocity here]. By the end of the book it is a question she has to resolve for herself, and comes up with this for an answer: "Christianity wasn't an argument I could win, or even resolve. It wasn't a thesis. It was a mystery that I was finally willing to swallow." Which is a pretty decent answer.