Liturgical Hope as Public Work

Abstract

My neighbor died recently. His body was discovered in the midst of the severest lock-downs of the pandemic. He died alone, despite the efforts of neighbors to reach out to him, and because of the necessity for social distancing, rumors and misinformation flew up and down our small street. The house sat empty for months and began to take on the reputation of a “haunted house” to the neighborhood’s youth, while adults walked by whispering. In an already fearful climate, the stories that swirled around the house fueled even greater anxiety, uncertainty, and grief. Over texts and phone calls, some of us wrestled with how to support each other in this situation. A simple ritual evolved. One neighbor offered to bring a table to put out on the sidewalk in front of the house. Another offered to bring votive candles. Yet another brought flowers. After getting to know my neighbors better, I wrote a simple, interfaith friendly prayer remembering Eric’s life (not his real name). As people walked by, some of us sat apart on the front lawn, passed out votive candles, and invited people to take them to their own homes, light them at seven o’clock in the evening, and offer a prayer if they wished to do so. We deployed a common time as a unifier for ritual action and remembrance in the hopes that this would help create a sense of shared experience, even as households were separate. We anticipated and hoped that a collective, even if disparate, remembrance would be a comfort to our community. What I didn’t anticipate was the extent to which gathering itself was powerful, even if its focus point was simply that some of us would be present at a flimsy picnic table to dispel misinformation and fear as people walked by. People in the community felt able to ask questions about what had occurred, and we realized how distorted the facts had become, filled in by assumptions and hearsay. We could offer factual information. We could be honest about what we didn’t know. We could create different associations with the space than that of fear. By facilitating a diffuse gathering with a simple liturgy, a deeper public work had begun— one that offered hope in the sense of community and clarity that ameliorated isolation, fear, and half-truths. Leitourgia is often referred to as “the work of the people,” and yet as a number of liturgical scholars have clarified, a more accurate meaning is that of “public work.” Edward Foley offers this observation: