Two years ago, when our daughter was two-and-a-half, we took her to the community Maundy Thursday service. It was held at a Lutheran church that I love dearly because they collectively look away from their watches and phones for as long as it takes on Sunday morning (or, in this case, Thursday night) to go through all four readings of the day, to chant at every opportunity, to kneel and bow, to get the bread and wine into the hands of every congregant, to offer healing prayer and sprinkling of water no matter how long the line or how late the hour.
My strange, religious self, though uncomprehending, loves all this ritual and its eschewal of clock-watching. Our 2-year-old daughter, though she didn’t watch clocks either, was not as eager as I was for the long, slow service on that Maundy Thursday. We made a few trips to and from the nursery, but she didn’t want to stay there. She opted for the sanctuary, with me, where she proceeded to color and talk and wiggle and whine.
Maundy Thursday services remember Jesus’ last evening spent with his disciples before his death the next day, on what is now called Good Friday. Many Maundy Thursday services rehearse two of Jesus’ last acts in particular: a meal of bread and wine, and foot washing. Churches do foot washing in a number of different ways. The Lutheran church that hosted that year’s service invited folks forward to strip off socks and shoes and take a seat at one of the wash basins. Then one of the pastors washed their feet.
I asked our daughter if she wanted to have her feet washed. She wasn’t sure. “It’s up to you,” I said, “but if you want to, you can. It’ll feel nice.”
She followed me forward and watched as I took my turn at the basin. I do not particularly like this practice; I am exceedingly ticklish, my feet especially, and sometimes it’s all I can do to avoid kicking whatever poor soul is doing the washing. Plus, I have weird feet. But I do it anyway, for the same not-quite-clear reason I do a lot of religious rituals, because I trust that something about the practice will form me in ways I probably can’t even predict.
I survived my foot bath; more importantly, so did Pastor Ken, the lucky washer assigned to me. And then I asked our daughter again if she wanted a turn. She still wasn’t sure, but I told her she could sit on my lap and this seemed to make her feel a little better. We returned to the basin, and I sat down again, this time presenting her perfect feet to be washed. She sat quietly while Ken poured the water and washed and patted them dry. And then I helped her back into her shoes and we returned to our seats.
It was a sweet moment, for sure, but there were another 30-plus minutes of service to go. We made it. Barely. And then we went home and gratefully to bed.
But our daughter talked about Ken washing her feet for an entire year. An entire year, until it was Maundy Thursday again, and we got to go back to the Lutheran church, and she got to sit again on my lap in front of a basin. She remembered all year long.
Other parts of Holy Week--Good Friday, the day we remember Jesus’ death; Holy Saturday, when we try to resist drowning out the silence of a godforsaken world; Easter Sunday, when we celebrate the unlikeliest day of the Christian year by madly claiming that Jesus beat out even death--made impressions upon our 2-year-old too, though admittedly not so deeply as the touch of hands and water on her small, smooth feet. But she remembered all of it. She didn’t necessarily remember the story; she certainly couldn’t articulate all the meanings (as if any of us could), but she remembered the deeply sensory experiences of the rituals of this holiest week.
In this way, our daughter, as usual, gives me hints about the rest of us, myself included. Surely she is not the only one deeply imprinted by ritual; she just happens to be more transparent in her memories and thought processes. (For instance, for that year, whenever we would mention Pastor Ken, she’d make the connection out loud: “The Pastor Ken who washed my feet?”) Surely I am imprinted by my own rituals too. And maybe that’s a hint to why I keep them when I don’t always know what they mean, or if I like what they mean, or if I believe what they mean.
If our daughter's experience hints toward the power of ritual, it also offers a warning: I’d better make sure that the practices of our every day--the things we do again and again, often without thought--are offering the kind of formation I want in my children’s lives. I don’t just mean church. I also mean toothbrushing and bathing, snuggling and spacing, greetings and goodbyes, mealtimes, bedtimes, all the sometimes-mind-numbing incessance of our days. If she remembers the once a year water on her feet, surely the patterns of our life--our sitting down, our rising up, our sleeping and waking--are literally forming who she is and will be.
We will do it imperfectly, as we have been reminded all through Lent and every day, but may we strive to do it all with the cool gentleness of water on skin, hands on feet, with love.
My strange, religious self, though uncomprehending, loves all this ritual and its eschewal of clock-watching. Our 2-year-old daughter, though she didn’t watch clocks either, was not as eager as I was for the long, slow service on that Maundy Thursday. We made a few trips to and from the nursery, but she didn’t want to stay there. She opted for the sanctuary, with me, where she proceeded to color and talk and wiggle and whine.
Maundy Thursday services remember Jesus’ last evening spent with his disciples before his death the next day, on what is now called Good Friday. Many Maundy Thursday services rehearse two of Jesus’ last acts in particular: a meal of bread and wine, and foot washing. Churches do foot washing in a number of different ways. The Lutheran church that hosted that year’s service invited folks forward to strip off socks and shoes and take a seat at one of the wash basins. Then one of the pastors washed their feet.
I asked our daughter if she wanted to have her feet washed. She wasn’t sure. “It’s up to you,” I said, “but if you want to, you can. It’ll feel nice.”
She followed me forward and watched as I took my turn at the basin. I do not particularly like this practice; I am exceedingly ticklish, my feet especially, and sometimes it’s all I can do to avoid kicking whatever poor soul is doing the washing. Plus, I have weird feet. But I do it anyway, for the same not-quite-clear reason I do a lot of religious rituals, because I trust that something about the practice will form me in ways I probably can’t even predict.
I survived my foot bath; more importantly, so did Pastor Ken, the lucky washer assigned to me. And then I asked our daughter again if she wanted a turn. She still wasn’t sure, but I told her she could sit on my lap and this seemed to make her feel a little better. We returned to the basin, and I sat down again, this time presenting her perfect feet to be washed. She sat quietly while Ken poured the water and washed and patted them dry. And then I helped her back into her shoes and we returned to our seats.
It was a sweet moment, for sure, but there were another 30-plus minutes of service to go. We made it. Barely. And then we went home and gratefully to bed.
But our daughter talked about Ken washing her feet for an entire year. An entire year, until it was Maundy Thursday again, and we got to go back to the Lutheran church, and she got to sit again on my lap in front of a basin. She remembered all year long.
Other parts of Holy Week--Good Friday, the day we remember Jesus’ death; Holy Saturday, when we try to resist drowning out the silence of a godforsaken world; Easter Sunday, when we celebrate the unlikeliest day of the Christian year by madly claiming that Jesus beat out even death--made impressions upon our 2-year-old too, though admittedly not so deeply as the touch of hands and water on her small, smooth feet. But she remembered all of it. She didn’t necessarily remember the story; she certainly couldn’t articulate all the meanings (as if any of us could), but she remembered the deeply sensory experiences of the rituals of this holiest week.
In this way, our daughter, as usual, gives me hints about the rest of us, myself included. Surely she is not the only one deeply imprinted by ritual; she just happens to be more transparent in her memories and thought processes. (For instance, for that year, whenever we would mention Pastor Ken, she’d make the connection out loud: “The Pastor Ken who washed my feet?”) Surely I am imprinted by my own rituals too. And maybe that’s a hint to why I keep them when I don’t always know what they mean, or if I like what they mean, or if I believe what they mean.
If our daughter's experience hints toward the power of ritual, it also offers a warning: I’d better make sure that the practices of our every day--the things we do again and again, often without thought--are offering the kind of formation I want in my children’s lives. I don’t just mean church. I also mean toothbrushing and bathing, snuggling and spacing, greetings and goodbyes, mealtimes, bedtimes, all the sometimes-mind-numbing incessance of our days. If she remembers the once a year water on her feet, surely the patterns of our life--our sitting down, our rising up, our sleeping and waking--are literally forming who she is and will be.
We will do it imperfectly, as we have been reminded all through Lent and every day, but may we strive to do it all with the cool gentleness of water on skin, hands on feet, with love.
