Caring Liturgies: The Pastoral Power of Christian Ritual

Description

Caregiving practices in churches often center around listening and giving counsel, making referrals, and creating support groups for specific needs. In Caring Liturgies, Susan Marie Smith proposes that Christian ritual is both a method and a means for helping people through liminal times of transition and uncertainty, even vulnerability and fear. It teaches readers to recognize the ritual needs of fellow Christians and thus create post-baptismal rites of passage and healing that might strengthen and support them in the fulfillment of their ministries. Review "Susan Smith's creative thinking and academic rigor are balanced by her practical pastoral applications to real life challenges of change and transition. Caring Liturgies deals with life's ambiguities and paradoxes well, offering astute pastoral wisdom and clear theological insight in a practical manner. Presenting the idea of ritual as a powerful symbolic expression of liberation and healing, Smith patiently leads the reader through the necessary stages of curiosity and questioning of this methodology to acceptance of this traditional wisdom. I wholeheartedly recommend this book to anyone who yearns for a creative, liberating expression of one's faith in times of turmoil." --Jim Clarke, St John's Seminary, Camarillo, California "Susan Smith skillfully weaves together her pastoral experiences and scholarly knowledge to provide students, pastors, and lay leaders an excellent resource for their work as care givers and creators and leaders of caring liturgies. With Caring Liturgies, Susan Smith has provided communities and their leaders with useful strategies for creating rites that cultivate spiritual growth in times of transition. Her book brings to light through their rituals, caring communities birth hope in the midst of despair and life in the midst of death." --Jill Crainshaw, Wake Forest University From the Inside Flap Caregiving practices in churches often center around listening and giving counsel, making referrals, and creating support groups for specific needs. In Caring Liturgies, Susan Marie Smith proposes that Christian ritual is both a method and a means for helping people through liminal times of transition and uncertainty, even vulnerability and fear. This volume teaches readers to recognize the ritual needs of fellow Christians and thus create post-baptismal rites of passage and healing that might strengthen and support them in the fulfillment of their ministries. The book extends the usefulness of denominational "occasional services" books and other resources by suggesting ways to build a rite around a central symbolic action, pointing out issues of ritual honesty and ethics, and identifying skills and attributes necessary to preparing and leading a rite. Numerous narrative examples help to flesh out the principles and illustrate the key argument: that rituals are necessary means to enable human growth and maturity, both through times of suffering and times of transition, and that ritual-making leaders are central to the ongoing health of the church. About the Author Susan Marie Smith, an Episcopal priest and teacher of liturgy, ritual, and preaching, is rector of St. Alban's Episcopal Church in Bexley, Ohio. She received her PhD in liturgy and ritual at the Church Divinity School of the Pacific, Berkeley, and is author of Christian Ritualizing and the Baptismal Process: Liturgical Explorations toward a Realized Baptismal Ecclesiology (2011). Acknowledgments vii Introduction. Worship as Ritual: Understanding and Claiming Ethical Christian Ritual 1 What Is “Ritual”? 1 Four Attributes of Ritual Practice 4 Reasons to Create Caring Liturgies 9 1. Creative Rites: Assessing Pastoral Ritual Need 19 Joanie’s Story 22 The Problem of Resistance 24 Resistance as a Dilemma between Theology and Experience 27 Ritual Creativity: Solving Dilemmas through the Third Way 34 Resistance as Unrecognized Vulnerability and the Need for Empathy 36 2. Ritual Midwives: Planning and Leading Ritual 43 Engaging a Caring, Competent Community for Ritual Planning 43 Four Attributes Necessary for Ritual Planning 46 Roles Necessary to Planning a Ritual 51 Roles Necessary to Conducting a Ritual 53 Speaking or Acting “On Behalf Of” 59 vi Contents 3. Metaphors and Symbols: Linking a Person’s Story to the Christian Story 65 Arriving at a “Defining Metaphor” 66 How Metaphor Works 69 Entering the World of the Metaphor 71 From Metaphor to Symbol 75 From Symbol to Sacrament: The Sacramental Principle 77 Using Symbols Sacramentally 79 People as Symbols 81 Effective Symbols: Symbolic Rupture 84 Using Symbols Ethically 86 4. Ritual Honesty: Holding Truthful Tension 89 Five Aspects of Ritual Honesty 89 1. A Ritual Sets a Dominant Feeling-Tone 91 2. Accommodating a Wide Range of Feelings and Thoughts 93 3. Ritual Symbols Must Be True 99 4. Ritual Involves Everyone Present 101 5. Allowing the Creative Tension of Opposites to Abide Together 103 5. Holy Sacrifice: Mediating the Labor Pains of Change 109 A Brief Christian Midrash on Sacrifice 111 Labor as an Expression and Integration of Holy Sacrifice 115 6. The Paschal Mystery: The Crux of Caring Ritual 123 Centerpiece of Christian Living: The Paschal Mystery of Christ 124 1. Paschal Mystery as Ritual Spirituality of Baptism 128 2. Paschal Mystery as Lens Through Which to See Life 132 3. Paschal Mystery as Both Call and Commitment of the Baptized 133 4. Death to New Life as the Critical Criterion 135 Conclusion 138 Notes 139 Index 147