Ritual

Friends,

Earlier this week from our home on a bluff above Puget Sound we noticed a tribal canoe journey of perhaps a dozen canoes about a half mile out. Because the surf was quiet and the wind was right, we could not only watch their coordinated paddle strokes, but we could also hear their muffled chants which gave them an even more personal presence. With our binoculars we assumed the larger canoes had eight paddlers and the smaller ones three and four, with some motorized handlers nearby. I am not sure of the miles they traveled, or how many hours of their journey. I assumed they were experiencing a physically and emotional challenge to their effort, but I also imagined how grateful they were for the opportunity to participate in a deeply rewarding ritual of solidarity to share in a common and ancient spiritual tradition.

I’m not able to accurately express my gut response to what I was watching as the canoes passed by. But I seemed to feel as though I was drawn back into a sacred time and space when, for perhaps millennia, tribal canoes regularly plied these waters for trade, hunting, and sometimes conquest. As I observed them this week, however, I was aware the canoeists were more on a pilgrimage, perhaps a rite of passage for some, that tied them to their heritage of courageous seafaring. I admit to being a bit jealous. I would have liked to have been part of a similar ritual.

Out of my respect for the shared experience of the canoeists, I have been thinking about the meaning of rituals, both sacred and ordinary, in my life, and for us all. Rituals provide us with patterns and continuities that make life better integrated. Sacred, communal rituals provide us with an expectant, common experience that binds us in community. For example, our Quaker ritual of sitting silently in a sacred circle, with an occasional verbal message and an opportunity to share our "joys and concerns" invokes for us a sense of shared, supportive lives and service that are nurtured by our silent worship. Other religious rituals, such as Catholic mass; or Protestant orders of worship that include music, readings and a sermon; or Muslims kneeling in recitation of prayer; or indigenous people acknowledging the Four Directions are unique examples of how we define ourselves and values and express our ritualized practice of a Holy presence. And perhaps the most important of rituals are the universals of honoring birth, death, or rites of other momentous passages in our lives. Again the primary purpose of solemn, spiritual rituals is to establish a pattern of prescribed (if ever evolving) practices as part of emotionally and spiritually nurturing and maintaining a precious, sacred part of our communal lives.

And then there are family, seasonal, national or club rituals, among others. When we think about the most cherished of our personal traditions we are especially grateful for the connections and memories that evoke particular times of celebrations that we never forget: passing a driving test with high fives from friends and family; honoring and celebrating the natural, planetary rituals of the solstice or equinox; baby’s first steps; singing our favorite family songs together at holidays;  grace before dinner - the list goes on. What are the most memorable rituals in your life? In what ways are they important to you? How can we more adequately recognize and honor opportunities to name and celebrate an important, repeated event in our lives as a ritual?

We most often live in swirl of busy, daily lives. But our lives would be well served when we recognize and practice rituals that connect us to each other and to our sacred remembrances. As I tried to imagine the thoughts and perhaps communal prayers of the tribal canoeists during their ritual pilgrimage, I also imagined them honoring and confirming an ancient sense of belonging to each other, their heritage and their gratitude for the water, sky, sun and earth that support their existence. May their witness and their ritual be sustained into many more generations.

Peace,
Tom