Blog #2 Particular Tradition

            My family used to go to a small church in China-a Presbyterian church. The church itself does not look very old, but my father has been attending this church for most of his lifetime. Distinct from father, I visited many other churches in China, and it confuses me sometimes. The name for each branch of Christianity may be different, but I did not observe any obvious differences. When I came to United States during college, I realize most Christian churches are quite identical, and the traditions or teachings are not so different either.

            When it comes to Presbyterian Christian traditions, I found that by far every church I attended shares the exact same tradition. The root of Presbyterianism comes from theological and evangelical tradition, such as gender, status and regional variations. [1] First, baptism is one of most important ceremony for a Christian to declare his or her faith in becoming a Christian. Although sometimes Christian family gives new born baptism-infant baptism, but this is merely a symbolic baptism. A person may apply for another baptism at roughly 14 years old, depending on the rules for each church. The traditions for baptism has been in Christian society for more than two thousand years, and the procedures are the same in churches of United States and China. Even though the procedure for baptism is the same, there are minor differences in the “measures” for baptism in United States and China. My father told me the pastor dipped his hand into a golden plate of water and proceeded to lay hand on my father’s head as part of the baptism ceremony. However, it is more common to submerge the entire human body into a Jacuzzi, swimming pool, or a river in United States. According to Bible, Jesus was baptized in Jordan River, so I believed that the way baptism is performed must have been modified more or less along the course of the entire Christianity history. According to Holmes, Presbyterian tradition manifests “how those beliefs and practices [that have been held by laity] combine theological tenets with customary belief and socio-political objectives.” [2]

            The second very important ritual that Presbyterian Christians do is the communion, which is usually scheduled monthly. The history of communion can be traced back to the time when Jesus was killed approximately two thousand years ago. Before Jesus was to be pinged on the cross by Romans, he broke the bread and shared the pieces to his disciples, and then he toasted with his wine, passing his cup to his disciples during The Last Supper. [3] Jesus did this because he knew he was going to die, so communion is to remember the death of Jesus Christ. Because the first communion was done thousands years ago, communion now sometimes performs differently than that of in the history. For one thing, the communion bread that my father’s church has is made out of Chinese dumpling skins, while many churches in United States simply cuts out a loaf of bread and shed it into pieces.  The tradition of wine drinking in communion has also been reformed worldwide. In ancient time, people drank the real wine during a communion, but it is not feasible to serve alcohol in church especially because many baptized Christians are underage. Therefore, grape juice has been replaced for the actual wine very long ago both in United States and China as my father confirmed. Although the tradition for communion changed slightly, the core reason to perform communion remains the same. Christians believe that communion is the way to come both in faith and in love towards Christ, and in love one toward another. [4]

            In summary, the various traditions and rituals for Christianity do not differ very much in my father’s experience and in United States. Although there are differences in the practices of Christian traditions, the main concept remains unchanged. In fact, these actual practices of various Christian traditions are often not stated very clearly in the Bible too, so the ambiguities occurred. Fortunately, these ambiguities do not incur problems, given that the teachings in United States are similar to that of in China.

 

1.      Andrew R Holmes, The Shaping of Ulster Presbyterian Relief and Practice 1770-1840 (Oxford University Press, 2008), 374.

2.      Andrew R Holmes, The Shaping of Ulster Presbyterian Relief and Practice 1770-1840 (Oxford University Press, 2008), 374.

3.      Bob Deffinbaugh, “The Last Supper,” Bible Organization, https://bible.org/seriespage/last-supper-luke-227-23 (accessed August  2013).

4.      John Aikman Wallace, Communion Services, according to the Presbyterian form, (General Books, 2012), 15.