Journey Back to Eden.pdf - St Mark Coptic Orthodox Church Chicago

A TIME TO VISIT NEW PLACES 191times in their lives, could find themselves lost and alone there, andin need of welcome and assistance.So, according to the norms of their culture, I was received withgreat kindness. Part of the hospitality of the father of the tentdwellerswas to pour out at my feet the equivalent of a bushel ofcakes of bread!It’s marvelous how the nomads in this region bake their bread.Since water is scarce in the desert, they must do all of their bakingduring those relatively few times when they are close to a generoussupply of water. They make a lot of bread and carry it with them asthey travel. To prevent it from becoming stale on the journey, theybake their bread with a thick, hermetically sealed crust, whichkeeps the inside moist and fresh. Once a cake of bread is opened, itmust be eaten more or less all at once, because it cannot be saved.No plastic wrap, no tinfoil, no tupperware here. Their means ofpreservation is a thick crust in its integrity. Once broken, all thecontents must be eaten or they will be lost.The father of the tent-dwellers picked up one of the cakes ofbread at my feet and broke it open for me. I scooped out the insidesand ate the delicious bread. Even as I was eating the firstcake, he broke another and put it before me. I thanked him andsaid that I had had enough now, but he urged me to a third one,even though I was only nibbling at the second. I told him that Iwas really satiated, and that I would need to leave soon. Could hehelp me get back to the jeep, or could he take me to themonastery? I couldn’t linger much longer; I was expected somewhereelse. He broke the third cake, and urged me to have afourth!I have sometimes been in the home of a Mediterranean family,an Italian house, for a Sunday dinner and know the impossibility ofsaying “no.” Somehow the gift of food is linked in an inextricableway with the gift of self. To reject the food is to somehow reject thegiver of the food, and to consume the food is to offer the gift-giverthe greatest affirmation. Here I found myself exactly in such a situation.I was forcing myself to eat a third cake and to nibble at afourth. And even then my host began to urge me heartily to a fifth,and a sixth, and a seventh!When my protests became louder and more forceful, the headof the house did something really incredible! He took one cakeafter the other from all that were lying before me—all of the bread