“Thin Places” are an ancient notion of places (and, I believe, times and experiences) where the barriers between this seen, tangible, touchable, understandable world and the unseen, spirit-filled, intangible, ineffable world seem weaker than elsewhere. In Celtic spirituality, certain locations felt like gateways to the other worlds; certain groves seemed to be where the other realities were just on the other side of the trees, like if you went through you would find yourself in another dimension. C.S. Lewis’ wardrobe is a thin place between England and Narnia. Butler Bass grew up in Arizona, where the expanse of desert and expanse of sky touched, earth and heaven kissing lightly, a place where the barrier between expected and normal and the unexpected was razor thin.
Certain times have the threshold between realities get really thin, too. Traditionally, All Saints Day is one of them. I have no idea whether there is something about this time midway between seasons where things are thinner and closer or whether we just notice the closeness that is always here because we’ve grown accustomed to allowing ourselves to feel it on the first of November. It probably doesn’t matter.
Non-scientific cultures don’t have as much problem with realities of matter and spirit intruding on each other or interconnecting or overlapping or interacting than we of European Enlightment descent. I wonder if the current over-doing of Halloween is an unformed effort to reaquaint ourselves with those suppressed aspects of mystery and non-rational energy out there. Of course, it gets overlaid with silliness and too much sugar and too much mock-gore and too much commercialism, but those are also ways of exerting control over the very uncontrollable features of death and life interwoven!
The important part of All Saints Sunday is the recognition of the generations of Christian souls who have made us who we are, individually and congregationally, and to mark the passing of people precious to us. Our foundations as Christians are deep in the past with the work and witness of imaginative and famous spirits and the work witness of “just plain” Christian folks, and it is all sorts whom we celebrate. Some have passed over that threshold in the last year, and we remember them specifically in worship. Yet we also can use this observance as a reminder of individuals dear to us and thank God for their presence in our lives.
November also brings us Veterans Day or Remembrance Day or Armistice Day, depending on your country, marking the end of the Great War (World War I) on the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month in 1918. If you go to a national cemetery or a battlefield park, you can also sense the thinness of those places, places where death and life touch, places of memory and loss and gratitude, places where the best and the worst, the past and the future coexist. We will have the traditional poppy flowers next week on the communion table to commemorate Remembrance Day just as we commemorate All Saints this week with reading names.
Even in our Protestant tradition, we understand that there are times and places that feel liminal, feel like the boundaries are more permeable there and then, whether we consider those experiences spooky or deeply spiritual. Faith gives us a way to hold realities together, to let the secular and sacred touch, to kiss. Communion is one moment, a sanctuary is one place. May we place our hands and hearts on the thin places of God’s universe, and learn from them.
In Christ,
David
Speaking of time: remember to set your clocks back for the end of Daylight Saving Time at 2 am Sunday!
Texts For Sunday Worship:
From the Hebrew Bible Joshua 3:7-17
From the Epistle 1 Thessalonians 2:9-13
From the Gospels Matthew 23:1-12
No comments:
Post a Comment
Share your thoughts on this post in a spirit of love for God, yourself, and each other. All comments are checked before posting. While you may post anonymously, we encourage you to leave your name!