Abstract
This paper reviews the history of baptism and holy communion in the United Methodist Church can seem confusing. Since the early days of the Church's founding, the significance of these two sacraments have changed and transformed. The paper discusses how initially they were quite important, but since waned in importance in the Church, becoming akin to personal choices instead of acts of divine community with God ("By Water and the Spirit"; "This Holy Mystery"). The current conception of both these rites of sacrament, as a consequence, is uncertain for many members of the laity in the United Methodist Church. Indeed, some of the clergy are unsure how these acts should be integrated within the context of worship. Nonetheless, Church doctrine has some very clear lessons to teach about both the baptism and holy communion.

Tags:religion, communion, baptism

Abstract
This paper takes a look at the way author bell hooks treats the issue of love in her book 'Communion', part of her trilogy on love in America. This paper discusses hooks ideas on how women can achieve freedom through love rather than seeing love as a subjugating force. It begins with the premise that women feel confused about love because of the way they are socialized in a patriarchal social structure.

From the Paper
"In her book 'Communion: The Female Search for Love', bell hooks (who prefers that her name have no capitals) completes a trilogy on love in America, in this case discussing how women can achieve freedom through love rather than seeing love as a subjugating force. She begins with the premise that women feel confused about love because of the way they are socialized in a patriarchal social structure. Hooks notes that feminist writers have denigrated love and made it difficult for women to express their true feelings on the subject, which she says should be as important to women in middle age as it was when they were younger. She proposes to offer what is needed, namely "constructive visions of redemptive love" (15). "

Tags:love, communion, hooks

Abstract
This paper discusses one of the basic tenets of the Christian religion, the communion service. The author looks at the origin of the communion service in the New Testament and examines the changes that it underwent in the church during the centuries. The author concludes that, in spite of the different forms taken by the communion service in different Christian denominations, all agree in its meaning as the reenactment of the communion with the Risen Christ.

From the Paper
" Indeed it came to pass that the Communion Service is a continuing remembrance of our Lord's Last Supper with His disciples. The first Book of Common Prayer was published for the Church of England in 1549, and it was primarily the work of Thomas Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury. Also several books in English had appeared in the 1540s to encourage lay devotion and participation. Of these the most important was The Order of the Communion (1548)."

Tags:belief, transubstantiation, liturgical, rite, faithful

Abstract
This paper is an analysis of Sven Birkets' "The Gutenberg Elegies: The Fate of Reading in an Electronic Age". This book of essays urges the rejection of today's high-tech, easy-access electronic age. Sven Birkets believes that today's technology has placed the world in a state of "intellectual emergency" that threatens to destroy not only the conventional and healthy manner in which an individual relates to one's own self, but also the way this individual relates to others and the surrounding world.

From the Paper
"Twenty to twenty-five years ago, as the world ventured forth into the last quarter of the twentieth century, the future leaders of this world ventured forth into the public school system. On any given weekday, any number of these pint-sized learners could be spotted being deposited onto school grounds and into classrooms armed with first generation Star Wars backpacks and lunch boxes packed with such tools of learning as pencils, paper, workbooks, and reading primers. Pac-Man was as of yet but an unrealized dream in the mind of a Japanese developer and the innovative electronic games of Pong and Tank were diversions to be pursued only after school hours and after the completion of homework and chores."

Tags:Electronic, Age, technology, high-tech, Sven, Birkets

From the Paper
"Throughout its more than 250-year history, the Methodist Church has placed great significance on its observation of the sacraments of baptism and the Lord's Supper. Indeed, owing to the frequency and fervor with which John and Charles Wesley and their small society, the "Holy Club" organized by Charles at Oxford in 1728 (Bowmer (b), 24), celebrated the Lord's Supper, the group was known to some as Sacramentarians (Parris, 18; many others). The Anglican Church in John Wesley's time practiced the observance of the Lord's Supper on a quarterly frequency (if not less often); the Holy Club partook of the elements at least monthly. It is believed by some that Wesley himself took communion on average once every five days, and perhaps even daily at the times of church festivals (Parris, 18; Spivey, 190)."

From the Paper
"The last supper is one of the incidents in Jesus' life which is described by all four of the gospel writers. Comparing the individual narratives helps reveal both the writer's purpose and the readers' reactions to and questions about what the writer wrote. Each writer seemed to be familiar with those who worked before and responded to those works, adding to them through his unique view of the same risen savior.

The Christian bishops and writers in the first three centuries, who are the ones who would know, all agreed that Matthew was the first gospel written. His account of the last supper begins immediately after the five-chapter message called "The Olivet Discourse" with a 19-verse introduction that sets the scene, especially explaining Judas' actions during the supper. (Mark, on the other hand, merely summarizes the financial.."

Abstract
The paper attempts to show how the morality of the main character in James Fenimore Cooper's "The Deerslayer", Natty Bumppo, is an extreme morality that involves spiritual communion with nature, a firm opposition to discrimination and hatred and an exaggerated state of divine morality. The paper discusses how Natty represents the embodiment of Cooper's morality in his battles against racism, hatred and killing while at the same time gleaning all the lessons and communion from and with nature that he can. The paper posits that this morality is worthy of aspiration, and the closer we come to achieving it, the closer we come to communing with nature and the Divine.

Outline:
Thesis Statement
Natty's Morality is Guided by Nature
Natty's Morality Derives from the Pure Morality of Nature
Natty's Morality is Exaggerated

From the Paper
"As much as any American writer, James Fenimore Cooper's work, is representative of the American frontier and the struggles of Native Americans and pioneers who took the advice of Horace Greeley and "went West." While many criticize the writing style and syntax of Cooper, almost no one denied the value of his work as being representative of "the self-actualized individual. . . . provided a calling for many new Americans who chose the West as a new frontier, a place to prove their individuality and self-worth" (Eberle 2). The Deerslayer is the fifth and final novel in the Leatherstocking Tales, a series of works devoted to the story of Natty Bumppo, who, in this novel, is labeled the "Deerslayer" or "Hawkeye." "The [sic] Deerslayer [sic] deals with racism, hatred, Manifest Destiny, technology/progress, and was the first environmentalist" ("True" 4)."

Tags:communion, nature, divine, racism, discrimination, Native-Americans

Abstract
This paper discusses and analyzes two articles about the Roman Catholic clergy's decision to deny the Catholic sacrament of Communion to pro-choice Catholic politicians.

From the Paper
"The purpose of this research is to examine two articles on the subject of the Roman Catholic clergy's denial of the Catholic sacrament of Communion to politicians who articulate a policy stance that the Church has historically characterized as pro-abortion. The plan of the research will be to set forth the context of discourse in which these articles have appeared and then to analyze the language used to discuss the issue and the use of facts and premises in each article. The Roman Catholic Church's opposition to abortion..."

Tags:Politics, Abortion, Right, to, choose, Catholic, Church, Bishops, Communion

Abstract
This paper discusses the use of metaphors of light, darkness and shadows in Tennyson's work. The use of these images are paralleled with grief, death and loss of a loved one. The paper shows how the shadow imagery not only embodies the depths of Tennyson's emotional response to unspeakable grief, but aids in revealing the consolation Tennyson finds in his belief in spiritual communion, reincarnation and immortality.

From the Paper
"The first use of the word shadow does not appear until section XVI. The word shade, however, occurs in the Prologue. Since the poem was written over a nearly twenty year period and not originally intended to be brought together as one entity, it is probable that the Prologue, known to be written in 1849, was intended to help unite the poem thematically. With the use of the word shade here Tennyson initiates the light/dark contrast. When he says "Thine are these orbs of light and shade;" he is contrasting not only life and death, but also bright shining faith in the "immortal Love" of the "Strong Son of God," with dark despairing doubt. His prominent use of light and shade here at the start is meant to give notice to the reader that these images are to be significant to the work as a whole. He is stating that it is by "faith alone" that we trust that we are not "made to die." Much of Tennyson's dark doubt comes from the fact that he must believe that this is a "just" God, the giver of life and the reaper of death who has his foot on the very human skulls that he created."

Tags:death, image, dark, light, grief, faith, god, storm, suicide, hallam, nature, spiritual, communion, reincarnation, immortality

Abstract
This paper explains that, for E. B. White in "Once More to the Lake," it is plain that the lake, its coves, streams and paths constitute "this holy spot." The author points out that, for the entire essay, White has built steadily the idea that this adventure is an opportunity for communion with nature, man and god. The paper concludes that, at the end, White realizes he is not his father or his son but that he is himself, which truncates the possibility of resurrection; it casts the richly woven tone poem into the void without another word.

From the Paper
"Nominally, the essay concerns White's return to a lakeside camp where he spent boyhood summers, this time bringing along his own son for the first time. The Christian liturgy of the piece begins early: it is possible to view White and his son as priest and acolyte, especially as no other current family members are mentioned in the piece. All references to family are to White's birth family, not his son's siblings if any or mother. By this device, too, White places the piece in the realm of gospel, of a writing about magical things that are past, but somehow are to live on through some sort of mystical revisiting, not unlike the mystical revisiting in the Roman Catholic/Episcopal Eucharist of the passion of Christ."

Tags:holy, adventure, communion, father, son