A Parable

She takes a cracker from the special sacrament tray each Sunday

For those who are gluten intolerant.

She neither has celiac nor gets stomach cramps from gluten;

Reading where the autoimmune disease she has

Was sometimes aggravated by gluten,

she went totally gluten free for three years.

When her husband started making delectable aromatic sour dough bread

She tasted a small morsel.

Soon she was enjoying half a slice;

Eventually a full slice for breakfast each morning;

While still taking a gluten-free cracker

from the sacrament tray each week;

Feeling each time, 

well, 

like a hypocrite.

She doesn’t have much in common with most of the congregation.

Perhaps coming from a small town, the values and priorities

of the assumed privileged seem to collide with hers.

Maybe, she thought to herself,

hypocrisy is our bond;

Something we have in common.

After all these years, has she finally found her place

in the Ward choir? (Even though she can't carry a tune.)