Best alternative communion snack

MANNA: In the Bible manna was eaten by the Israelites on their desert trek to the promised land. It arrived with the night-time dew like hoarfrost and had to be collected before it melted in the heat of the sun. Ground, pounded into cakes, and baked, it tasted like olive oil.

But what was it? Possibilities include the thalli, or plant bodies, of lichens; decomposing psilocybe mushrooms; and the waxy secretions of scale insects.

ANANITA MUSCARICA: This is an entheogen, something which generates godly inspiration. It is a hallucinogenic, vision-inducing "magic" mushroom.

An expert in historical linguistics, John Marco Allegro, caused controversy and damaged his reputation with The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross, in 1970, which argued that early Christian cultic practice was based on Ananita ingestion. However, the use of entheogens is nearly ubiquitous in human cultures through history and in many religions is a pathway to mystical, ecstatic and self-revelatory experience.

AMBROSIA: This is the food of the Greek gods which conferred everlasting youth and beauty. This means that the can- opener cannot, as popularly believed, have been invented by Ezra Warner of Waterbury, Connecticut, in 1858, but must date to at least Homeric times. Or else, just how did they open those tins of heavenly custard?

OATCAKE: Made in Scotland from oats, which of course is the real food of the Gods, and in the form of porridge, "puts hairs on yer chist". According to Dr Johnson's Dictionary of the English Language, oats is "a grain, which in England is generally given to horses, but in Scotland supports the people".

ANGEL CAKE: Addiction to these sponge cakes is leading to obesity among the heavenly chorus, so much so they have been dubbed "the vice of an angel".

A dessert of cream enclosed in sponge-cake is popular in the Charlotte Russe Church. Alternatively serve Angel Delight or angel fish. The latter is not the piece of cod which passeth all understanding.