Saturday, October 24, 2020

Creating Something Special (and Socially Distanced) for All Saints

How can we create something special for a worship community that can't gather in person?  I'm thinking specifically of All Saints Sunday, but this question seems essential to our time.

Disability activists would remind us that the question has always been essential but that many of us had the privilege of being able to avoid wrestling with it.

So, if we wanted to create something special for All Saints, what might we create?  If we wanted it to be participatory, what would we create?

I've thought of mailing something to all of our members, a care package of sorts.  I saw one person post about plans to send all the odds and ends of Christmas eve candles to members along with a liturgy of remembrance that could be done alone or with families/other pandemic pod members.  But the thought of addressing all those envelopes and getting everything mailed overwhelms me.  After all, there's not much time before All Saints Sunday on November 1.

Our church does drive through communion, and I've thought of having some sort of special package to hand out.  But that does eliminate the participation of those who can't get to drive through communion.

The other vision I've had involves setting up a meditative space on the church grounds.  In past years, we've had a table where people could bring pictures of lost loved ones.  I wouldn't think that people would want to do that.

I have a vision of a Day of the Dead type altar--we have an outdoor barbecue in the back.   It's made  out of cinderblocks and hasn't been used as a barbecue in years, if not decades.  Could that be transformed?

Here's a picture that I found by way of a Google search; It first appeared in this article in Los Angeles Magazine:



I could do the initial transformation by Friday, and then people could come during the week-end or send something that we'd add to the altar.  I could create some sort of video something that could be sent to members who can't get to the site.

Of course, the potential problem might be vandalism.  But I'd create it with cheap materials, and even if someone stole them, I wouldn't care.

In a different time, I'd invite people to bring a picnic and maybe we could start a different kind of All Saints tradition.  But that will not be this year.

Let me also wonder if I'm appropriating the traditions of a culture that's not mine.  Yes, in some ways, I am.  I'm a descendent of immigrants from northern Europe--this tradition is not mine.  Yet my hope would be that if we could do this in a respectful manner, that it might be meaningful, both for those of us who never had this experience and for those in the community who might be happy to have this opportunity, this temporary monument to memory.


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