My sons asked me recently what I wanted in the way of a memorial when I died. I was quick to answer that I would like the people who loved me to gather in my memory to mark my life and the leaving of it, but that I didn't want anything in the way of a formal religious ceremony. Then, within three months of each other my father and my aunt died. They were both lifelong Catholics and were each ushered out with a full funeral Mass. I left the church many years ago but I found that participation in these lengthy, time-honored rituals, complete in both cases with beautiful music and familiar call and response was a profound way to release my beloved family members from this life into the next. Voices praying in unison and singing together honored the dead and the mystery of death which will come for us all more powerfully (I thought) than just sharing reminiscences, which we did also, of course.
This has me wondering about the difficulty of making communal rituals when the institutions like the church which used to weave them into our lives have withered. Ritual is used to point away from the moment to larger or overarching themes that are easy to miss in our quotidian existence. It's not so hard to make small personal rituals which ground us into the circumstances of our own lives, but gathering people together to participate in shared ritual takes quite a lot of energy to plan and promote, and once done the energy dissipates and disappears. There is something about new rituals that people tend to shy away from with jokes and derision. I remember going to an Elks lodge because someone said they had good food and cheap drinks and being surprised by an Elks Club ritual that honored fallen Elks. All these years later I can't remember why it felt so odd, but I clearly remember my embarrassment and the difficulty I had to keep from laughing out loud. It felt farcical, and this to a person used to and appreciative of ritual. Now I wonder why. What is the difference between a powerful communal act and a farce?
There is something instinctively satisfying about joining in unison with others through prayer, song and dance. It celebrates and underlines our common experiences as we navigate these embodied lives. It reminds us that we are all in it together. How can we promote this sense of unity and draw universal themes down into immediate experience when everything seems to be falling apart? What new rituals do we need and how shall we make them?