I am writing this separately from my thoughts on yesterday's Parsifal performance, but clearly, the thoughts behind this post were inspired by attending that.
I have a fundamental problem with society's pre-occupation with the search for the Grail. It permeates culture - Parsifal, Monty Python, computer games etc - but also language: people may refer to a shopping trip for a perfect pair of shoes (for example) as the Search for the Holy Grail.
A quick internet search reveals that the Grail was thought either to be the Cup used at the Last Supper or the Cup that Mary Magdalene used to collect Christ's blood after the crucifixion; whoever drinks from it is granted eternal life.
Theologically, what a load of bollocks!
The act of consecration - This is my Body, This is my Blood - is believed to transform bread and wine actually into the body and blood of Christ. If you believe that, it is available at every church in the world on a daily basis. It's not the drinking vessel that matters but the content.
Should Christians be seeking eternal life, theologically speaking? What does that actually mean? Surely someone who seeks to drink from the Holy Grail in order to cancel an inevitable earthly death is actually cancelling their right to enter into the Kingdon of Heaven. I can't see this as being the slightest bit desirable for a Christian.
In the New Testament, Christ refers back to the Ten Commandments and presents an executive summary, almost designed to be encapsulated in 140 characters - Love God and Love Your Neighbour. Nowhere in that does it say - also establish a cult of fandom worship of artefeacts that may or may not have been touched by your God made flesh.
Having said all that, supposing that rather than giving 'eternal life' drinking from The Grail (as opposed to taking Holy Communion in the village church) was actually supposed to heal sickness and allow the drinker to live until a graceful old age, this is undoubtedly a Good Thing. It is entirely consistent with the practice of many Christians over the centuries, not least those in organised communities, of tending to the sick.
But, as far as I can gather from Parsifal and from cursory reading over the years, legend has it that The Grail was kept under lock and key by, for example, the Knights Templar. This hardly reeks of Christian compassion and Loving They Neighbour, more an elitist form of Finders Keepers, we got it and the poor can eff off.
In the final analysis of course, we all accept these mediaeval legends to be entirely fictional, and there's no great harm done by their inextricable entwinement in our modern society. But it does seem odd that either one accepts the basic theology and thus none of the rest makes sense, or else, one rejects the basic theology, in which case, none of the rest makes sense!
