Musings of a village priest

If you’ve been reading my blog, you know that I have just returned from Sweden. Before I moved to California at the age of 40, the only Christmases I’d spent away from home had been in Sweden. And they do Christmas. I am totally charmed by Swedish Christmas (never mind that they all believe that every town is filled with Christmas trees the size of the one in Rockefeller Center and that people walk around in cloaks, bonnets and top hats singing Christmas carols every night.)

Because for so many years, they have been a mono-culture, there are literally thousands to hundreds of years of history of doing things in a certain way. This is slowly changing, somewhat uncomfortably in some cases, as Sweden becomes a land with more and more immigrants. There are many customs blended from their Pagan and Lutheran pasts which enrich their lives.

Christmas is a three day holiday. The first two, Christmas Eve and Christmas Day are spent quietly with family (not shopping until midnight). More people will go to midnight services on Christmas Eve than any other service during the year. Occasionally people will dress in the traditional costumes of their region. At country churches people might still show up in sleigh if the weather is right.

One of the customs they keep at home, as well as in the churches, is the advent wreath. For them, this is not a particularly religious custom, despite its origins. Rather, it symbolizes the light that bravely shines in the darkness. Every night you burn your (accumulating) candle(s) until Christmas arrives. On each of the four Sundays before Christmas (Christmas Eve could be the fourth), a candle is lit. The candle from the week before is lit again, as it has been lit every night at twilight since that Sunday. Finally 4 candles shine bravely against the night.

The Swedes are quick to point out that Spain has a much higher suicide rate than they do and that the myth of darkness of the day and darkness of the soul is being debunked. But in the dark, candles in a window are a wonderful beacon.

The Swedes don’t bother with the purple candles that the American churches have adapted. Rather they light their white candles as a reminder that light will return. It is not the only festival of lights, in this region, but it is a wonderful one.

On my religious journey, there are many things I have left behind. Advent is not one of them. For me, it symbolizes the soft stillness of the dark. It celebrates anticipation of the change even while it waits patiently through the long and starry night. I find it cozy and comforting and infinitely homely.

It is a season of warm drinks and contemplation. It is a time of shared quiet, as people gather in the room where the candles are lit.

In agricultural societies, this was a time when you reflected on the bounty of the last harvest, as you sorted through the seeds for the coming year. It was a time to tell stories while you patched up, fixed up and perhaps even caught up with that mountain of tasks.

For us, it can be a time to ruminate on what exactly you have within you that you might choose to gestate this year. What precious thing lies within you that you might sit with a while? What are you contemplating? What story are you telling?

So, make yourself a wreath of evergreens and find four white candles. Focus on a great possibility… or a very tiny one and contemplate how the world might be different if you were to bring that thing to fruition. Light one candle.

Tomorrow I’ll write about what that candle has come to signify in today’s Christianity and how you might use that in your own life if the Christian meanings don’t quite fit… or even if they do.

Reflections On The Thanksgiving Table©2007
Ann Keeler Evans, M.Div.

The faint clink of silver on china
The sharp snap of crystal against wood
The soft echo of laughter from voices now stilled,
These things I remember.
Soft linen napkins
Too many people crammed into
Someone’s tiny apartment somewhere.
Rain-slicked streets 53 stories down.
The California fog.
That amazing snow in the Swedish countryside.
My house, your house:
These, I remember, as well.

Many’s the time
We gave thanks at table
For pleasures both simple and complex.
Today your smiles haunt me
As does the notion of
A perfect cornmeal apple stuffing.
I miss the easy slide
From politics to pinots.
Your artful table settings
And carefully crafted seating charts
Never really transformed
The hodgepodge groupings
Of family and friends —
Why should they? How could they?
We gathered in celebration of abundance —
Not order.

Sometimes it feels that
Too many of the joys
Of Thanksgivings gone by
Are themselves gone by and ghostly.
But still, thanks are offered by
A gracious plenty:
I am not alone in thanksgiving.
And whensoever I eat this bread
Or drink this wine
I do so in remembrance of you.

But I intimated earlier that there were places where I wouldn’t have wanted everything to be the same. There is in small tradition rich lands the sense of knowing what comes next that is comforting.

For my sake, however, I miss, as I always miss the personal. Who was this person that died? While the sense of the universal helps one to place one’s private losses in perspective with the great cycles of life, it doesn’t do anything to address the particular. Of course everyone dies, but why exactly my husband, mother, child? And who was that person who transformed my life?

The deceased is and will always be far more than “the deceased.” He or she is the beloved dead. They had characteristics and ways about them that made them essentially them. When we say goodbye to those we have lost, I think we must say goodbye to that particular person, in a way that makes sense to them.

Religion’s job is to tie life to the universal to the myth that sustains faith that life will continue. That can be a comfort and a support as in the midst of one’s grief one can wonder if the spring will ever arrive again, either figuratively or literally. But what of that special scent — a combination of tobacco and peppermint? What of those strong beloved hands, never at rest? What of the sly joke or the soothing comment?

I believe, as one who celebrates the dead, that those are things that should be celebrated at the memorial or funeral. In this way they can be called to the front of one’s memory and not forced to linger on the edges of your mind trying to make themselves a place. We owe it to the dead to continue their personality and their wisdom, where it’s appropriate.

So at this funeral, I was glad to be able to provide a personal knowledge of this woman. But I challenge those who say, well, no one who hasn’t known the dead can be that personal. This is our job: to find the stories, the movements, the amusements that made up a life before we move to stand beside a coffin. There will come a time for every celebrant when we must say “I never knew Henry, but this is what I have been told.” And then tell the stories in such a way that the living can recognize the one they’ve lost.

I suspect it helps to view them in your questioning as part of the living, rather than as part of the dearly departed. No one tells the silly or naughty joke on the angels. But they are so willing to tell them on John, or Mary, or Kendall. That’s who the priests must “get the goods on” so that we can deliver the “goods” when the family most needs to hear it. “Ah, remember grandpa? How he always kept his apple tree pruned, or his pipe trimmed, or his exercise current? Remember?”

To insert the living and the different into the traditional is a delicate work but a worthwhile one. The results it gives can comfort and support a family through a long tough period of grieving. To assign tasks to folk — to plant flowers, to eat certain foods, to volunteer for a charity, to play a certain game, this gives us all something to DO when we most need it. It gives us a way to take that person into our life and give them heartroom. The heart is a house of many chambers, and there is always room for one more beloved dead.

And then, as you particularize and individualize those you’ve lost, lean on the ancient traditions to honor and heal your broken heart.

Does it seem like I’m idealizing? Well, yes and no. A later post will address some problems I struggle with here. But here comes another: “Well, doesn’t that make life easy?” column. Or perhaps a: “Well, doesn’t that make death easy?” column. We had Lizzie’s funeral yesterday afternoon. Here were the things that worked:

1. The chapel: here in this town of 22,000, in the midst of this cemetery, was a chapel used for memorials. I believe (and I’ll check) that this chapel is used for both religious and “civil” burials. (Yes, that’s how they divide them up here! Ours, since I’m an ordained minister, was a religious service, so even though I’m not a priest in the State Church, we got to use the organist and the pipe organ. The chapel is a gorgeous creation, acoustically perfect, with murals designed and executed by a local artist. It was incredible space to perform a ritual and a wonderful place to say goodbye.
2. There’s no confusion about saying goodbye. In the midst of the funeral, people come up to lay a flower on the coffin. You stand until you’re finished and then bow to the deceased. No one hurries you. No one crowds you — there’s quite a wide invisible line between you and the next person in line. The funeral home ensures that there are enough flowers of your choice for the family members to place on the casket. People outside the intimate family bring their own flowers to the funeral. So each person who attends the funeral has work to do before arriving.
3. The eldest son, or the eldest male in the family, if there is no son, wears a white tie. This signifies his assumption of family responsibilities.
4. After the funeral the guests are invited to a luncheon. Each guest must call the funeral home the week before to sign up. Such a luncheon is typically an open-faced sandwich with juice and light beer and cake and coffee. Again, this is something that reaches across all social levels so there’s never the sense you have to do more for your dead as there sometimes is in the US.
5. At the lunch, it is usually the priest who reads all the condolence cards. If, as in this case, contributions were sent a charity, the charity-of-choice notifies the funeral home about who made contributions. The funeral home prints up papers to be read by the priest. (Although in this case, since the priest — me — was more or less family AND not Swedish, the oldest son read the papers. My Swedish isn’t good enough to speak publicly off the cuff!)
6. Everybody, even sulky teenage boys, regardless of social status, knows how to shake hands, look you in the eye and either give or accept condolences.
7. And then for family and very close friends, it’s back to the house for more substantial food and different kind of drinks.
8. Every family, whether for this occasion or some other, has a designated driver.
9. And here’s a big one. Everyone pays a 0.03 percent tax that pays for your burial. So many horrible options are averted. Of course we come from a country with no interest in socialized medicine so it’s hard to imagine that there would be an interest in socialized burial. But it’s a huge thing not to have to think about whether you can afford to bury your mother.

None of the above changes the family problems nor eases the pain of loss, but they do give one a sense of comfort. It is helpful to have a path to walk that is familiar. There weren’t any problems doing things differently, but there was a relief that “ah, that’s what even the rich cousins did and oh, we can do the same thing.” Nothing was too outlandish or unreachable. Everything was dignified but not too stiff. There were some very, very sweet moments.

My love affair with Swedish ritual continued last night.

Whenever I come back to Kristinehamn, ever since I was a teenager, I have gone to swim in the community bathhouse. They have a 25-meter pool in a large glass room. It’s fun to swim there even during the coldest winter days, because the sun (when there is sun!) comes streaming in. Then of course there are the showers where you sit and scrub down with brushes or stand and scrub down with brushes before you go and sit in the bastu (Swedish word for sauna, a Finnish word). A brisk swim (picture circles of Swedes, leisurely swimming a thousand meters of breast stroke), an even brisker scrub (off with the swimsuits!) and a long sit in the bastu. When the men go in a group, they are always smart enough to take a couple light beers with them and there they sit until their skin starts to glow. It’s an invigorating and relaxing experience. I’m not sure why the women haven’t latched on to the beer klatch, but most women I’ve seen there have a pretty good time whether in a group or on their own!

I hadn’t gotten over to swim so far in this visit. Lorraine and Kjell and Erik and I aren’t together often enough to take our time together for granted. It gets so easy, especially on grey and chilly November evenings, to settle into the couch with a cup of tea and one of Lorraine’s homemade sweet rolls. There we luxuriate in the lovely, easy habits of friendships, built up slowly over the years.

But this evening I was determined to swim. Lorraine and Kjell were going out to gym class, and I was going to take advantage of the time off. I left Erik making the last corrections to Lizzie’s memorial service and walked over the canal bridge. Continuing down the other side of the canal, I came to the bathhouse. When I arrived, I discovered that it was Cozy Wednesday at the pool. The lights in the pool were on, but the overheads were off. Candelabra were scattered around the pool area on tables with tablecloths woven in typically Swedish patterns. Votive candles rimmed the Physical Therapy pool. Chamber music dofted through the speakers. When people talked at all, it was quietly. Laughter was a soft echo throughout the chamber.

My shoulder didn’t allow me to swim all summer, so I had no idea how far I would be able to swim. But it was amazing. On and on I forged, until my 1000 meters were finished (let’s hear it for the away team!). Who could know how encouraging, soft light, soft music and companionable silence could be?

In this sad but comfortable time of mourning and catching up on life with dear friends, this little ritual added another piece of magic to my life. Even in loss, it’s hard to escape the richness of life and its blessings.