Rites of Passage in a Secular World
Love, like a carefully loaded ship,
crosses the gulf between the generations.
Therefore we do not neglect the ceremonies
of our passage, when we wed, when we die,
and when we are blessed with a child.
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (1900–1944)
The following scenarios are familiar to many people in the Western world:
•A group of youngsters gather around a decorated cake; the candles have been lit, and the birthday boy or girl takes a big breath and blows out the candles.
•It is a wedding, and a speech by the best man has just ended. The guests stand and raise their glasses. “The bride and groom!” is the toast.
•A mother has recently given birth to her first child, Adam, and there is an informal family gathering. The father has bought an apple tree and dug a hole in the ground. As the family members watch, the mother plants the sapling, and younger members of the family enthusiastically fill in the hole. “This is for Adam and for all of us to enjoy,” the mother says.
•A small company of family and friends gather around an open grave, and an urn containing the last earthly remains of one loved by them all is lowered into the grave. A worship leader says the ancient words “Into God’s keeping we commit our sister here departed.”
The birthday, wedding, birth, and funeral ceremonies of which these scenarios form a part are found in the life patterns of peoples all over the world. In rural India, a family group gathers around the body of a loved one who died earlier in the day. A priest and family members join in prayers to mark the end of his life. They will meet again following the cremation for a final rite of farewell.
The rituals are different, the religious content or lack of it varies, and the cultural, economic, and geographic circumstances of the participants may be poles apart. There will be, however, the same need to gather and to mark with words and actions the key moments in the life of members of the human race. The metaphor of “life as a journey” is a good one. As on a road trip you travel from one place to another—stopping for refreshment, to meet friends, and to sleep for the night—so in the journey of life there are significant stopping places along the way and a final destination.
For thousands of years, these rites of passage—the entry of a child into this world; attaining adulthood; marriage of two people for love or for the economic good of their families; and the death of a person—were marked first and foremost by religious rituals. Even those with little or no religious faith or without allegiance to a church or faith group would seek to be married in a “sacred” sanctuary and to have their child baptized in the gathering place of a faith community. They would also expect to have a religious service when they died.
Times have changed, and with the growth of secularism and with a loss of the fear, respect, and love of God (Holy One, Higher Power), the long-felt need for religious ceremonies to celebrate the rites of passage has declined. And so in the West the baby shower is more likely to be a family feature around the birth of a baby than baptism by a minister or priest; the marriage ceremony is more likely to be on a beach in the Dominican Republic than in the local church; and a celebration of life will often be a gathering at a sports or community centre rather than at a church.
The need to celebrate the rites of passage, however, is as important as ever, and the death of a person will be significantly and ceremoniously marked within the family and friendship circle even if it is not accompanied by religious rites as in former days. A recent visit to our small-town post office where all deaths are posted revealed five notices of deaths and five celebrations either designated or planned, but not a single religious service or celebration.
The contemporary worship leader has to be ready with an answer for the person who asks, “Can you help me with a celebration of life that has no religious content?” or “My friend/loved one/family member specifically said that she didn’t want a church service, but we want to remember her as family and friends together. What do you suggest?”
To abandon the religious funeral service with its hope of a blessed life after this one ends for a simple time of thanksgiving and leave-taking is nothing less than a radical change in the way human beings have regarded death for countless centuries. The worship leader is challenged by this situation. The expectations of those who call on him to help them through the bereavement experience may not match the worship leader’s expectations or training. Worship leaders will expect to respond to the dying person and to the celebration or funeral service with a Christian approach, but may find that this will be all right “As long as you don’t mention God or Jesus in all this” (to quote a family member who approached me to conduct a service).
One valid response is simply to affirm your roots in a specific faith tradition, e.g., “I am trained as a worship leader in the Christian church and am not comfortable with conducting secular services or celebrations. I will try to find you someone who is able to help.”
If there is a person in the area who conducts non-religious celebrations, then you can make a referral to this secular celebrant. She will have the non-faith resources appropriate for an end-of-life celebration and the experience of celebrating without a specific faith perspective.
If you are new to a community, it is good to make enquiries with area clergy, local funeral homes, and at the central hospital to see if they have names and contact information for secular celebrants. Unfortunately, in many areas it will be difficult or expensive to find a secular celebrant, so this approach may not prove practical.
The request to preside at a secular celebration may come from a family member who is a long-time member of your faith community. “Other family members are not religious, but I know you and I trust you, and we don’t want a ‘stranger’ presiding at this final ritual of our loved one. What can you do for us?”
The request may come from someone who has been a congregant at one of the services where you were the officiating minister and has felt that it was an inspiring or meaningful rite of passage, or the person asking for your help may be looking for someone/anyone who is willing to preside at a celebration in memory of their loved one.
These and other approaches for a secular celebration all need to be taken seriously. There is value in telling the family members that you may be willing to help them, and that you may or may not be able to create a suitable service or celebration, but that you need to check out what this means for them and for yourself before you decide. Some of the questions you pose directly or indirectly to the family may be these:
•What are the most important elements in the funeral or celebration of life for you?
•What are the most important elements in the funeral or celebration of life for close family members?
•What elements of the service—readings, hymns, theological concepts or words describing God—would you not want to form a part of the service? (Do you believe in an afterlife or heaven, for example?)
•Was your loved one a member of a faith community? What were his expectations for the service marking the end of his life? Has he left any verbal or written instructions about his funeral/celebration of life?
•At what location do you see this celebration taking place and why is this location significant?
•Would a time of celebration following a meal, at which family members or friends speak about their loved one, be an appropriate way to celebrate her life? (In this situation the need may be for an emcee rather than a celebrant.)
Some of the questions that you pose to yourself might be these:
•Are there service elements that the family want to discard that are essential to my own understanding of a funeral, memorial, or life celebration? If so, can I explain this in simple terms to the family members? For example, “It is essential for me to speak of the loss that people are feeling; I can’t just talk of thanksgiving for happy times” or “For this to be a meaningful celebration for me as well as for you, I need to include at least one reading from the Christian scriptures. Shall we look over several of these together?”
•Are there words for God or theological terms that can be stated in simpler language? (e.g., “Resurrection” replaced by “life after death”)
•Bearing in mind the faith community involvement (or lack of it) of the person who has died, what would be a faithful response in terms of the service content and location? How does this mesh with the needs of family members? For example, “Mom was a pillar of the United Church, but her sons who don’t attend worship are more at home in the curling club bar and would like the celebration there. How can we work this out?”
•Is this a celebration of life that would be best carried out by family and friends informally speaking of their loved one after a good meal with a sensitive emcee in charge of the gathering?
•Is there a vital life theme that has a strong theological or biblical basis, but can be developed without making connection to its root in faith? For example, the person who has died may have been the dependable rock of the family circle. If it were a religious service, the connection might be made to the man who built his house on a rock in the parable of Jesus (Matthew 7:24), but where the celebration is secular the powerful theme of a “rock-solid foundation,” with large rocks present in the celebration area and small rocks given to participants could be used to make the point.
This is by no means a comprehensive series of questions, but it will be good to have some at the back of your mind as you talk with the family. You might also ask family members to take a look at examples of secular celebrations you have used in the past. Alternatively, you might show family members elements of a secular service such as those in “Secular Celebrations” or the non-religious celebrations in “Meditation 3” and get them to comment on the selections they like and the selections they do not like and why. Their responses as you review the liturgies together might be something like “This reading is useful,” “I don’t like that affirmation,” or “I would like to modify this committal.”
Through this process of choice, elimination, and modification, you will likely find the form of service that would be helpful for the particular family group you are working with and one that you are comfortably able to use. At the end of the day, if you are able to find a combination of words and readings (sacred and secular), objects and actions that meaningfully celebrate the life’s end of a person in your local community, you will have served that community well and brought recognition to your faith community.
This does not mean that you have to abandon the Christian foundation to which you have been called. It may be helpful, for example, for the family to hear that the theme of loving kindness central to the Christian and Abrahamic (Jewish, Muslim, Christian) traditions will form an integral part of your celebration or service and will be an often unspoken but essential part of the pastoral care as you work with the bereaved family after the service is over.
It is also important to point out to family members that if you are making a statement that arises from your Christian tradition, you will declare it openly in the service. So, “From the viewpoint of the Christian tradition, the work that Louis did in promoting the cause of low-cost housing in our town would be seen as just and vital work.”
However, it will be necessary to assure the family members that the contribution that the deceased person made to his social groups—Rotary Club, Lions Club, his colleagues at work, his friends who have the same hobby—and his family circle will also find a place in the celebration. It is also good to tell family members that the central values that governed their loved one’s life, e.g., generosity, lifelong learning, will also be reflected in the service.
The family will be reassured if you make it clear that although you will be approaching the celebration through the essentially Christian lens of your faith community, you will not be using specifically Christian prayers, readings, or language. They also need to hear that you will not be going out of your way to convert anyone through the celebration or service that you will be creating.
It is all very well and good to discuss secular celebrations in general terms, but what does it mean in practice? A key factor is the language used.
We often use the sung grace “Johnny Appleseed” when our grandchildren are with us:
Oh the Lord is good to me
and so I thank the Lord
for giving me the things I need,
the sun and the rain and the apple seed,
the Lord is good to me,
Johnny Appleseed. Amen.
Imagine our surprise when Nathan, my grandson, said that they had sung the same song before snack time at playschool, “But,” he claimed, “you have been singing the wrong words. They should be…”
Oh the Earth is good to me
and so I thank the Earth
for giving me the things I need,
the sun and the rain and the apple seed,
the Earth is good to me,
Johnny Appleseed. My friend.
The difference is to whom or to what we give our thanks. Is it “God,” or “The Lord,” or is it “Mother Earth,” or simply “The Earth”? If we thank “The Lord,” some would say that we are thanking Jesus who is “The Lord,” but most would say that we are ascribing our thanks to God, whom we sometimes call “The Lord” and who is the creative source of all things—the Mighty Creator who cares for us all and has gracefully given us all we need without asking us for anything in return.
For people of faith, it is traditionally important to name the Name. It is important to give our thanks to God, the Holy One, or the Higher Power, for the life of a family member. For those without a formal faith, thanksgiving does not have to be directed to the Holy One. It is enough to come together with other friends and join in a common thanksgiving time for someone who was a significant person in their lives.
And so, if the person is a member of the Christian faith community, this would be appropriate:
Preface to the Service
We have come together to worship God,
and to give God thanks for (name),
whose life is over.
We have come to share our sense of loss
over a well-loved family member and friend.
His/her presence was there for us in times of testing,
and we are here for his/her loved ones
as they feel their loss.
Give us a good remembrance today,
and send us out encouraged with the hope of the life
that begins when this one ends.
Whereas, if the person had no Christian faith, the following preface, which does not name God or refer to a life to come, would be more appropriate:
Preface to the Service
Celebrant: We have come to this service to celebrate the life of (name) whose life has ended.
All: It is good to be here.
Celebrant: We have come to join with others who knew him/her and loved him/her, to share our memories, and to tell our stories.
All: It is good to be here.
Celebrant: We have come to tell of all we have lost in (name)’s passing, to put our grief into words, and to follow words with actions.
All: It is good to be here.
Celebrant: We have come as family and friends to remember the effect of (name)’s life on each of our lives.
All: It is good to be here.
As worship leader you will not seek to impose a Christian or other faith on anyone at this difficult and vulnerable time. You will prefer to meet the grieving family where they are and with the belief system that they rely on for their life’s journey. Though you will personally see God as the focus of thanksgiving, you will be glad to respond positively to others who are telling stories, finding readings, and remembering the person who has died without mentioning the Holy One or praying in the name of Jesus the Christ.
I have included a section for secular celebrations at the conclusion of chapter 17 and non-religious meditations in chapter 18.
Don’t be surprised if the self-declared, non-religious folk talking to you about the service mention that they would like Psalm 23, or verses from Ecclesiastes chapter 3, or the Gospel of John chapter 14 to be included in the order of service. And don’t be surprised if they request The Lord’s Prayer. These religious staples go beyond their words and content and for some families are part of what makes a “real” funeral. Indeed, the suggestion that these items be included may be the beginning of a fruitful conversation about the faith component of the service.
The same goes for music. The request for “Amazing Grace” does not mean that there is a group of “wretches” in the family longing to be saved. The John Newton favourite is well-known from popular music, and its stirring, haunting melody touches the emotions and brings back memories of past services in ways for which words would fall short. And be ready for requests for modern music that has a strong faith component, e.g., “We Rise Again” by The Rankin Family.
But how will your faith community leadership feel about secular celebrations? A key factor here is your willingness as a worship leader to be open. If you fail to explain your theological position to those you serve as minister or pastor, then there may be unfavourable comparisons made between the way you conduct secular services and the way you conduct religious ones. If, on the other hand, you bring examples of the secular celebrations to the board/council, give an explanation of the implicit theology, and invite questions, it is unlikely that there will be any problems. It would be beneficial to invite one or more of the board or council members or a member of the worship committee to attend one of the secular celebrations and report back to the leadership group about how it met the family’s needs and how it differed or was the same as the conventional funeral or celebration service.
One of the side benefits of this process will be to open up your faith community to readings that, though outside of the canon of Hebrew or Christian scriptures, are inspirational and meet needs of the mourning group in a way that the traditional readings cannot do.
In the next chapter, I examine the theological underpinning of the bereavement event: the pastoral care of the dying person, the funeral or celebration service, and the post-funeral pastoral care. This I have characterized by loving kindness and believe that if this loving kindness is integral to the pastoral care and the funeral service or celebration, it will be possible for both the Christian and the secular approaches to be used with integrity by the worship leader.