Marigold Path Grid Blog: Ritualizing Shrines
November 2, 2006
This post is part of a gridblog for people around the globe remembering those that have passed away
All Saints Day 2006: Transmission met for house church – for eating, singing, socializing, praying, and ritualizing together. The central part of our ritual (see post below) was based on remembering those who have died before us and contemplating our own mortality. We built shrines in silence and then lay down dead (in the yoga style corpse pose), until Isaac woke us with song. Then everyone shared about their shrine. Below are thumbnail photos of their shrines with snippets of the stories they shared.
Paul built a shrine to his grandfather (a simple man who lived for a time in an orphanage in Ohio);
Isaac assembled one for his great-grandmother from Indiana (a good farmer’s wife who loved to bake);
and Katie commemorated all the relatives and traditions that have been lost, along with the knowledge of her family line beyond her grandparents.
Bowie remembered the victims of Katrina;
Elaina built a shrine to Bono (who’s not dead! but is inspirational in his work to prevent unnecessary death from poverty);
and John molded a lizard out of playdough to represent Jim Morrision (who died at the same age John is now, and who will only seem younger to John as he journeys forward in life).
You can see more photos of our shrines & us on Bowie’s flickr feed
Nov 1 is All Saints (Come for House Church)
October 30, 2006
Makeshift Shrine for Mamama, originally uploaded by bowiesnodgrass.
overnight the time changed -
a new season of longer nights
and windy days, a brisk chill
in the air while the dead dance
Come Join Us For All Saints’ Day/ Día de los Muertos
This Wednesday just happens to be November 1st, a major Christian holy day. So we’ll be doing a (little longer) 45 minute ritual followed by a hot meal and apple crisp. If you’d like to come, please email epiphany.ny@gmail.com
rough draft for ritual
- song (Isaac lead)
- scripture (john is picking, maybe Ezekiel 37)
- activity – make shrines* and lie dead
- song (What Wondrous Love is This?)
- share about shrines and pray for each other
- song (Katie leads, Old Irish Blessing)
making shrines
We’ll be making shrines this week for a person who has died, someone you admire and whose life has touched your own. This can be someone in your life or someone you never met. If you can, bring some items that remind you of them (a photo, momento, etc.)
Our shrines only need to have three components:
- an object (anything that can represent the subject of the shrine),
- an offering (candle, flowers, etc.),
- and some sort of sign of the season (we’ll have dried leaves, etc.).
upcoming dates
1st and 3rd Wednesdays – November 1 and 15; December 6 and 20
Prepare to transmit this Wednesday!
October 22, 2006
So we’re coming up on our next gathering, and I had some ideas about what to do:
1) I’d really like to get some music going, but I’d like to do it without relying on paper. Music should be a welcoming, gathering, and mutual experience while paper tends to alienate people from each other. Maybe some niggun? Maybe Taize? I’d love to do some easy part-singing, especially since we’ll be doing it a capella.
2) Keeping in mind Renata’s desire to keep things rooted in the Word and John’s desire for “more Jesus, less Christ,” I was thinking it’d be fun to unpack the story of Jesus and Bartimaeus (mark 10), maybe in the style of my good friend, Peter Pitzele. It’s a story which is frequently used to impress people with how badass Christ is, but there are a lot of more subtle Jesus-moments to be pulled out of it. Additionally, I just finished writing a ten-page commentary on the pericope for school so I’ll actually be able to contribute something…
The basic idea behind Peter’s method is that the congregation gets to discover meaning in the text for themselves by placing themselves in the story. For example, “you are Eve and you just took your first step outside of Eden. How do you feel?” The leader (i.e. me)facilitates the discussion rather than preaches his or her own opinion.
How does that sound?
Imagination
October 14, 2006
I want to live also
In the world of the imagination
Where stories keep memories alive
And things only imagined become real
I want to live in a
Land where God is alive and speaks
To us in nature, ritual, love & tribulation –
Sanctifying, blessings, dancing & creating
written after reading “Fairies” by Fanny Howe
Isaac Laughed
October 11, 2006
isaac comforting abraham study: 4
Originally uploaded by giveawayboy.
The Sacrifice of Isaac (or Akedah), as it came to me last night.
Isaac Laughed
by Bowie Snodgrass
First Sarah laughed –
When three angels said
She would bear a son.
Even in my old age?!
Then Isaac laughed,
Going along with his dad,
Sure, we’ll do the sacrifice,
I will journey with you.
So Abraham took him up
The hill to an altar –
When an angel appeared
From God and laughed.
Francis of Assisi NOT a sissy
September 22, 2006
Originally uploaded by jimfrazier.
In preparation for our Yom Kippur interfaith component on Francis, I watched Franco Zeffirelli’s Brother Sun, Sister Moon this week. Wow. 70’s Christian melodrama at its best and an inspiring portrayal of the twelfth century Francis, complete with a Donovan soundtrack!
One of my favorite lines was delivered by Alec Guinness, playing Pope Innocent III:
For in our obsession with original sin, we often do forget original innocence!
I’ve also pulled up a seminary paper I wrote in May ’03 on “The Comparable Vitae of St. Francis of Assisi (1181-1226) and St. Sergius of Radonezh (1314-1392)”. Not one of the strongest papers I wrote in grad school, but a good refresher for me on these two saints.
Opening lines:
The great saints of history were men and women who lived in total devotion to Christ. The most revered of these changed the way the Church thought this was possible. As the ecclesiastical structures on earth canonized (from the Greek word meaning ‘standard’) these saints, they sometimes changed their own rules and standards for how salvation was thought possible.
Hey, I’m in the New York Press!
September 22, 2006
There’s a picture of Katie and me dancing in the street, protesting the anti-dancing cabaret laws. Who knew I would ever be so famous? And it’s a pretty good picture of me, if I do say so myself…
St. Francis & Storahtelling
September 22, 2006
Originally uploaded by perhapsfairfax.
Yom Kippur 5767 (in the Jewish calendar) is coming up on Oct 2nd. Ike has been gigging with a group called Storahtelling – “a radical fusion of storytelling, Torah, contemporary performance art and traditional ritual theater” – for three years now. Since Yom Kippur is so close to St. Francis’ Day this year, they have invited us (Transmission) to do a littler interfaith component during their day long YK 5767 RituaLab.
Here’s an email I sent to a Storahtelling leader on Sept 11th -
Hi Amichai -
Again, thank you very much for welcoming me in yesterday. What an amazing and wonderful group you have. And so welcoming - this morning Ayelet stopped me in the Times Square subway to say Hi!
I wanted to send you a little more info on Francis, who is arguably the most beloved Christian saint (he is certainly a favorite for Episcopalians, who value their saints for the lives they lived and as role models, more than for miraculous powers).
Francis’ feast day is October 4th, but will be celebrated by Christians on Sunday, October 1st (which is often a ‘blessing of the animals’ service). So incorporating Francis into an Oct 2nd Yom Kippur is timely - and will hopefully be one more way for us to think together about the interplay between atonement and peace - both personal and shared.
Blessings, Bowie
Info on Francis
St. Francis Prayer
Lord, make me an instrument of Thy peace;
where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury, pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
and where there is sadness, joy.
O Divine Master,
grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console;
to be understood, as to understand;
to be loved, as to love;
for it is in giving that we receive,
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.
Amen.
* this, other prayers by Francis, and many other great prayers from World Prayers
soul and substance(s)
September 17, 2006
Hmm. I stumbled across this ad which will soon be running in the UK and which features the image of Jesus appearing in beer foam. Apparently, this image is intended to encourage people to go back to church this Christmas season. I don’t quite see the connection, but I like the image.
read all about it over at yahoo news.
Greenbelt was great
September 10, 2006
I had an amazing time at Greenbelt. So many chill, creative, cool Christians. So many innovative worship experiences. So many ideas and such a feeling of mutual support. And Ike was a great traveling companion.
It was also great to reconnect with Ian Mobsby, whom I met at a conference in March and who encouraged and enabled Ike and I to contribute at Greenbelt. We pitched our tent along with the people from his emerging church in London (Gareth, Andrew, Mike, Carrie, Ivy, Neil, and Aaron) and had a great time with this Moot crew. They are in our prayers and we are in their blog :-)
WORSHIP SERVICES
We attended a lot of services. All amazing, all different. The groups I saw were:
Grace (London)
Ikon (Belfast)
Fuse Factory (Switzerland)
Morph
Sanctus1 (Manchester)
Greenbelt Communion service on Sunday morning, with John Bell from the Iona Community
Very sadly, we missed the Moot “Body Mass”, which happened on Monday, after we left. There are some very cool photos of the service up on their blog. We also missed the Monday service by Foundation in Bristol, but the folks from the group were super friendly and came to our service – big thanks!
Thanks also to Sue from Visions in York for her hospitality!
OTHER HIGHLIGHTS
A workshop led by Ian Mobsby on the Emerging Church and Trinitarian Theology Worship (based on Rublev’s icon of the Trinity)
An amazing talk by Shane Claiborne from The Simple Way in Philly
A panel discussion chaired by Jonny Baker exploring mission at Mind Body Spirit Fairs and contemporary spirituality. With panellists Ana Draper, Ben Edson, Steve Hollinghust and Gareth Powell.
The organic beer tent!