Attendees break bread — and pancakes — together at Brunch Church

As Pastor Ashley Updegraff welcomed more people than expected to Prairie Lutheran Church’s first Brunch Church on Sunday, April 21, she compared the experience to the biblical story of loaves and fishes, in which Jesus uses two fish and five loaves of bread to feed at least 5,000 people. 

Prairie Lutheran’s menu was pancakes, sausage, potatoes, eggs, orange and apple juice, and “the food seemed to go the distance,” Updegraff said, feeding the more than 70 people who gathered in the Eden Prairie church’s Great Hall on Sunday morning. Extra tables were needed from the original setup.

Brunch Church grew out of Updegraff’s own experience observing people attending a Sunday morning brunch. Combining brunch with church made sense, she told attendees, as Bible stories tell us Jesus was “constantly” sharing meals with others.

Although Updegraff, the lead pastor at Prairie Lutheran, led the gathering in a Bible reading and prayer, the focus was on interacting with those seated together at round tables. Tablemates broke off pieces from a loaf of bread placed on each table and shared Communion with each other, repeating the statement, “The body of Christ, given for you,” as they passed a piece of bread to the person seated next to them. 

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The second half of the Christian sacrament of Communion, the sharing of cups of wine with the accompanying words, “The blood of Christ, shed for you,” occurred after those gathered in Eden Prairie had eaten their pancakes and eggs, echoing the story of the first Last Supper told in the biblical book of Luke, in which Jesus shared wine with his disciples after the meal. Small glasses of wine were placed on the tables. (Juice and gluten-free bread options were available for those unable to partake of the wine or regular bread.)

In addition to the food, each table was provided with a list of question prompts, based on the morning’s Bible reading, John 10: 10-15, in which Jesus describes himself as a good shepherd. Questions like “What catches your imagination in the passage?”, “In your opinion, what makes for an abundant life?” and “What, or who, are the wolves in our world?” served as jumping-off points for discussions related not only to the Bible passage, but the personal lives and experiences of those who were there.

The experience, attendee Joe Dahmer said, was a good one. “I don’t think you always have to be in a formal setting to worship,” he said. 

At the end of the event, Updegraff indicated that the church will likely plan more Brunch Church events and that there is a possibility it could be held in a restaurant at some point. For the inaugural event, she said, “I was pleasantly surprised by how many people came. I’m very pleased.”