Multiple voices are weighing in on the experience of Covid-19 – what we are learning, examples of resilience and kindness, hopes for a changed social fabric in the future. I too long for systemic change that brings us to a more humane living of universal acceptance and care of one another and creation.
Sisters of St. Joseph Chapel in London, Ontario
Since my life has been very confined these days, I share a minute experience from the reality of our residence. In our community of women religious, like many parishes and faith gatherings, we have not been able to assemble for communal prayer, although our prayer patterns continue privately, in our rooms.
The action of gathering, as an assembly to praise and encounter God, is just as essential as gathering together at the table to enjoy a meal. It is in our DNA. The Jewish community gathers at the synagogue, the Muslim community at the mosque, the various denominations of Christianity strive to assemble in meeting houses, churches, chapels, and outdoor venues. The gathering is the action that says I intentionally want to participate, to engage with others in offering praise and worship. It is a response in relationship with our ever creating God.
So for the past few months, we have tried to continue a sense of gathering in creative but safe ways.
We can’t celebrate Eucharist, but we can celebrate the Word of God, and we can praise in song, and offer lament and intercessory prayer for the sake of our fragile world. And we can do this communally through closed-circuit TV that was planned in the design of our 2007 residence. This functions like the lobby channel in an apartment building that allows you to see who is at the main entrance ringing your bell. Each individual person is united to the whole community as we intentionally listen to the Word proclaimed over closed-circuit TV, and join in singing and prayer from our rooms.
One day, as I waited alone in the chapel, to start to pray at the appointed time, I awakened to a new sense of how the many years of song and prayer, joy, and sorrow that had been offered here, somehow continued to resonate in the space. The chapel is the heart space of our life together. It pulses with the rhythm of daily prayer, Eucharist, funerals, Jubilees, special services of gratitude for the gift of creation, feast days of foundresses, etc.
This accumulated wealth of ritual activity and silent contemplative prayer is the foundation of our prayer together while apart. Although separated by walls and floors, each of us at the appointed time intentionally turn our thoughts and mind to the prayer at hand.
Perhaps for the first time, I realized in concrete time and space the church’s phrase the Mystical Body of Christ. Each of us has been baptized into the one Body of Christ. Being one body is obvious to me when we are all gathered around the Eucharistic table and singing our favorite hymn. But there are other times that it is lost on me. That day while leading prayer in the empty chapel I was assured that Christ has drawn us together in great Love.
Covid has challenged us to experience a whole new approach to intentionally praying together. Gratitude is the primary expression that fuels our days. I wonder what else we can learn from this experience . . .
- Sister Loretta Manzara, csj