Well, it looks like the Easter season will be upon us sooner than I was looking for it. I stumbled across Church To Reclaim The Spiritual Roots Of Mardi Gras on the njtoday.net site.
Well, can you really reclaim something you’ve never had? Where is "Mardi Gras" in the Bible again?
Why is it wrong to supplement Biblical holy days with manmade holidays? The best example of why is in the article itself.
People search for the baby Jesus in the cake, remembering the three wise men who looked for Jesus after his birth. Finding the baby Jesus will win you a prize.
Talk about trivialization!
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The biggest United Methodist church in my city has a Mardi Gras dinner every February — complete with beads and a parade around the banquet hall.
Then the church marks Lent, with "self-denial" coin cards.
I don't quite understand why they do it. But then, that's why I left the UMC to move toward WCG in my teenage years.
I had to look up what coin cards are. 🙂 I think I've seen them somewhere before when I was really young, but I'm not sure.
It looks like you put in a quarter every day for the 40 days of Lent. I can hear it now: "A quarter a day! That's all!" Of course, that's $10 more for the church coffers, multiplied by how ever many members there are …
Yes, that's what I meant. When I was a boy, the saving rate for those cards was "a dime a day" — and I think it went up to 25 cents on Easter weekend.
Come to think of it, it's a Lenten version of "Christmas clubs" at the bank — but of course, ancient worshipers saving all year for the Feast came first.