Keep the bottle sealed.....

 Even as attendnace at worship services continues to swiftly plummet, there is still a lot of rituals in place.  Persons need a tangible act to mark a loss, a transformational moment, a beginning.  Consider the placing of items to mark a tragedy or a passing. Far more than flowers, the notes and the items left speak deeply.  

One of the real kicks of being clergy is the opportunity to oversee rituals and also to create new symoblic acts for the moment.  There is nothing like a good baptism. I use a scallop shell that I brought back from the beach.  Some families have painted on the shell the name of the child and the date of her baptism.  Following a baptism, I've been asked to bless the child's teddy bear...love that!  Families have started journals for their child on the day of the baptism and themselves and others in the circle of care write reflections that day and every signficant moment in the child's life culminating with a full journal presented to the child on her graduation from high school.  Parents or grandparents of little ones, it's not too late to begin this custom!

One of the coolest rituals I recently read is on the occasion of a baptism presenting the gifts of:

• A sea shell so the child will love the water.
• A bird feather so the child will love the air.
• A flower so the child will love the earth.
• A sealed bottle with the instruction to never, never, never open the bottle so the child will love mystery.     

Living through this pandemic, I've been reflecting on the need to create liturgy and ritual as we journey ahead; words and symbols and actions.

I invite you to share any insights and ideas and will keep you posted in future writings.

Embrace they mystery ----     

Can I open my eyes yet?

Ever watch a little kid play "Hide-n-Seek?" She will stand in the middle of the room, place her hands over her eyes and stand very still; the logic is if she can't see you then you can't see her.  

Last year as the pandemic raged (...sigh it really has not quieted down....) I stopped my subscription to the daily newspaper and quit listneing to NPR.  I chose not to read nor to hear the news.  It was scary.  No one definitively knew anything. I figured if I didn't know anything, I was OK with that and could continue merrily and blissfully unaware. 

Fires burning the western United States, Louisiana with another hurricane and hundreds without power in hundred degree weather, drought in Africa, Afghanistan lost to the Taliban, Haiti having one tragedy after another.....I could go on......it's enough to make me once again cancel my subscription to the paper.  

As kids get older they begin to understand the finer points of hide-n-seek. They will actually go somewhere to hide and when they do they try and make themselves very small and squeeze into tiny spaces.

Fear makes us small. Fear can cause either freeze or flight ---- I've done both very well depending on the situation. 

In scary times, we look for persons who steady us, are our trustpoints.  During these days, I miss my mom doubly so.  She had a tool kit stocked full of ways to handle fear. Sometimes she used humor; after watching a horror movie when I was afraid someone was going to get me she said, "Don't worry, he'll drop you at the first street light."  She used reason.  She used her presence.  She used her faith as she would say, "Perfect love casts out all fear."

We are not made to be small and afraid. 

We are called to shine our light into all those dark and scary places. Even the tiniest light, the smallest candle makes a major impact.  Shine on.....  

ABC's Wrap-Up

V = VOICE  

A frequent refrain from my mother was, "Sally, you don't know how your voice carries!"  

Yes....I do......  

When my brothers were outside and it was time for supper, she would appoint me to be the human dinner bell.  She'd call me in and ask me to let my brothers know it was time for supper. I never thought she expected me to walk up to them and invite them to table. Insted, I would open my mouth and yell, "SUPPER! SUPPER'S READY!"  Supper is a great word to shout out.  One can expel every bit of air in the lungs in the yelling of the word with its two syllables and hard consonants.  Supper.  Try yelling it out sometime and see what happens and who answers or even better who comes to the table.

W = WATERMELON  Another staple of summer.  The watermelon is so much a part of the season we often have our first one on Memorial Day picnics, the "official" start of summer.       

Are there still any kids who have not been told that if you swallow a watermelon seed that a watermelon will grow in your belly?  

I'm a big fan of watermelon; I lke the fruit, I like the flavoring added to hard candy (Jolly Rancher, anyone) and to water and beverages of a more adult variety. 

X = X-RAY  As we once again....sigh....return to wearing masks in stores and indoors (I confess I never stopped so doing) one of the moments that makes me sad is when I see a little kid, a three or four year old, wearing a mask; they are so innocent and I wonder the impact upon them of these days through which we are living. 

The same feeling of sadness occurs whenever in the midst of summer I see a kid with a cast on an arm or a leg. 

In these moments I trust even more on the resilience of children and how they are gifted with both a literal bounce and a wellspring of inner bounce to which they keep coming back and getting up and going forward. 

Y = YELLOW   I have never had done, nor do I think it is soon to happen, my color pallette.  Am I an autumn?  A summer?  What color is my color that when I wear it I own it?  Don't know.  Someone, someday may let me know.  When that happens I hope I already have the wardrobe for it. 

If there is a color for the season of summer my vote goes to yellow --- the golden sun, the jerseys of the 1979 Pirates, a canary melon.....

Z = ZUCCHINI   Be it a dry summer, a rainy summer, an extra-hot summer...whatever the weather the zucchini always seems to thrive.  There is an abundance of zucchini, they fill the stores, the farmer's martkets and our own gardens. There are so many zucchini that we freely and easily give them away....to everyone.

Thankfully,  I like zucchini. I am even more grateful that my mother was an incredible cook and made wondrously creative  dishes with the vegetable.  She pickled it, fried it, made a cake with it, cookies, used it as the noodles in lasagne....I swear if she would have been agreeable to fermentation, we would also have drunk it.