Though its leadership fights to keep the doctrine pure, the faith is constantly contaminated, syncretized, revered, and tinkered with by its adherents - and by outsiders like me, who it continues to influence. It's sentimental and businesslike, the faith of superstitious peasants and of brainy postmodern Jesuits. It's undergirded a great deal of radical immigrant and labor activism for generations, but it's also been a reactionary force wielding money and power in support of political bosses.

I read the story about the loaves and fishes and thought about Jesus gazing at the hungry crowd, saying to his anxious, doubting, screwed-up followers: "You give them something to eat." So we did.

What happened once I started distributing communion was the truly disturbing, dreadful realization about Christianity: You can't be a Christian by yourself.

The entire contradictory package of Christianity was present in the Eucharist. A sign of unconditional acceptance and forgiveness, it was doled out and rationed to insiders; a sign of unity, it divided people; a sign of the most common and ordinary human reality, it was rarefied and theorized nearly to death.

There's no way to be a Christian at home by yourself.

I wanted to stand on the kind of holy ground that wasn't curated by church professionals, where a burning bush could blaze forth in defiance of safety regulations and outside of regular office hours.