Reverence: Language or Spirit?

The memorial service gathered many stories of the life of my elder friend, and they were told, as is our custom, both in an organized way from the pulpit and in a spontaneous way from the gathered people. It was also a demonstration of the "language of reverence" conversation we Unitarian Universalists are having, and for me, a rather uncomfortable one. Jane was an old-style humanist and social activist, despite being a maker of quilts and a source of wisdom about parenting. Spirituality of the churchy kind was not her own thing, though in her own way, her life was a prayer and a celebration of the gift of spirit. Church was for gathering, sharing, for getting about the business of raising families, making quilts, and seeing to the advancement of justice in the world.

I was struck by the disconnect between her way of church and the tone of the service. I was seated near one of the older women I had known when as a high school student I sang in the choir. When we were invited to join hands at the end, she leaned over to her companion and whispered, "this is why I don't come to church any more." Jane was of the same school. So I felt a little sad with the naming of "God" the saying of "amen", the offering of prayer, the suggestion that she and her husband might be "up there somewhere looking down" and sending us their love. Surely, when we gather a theologically diverse group for a memorial service, we know how to honor those who have different ways. Surely we know how to offer words of that speak of diversity and inclusion, ways that don't simply assume all of it is all right with everyone.

Somehow the reverence didn't extend to offering a service that would have pleased the one it honored. I would have preferred an open acknowledgment that we were remembering one of the ones who didn't do "the language of reverence" as it is practiced in these times, one who, by attending more to her life than to fancy words, became one of the most remarkable people anyone could remember. In my heart, it will be so.