Same goes for theologies that suggest the poor are poor because
of their sins, that if only the sick had more
faith or gave more money they would be healed, that the tsunami or the earthquake or the flood that devastated a community was clearly the result
of God's wrath on its gay inhabitants, that we can stop rape
by teaching women to cover up better, that sex before marriage makes a
person «
broken» and «unwanted.»
In the sharing
of Christian experience and mutual reinforcement in the
faith the idea has affinities with the Methodist class meetings
of an earlier day; and when the cell principle is integrated sufficiently with the rest
of life, it reminds one
of those early Christian groups who «day
by day, attending the temple together and
breaking bread in their homes,... partook
of food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having favor with all the
people.»