This theory of liturgy is not institutionally or theologically religious. It precedes but then underlies all those kinds of ceremony. It is immanental, meaning that it assumes that sacredness wells up through place, and it is sensory which means that the consciousness dynamics are evoked through sense images that are familiarly local and significant. Words, music, movement, and whatever other elements (smell, food, special clothing, flowers, management of light) need to be organized and presented in ways that put the participants into liminal neurospace. The framework might be considered by those people to be “secular” as at a “rave” or at a patriotic fireworks display or as an opening for a bucking bull rodeo competition. (For the uninitiated, these days such once spontaneous events are now preceded by announcements, rock music, smoke, moving colored lights, and a procession of the contestants.)
Clearly the culture, which is based on the ecosystem if it has been there long enough, will guide the liturgical choices for evocation. Most people have not much thought about “local theology” which is why Robert Schreiter’s book is so valuable. The book is not just the work of an individual, but a carefully thought out account of discussions by informed persons over a period of time. Therefore, I won’t try to duplicate what is there. Nevertheless, bringing up a few angles might help before I begin to discuss examples.
Often there is an interaction of familiar historical ceremonies with their assumptions, but occasionally there might an urgent need to symbolize a change. Feminism hit the Unitarian Universalism congregations in the mid-Seventies. One of the first liturgical innovations was simply the resolve to change the words in the hymnals which were rife with “man” because of the humanist approach. (Jesus Christ had already been removed.) First it was necessary to figure out what new word to use, which had to be gender-inclusive but only one syllable. I often used “folk.” “One” worked sometimes, but sounded a little pretentious. “We” and “us” sometimes fit. But the real liminal moment came when clusters of women gathered after church to write-in corrections. As they took hold of the very books that offended them and changed them, they felt empowered by solidarity.
In another dimension, the need for innovation meant that UU’s sometimes raided other traditions for readings. They wouldn’t say “man” but they try to say unpronounceable names of other people’s religions. Some weddings completely lost the moment of vows in among the candles lit and snuffed, the sips of wine and vinegar, the mixing of sugar and salt, the exchange or distribution of flowers.
If there is a known and accepted theology, it is easy to convert it into a Black Mass by simple reversal or by literal concreteness. People here were once shocked by someone who entered a vacated and deteriorating 19th century Catholic school building to leave a freshly killed lamb on the altar, not in worship but in mockery. Fanatic people cause themselves to be crucified -- is that true to devotion or does it empty the meaning by too-vivid reality?
Communion is so central and yet simple that it can be used many ways to make a statement, like the female seminary student whose tradition prevented her from offering communion, so she offered bread and water -- then it was technically NOT communion. Once people begin to think about such matters, there are major implications in whether communion wafers can be accepted into hands instead of open mouths, whether bread should be a whole loaf broken instead of unleavened crackers, whether recipients should kneel or stand. Often there are historical reasons and precedents. I always like the theory that a napkin was kept over the chalice of communion wine because when the communicants had to hide in the Roman catacombs things commonly found on the ceilings of caves were liable to fall in. The practice is an old confrontation between the sanitary and the obscene that can act as an awakening when things get too precious. The napkin is not just elegant.
Some theological systems run along parallel, maybe one of them secretly or simply not recognized for what it is, which is how the Bundle-Keeping ceremonies of the Blackfeet managed to survive. It was so different from pow-wows that white people didn’t know it was anything. Some systems pull two religions together, one way or another, patchworked or blended, like Santeria or Rastafaria -- half-Caribbean, half-African. Some theological sacred systems are emptied by commercial forces and this has happened to as many Native American acts (Dream catchers? Kachinas?) as to Christmas and Easter.
The local Blackfeet re-invigorate old Christian ideas. The life-sized corpus on the cross at the altar of the Little Flower Catholic Church in Browning acquires a golden garment at Christmas. At Easter the parishioners turn out to carry a cross from Browning to Starr School (about ten miles), at a time often cold and snowy. They also still commemorate the Baker Massacre and the Flood of 1965 with a blend of elements, maybe in a Christian order of service but with Blackfeet “rawhide orchestra” drummers and a mix of prayers in English and Blackfeet. Maybe tobacco.
A question that has interested many is whether the idea of an immanental and local sacrality arising from the land can be extended to the whole planet in a new universally shared liturgy. The idea of Gaea -- the planet as a woman or goddess -- has a lot of appeal. Many are pointing out that the concepts of science, particularly cosmology and physics, are becoming increasingly potent in terms of a morality of behavior, but most of all in imagery and music. (Space music. Trance music. Roots music.) The many glowing images from space impress us more than a naked tortured man.
Deep attention is needed to reconcile the desire for peace -- which is universal until one tries to define what it means -- and the desire for protective power (again a problem to define) that has to be guarded from becoming war. Categories such as “sanctuary,” “human rights,” “love,” “justice” must be defined over and over -- not in terms of concepts but as actions, a way of life. Goals can be shared without anyone agreeing to or even envisioning a way of getting there.
Religion is sometimes not at all practical, like the traditions that require a grown man to carry a ritual dagger or a woman to wear a burka. It’s time to take the magic sexual potency out of a rhino horn now that a pill works. In a time of overpopulation of the entire planet, why doesn’t the Pope say something about Viagra? Government regulations or church rules affect decisions far less than a meaningful awareness of conception. Commercial forces can arouse the desire to have a baby. Liminal realizations can arouse the desire to protect the planet. Realizations found in liminal meditation can prompt reconciliations in individual hearts. It is not rules, but felt meanings that can change the world.
SENSE MEMORY
In the beginning I was reflecting on my own moments of intense “valorization” to use Eliade’s word. When I preached about this, people would come up after the service to tell me about their own intense moments. They wanted to know what they meant. Now and then I would manage a liturgy that seemed to connect people to that feeling. What was going on? A classmate asked me, “How do you DO that?” Mostly I was drawing on theatre experience and Blackfeet ceremonies. Thus the need to develop a “technology of the spiritual.” This is a bare beginning.
Feelings are recorded in the brain by attaching them to the sensory impulses in that moment of the Felt. This is why a sense impact (smell, musical phrase) can call up a whole emotional moment from the past. It’s the coding, the filing for later access, in the brain. The newest theory is that this happens by something called “quantum tunneling.” I won’t even attempt to explain but you could look it up.
Consciousness shifts all the time, adjusting to new perceptions coming in -- new decisions and resulting behavior bring more information. Much of these perceptions is processed below our awareness. Stephen Pinker suggests that the importance of consciousness in evolution is that it supports language so that perceptions can be shared with other people, supporting cooperation. Any patterned sensory construct (e.g. art form -- whether it’s spoken, sung, printed, painted or sculpted, danced, architecture, film or even some games) can convey a consciousness or persuade a person to enter a consciousness domain that taps underlying assumptions about the world: the architecture of the brain. The “floor” and “foundation” might be acquired by the brains of all humans. Others will depend on the individual circumstances of the person in their culture. Liturgy, then, is a patterned sensory construct that reaches deep (liminal) levels of brain processing, evoking felt meaning.
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