by tashmcgill | Feb 28, 2016 | Culture & Ideas
I like rituals and ceremonies. We are a people who tell stories and the structure of our story, the meta-narrative of who and what humanity is, is written around and defined by the many rituals and ceremonies that comprise our existence.
Sometimes the rituals are small. I have small daily practices that matter. There is an element of ritual and ceremony when I host a Monday Night Dinner. We have more interpersonal rituals too – the marriage ceremony in all varying forms and the dedication, christening or baptism of children. In fact, most of these rituals are birthed in religious practices, this ancient calling of deep to deep that acknowledges in some small way there is still something magical and otherworldly about the most primal of our calls to mate and procreate. We celebrate Lent, Easter, Yom Kippur, Ramadan.
We observe, we remember. We make milestones.
But how do you create meaningful rituals for yourself or your family if you are not religious? Ceremonies and rituals bring us together. They are a chance to state what sometimes goes unsaid – that of course, parents commit to raising their children well. That friends and family commit to support the promises of marriage and family. So you have to write one of your own, which Mark and Paula asked me to do this week.
On their wedding day 3 years ago, they asked me to write and read a poem. On that day, we celebrated their marriage but also the dedication of their first-born daughter, Gracie. This week, we gathered on that same anniversary to celebrate and dedicate their second child, Olivia.
What does it mean to dedicate?
The idea of dedication was derived by the Evangelical Protestants who believed that traditional Catholic and high Anglican child baptism did not ensure salvation. Ultimately, the choice to follow God must be the child’s own, made of their own volition at an age where they had comprehension.
So parents dedicate their child to God, a promise to raise the child in the ways of the parents’ faith, as part of the Church until such a time as they can make their own decision. In more recent years, it’s become increasingly common for that series of promises to include the church community, friends and extended family also promising to support the parents and the child.
So, in case you have need ever, of a non-religious dedication … here’s one I wrote this week.
The rough outline is as follows
Welcome
Addressing Olivia as a gift
Acknowledging her as a sister
Siblings commitment
Acknowledging her as part of a broader family
Acknowledging her as a daughter
Parents commitment
Godparents commitment
Readings by the godparents
Friends and extended family commitment
A blessing
– fin.
Welcome everyone. We’re here as family and friends of Mark, Paula, Gracie and now Olivia, to celebrate a special milestone and significant day in the life of the Southon family. It was on the 24th of February 3 years ago that we gathered here to celebrate Mark and Paula’s marriage, and dedicated their first born. Today, we celebrate their ongoing commitment to one another and welcome Olivia to the family.
Olivia is a gift.
First – she is beloved. She was hoped for and greeted with joy from the moment we knew she was on the way. Olivia, since before you came to be, you were loved and desired as part of this family.
Second, she is a precious sister for Gracie. Sisters are a chance to grow up with a best friend, true confidante and someone always willing to help you grow and shape your character through thoughtful input. Or sometimes, to pull your hair and borrow your clothes.
Gracie – do you welcome Olivia as your sister? Will you be a good friend to her, share what you have and teach her what you know?
Sister responds:
Olivia – you are a daughter to Mark and Paula. You carry part of each of your parents – their kindness, generosity, hospitality, talent, love and that of each of your families. You have grandmothers, aunts, uncles and cousins who would love to be here to today and we remember and acknowledge that you are part of a much bigger family; some of whom are no longer with us. But we remember them and all the lessons they have left us with.
Mark, Paula – do you dedicate yourselves to loving, nurturing, caring for and helping to shape Olivia’s character as her parents? Will you share with her the lessons you’ve learned from your own parents, siblings and life experience? Will you open doors for her but set her free to become her own person when the time is right and always offer her the comfort, love and support that is “home”? And lastly, will you dedicate yourselves again to one another; along with the task and privilege you share in of parenting both Gracie and Olivia?
Parents respond.
And finally, Olivia is a gift to us – who are lucky to count ourselves friends of the Southons. She will continue to give us joy as she grows, learns to walk, giggle, talk and becomes her own person. It is our privilege to walk alongside Mark and Paula as they parent Olivia and Gracie. It is our privilege to walk alongside Gracie and help her become a great big sister and offer our support in raising Olivia.
Mark and Paula have asked Emma and Seb to represent their friends and family in the special role of godmother and godfather. To offer wisdom, care and support to Olivia, and the family as she grows.
Emma and Seb, will you commit to caring for, supporting, encouraging and nurturing Olivia as she grows?
Godparents respond.
Reading #1 (read by the godparents)
When you were born, little one, we sang over you
Sweet songs of hope and light
We sang you to the stars and the moon
We sang to you of the ocean and the mountains
We sang you to sleep and we sang you to life.
When you are grown, little one, sing back to us
Songs of a life fully alive
Sing to us of the skies you fly through, the dreams you see
Sing to us of the world you know, of the love you have
When you are older, sing sweet songs back to us.
Reading #2
From small seeds grow mighty trees.
A tree reaches up to the sky with all its strength
Bows to the wind but does not breakLittle birds fly across golden skies
Small feathers grow into strong wings
Wise birds return home to the tall, tough trees
When the tall strong tree touches the blue-gold sky
And the bird returns home on the wind that blew
There we will always make a space for you.
And for the rest of us. As a family we must also be willing to hold one another accountable to the promises we make. To support and encourage when times are tough and to laugh and celebrate when times are good, like today. Friends, will you commit to stand beside the Southons, supporting and encouraging their family?
Friends respond.
Blessing for Olivia.
Olivia, today you may not understand the love and commitment that has been expressed around you and for you.
But you will come to know it, in the same way you’ll know the warmth of the sun on your skin, the wind in your face and the rain that comes to water the earth in each perfect season.
You are loved and may you know that love all the days of your life.
When days are dark, may you find the arms that will hold you fast through any storm.
When days are bright, may you find yourself always in the company of the good and the wise.
As you grow, may you learn from all those who have dedicated themselves to you. And when you are old, may you remember how you were loved and what you learned, to pass on to those who will come after you.
May you be good and may you be kind. May you be strong, self-assured and compassionate. May you be full of laughter and integrity. May you know joy and peace in the blossom of your life.
We pray that any hardships serve to teach you, that your blessings serve as generosity towards others and we pray that you will always know the way home, no matter where life takes you. You are home in our arms, in our love and in our hearts for all the days of your life.
Welcome. Nau mai haere mai, moko.
Of course, as with the Garden poem which has now been read at some twenty or so weddings that I know of, you are welcome to use this material also. Change the names and the details, but you are welcome to the outline. The poems are my own. Email me and let me know too, I’d love to hear your stories.
by tashmcgill | Dec 6, 2015 | Culture & Ideas, Strategy
As I wrote last week, there’s a post-it note on my desk with the quote,
“Everything I’ve ever let go of has clawmarks in it.” David Foster Wallace.
Letting go of anything means change. Change is constant and uncomfortable. Very few human beings are wired to thrive on the thrill of the unknown. Most of us believe forewarned is forearmed and that minimising change is the utopian dream. We crave stability, without realising that stasis is the first stage before death.
While I echo Wallace’s sentiment, I can’t support his implied proposition – that to fight and cling is somehow noble. But Wallace committed suicide in 2008, having lived much of his adult life with depression and under medication in order to be able to work. I think Wallace’s fight to hold on and to resist change ultimately contributed to the ongoing breakdown of his life. You see, what we invest our energy into grows.
Change that we resist is usually an external pressure or energy; something that comes upon us. When you resist external force with internal force, the energy evaporates in the combustion of that reaction, but the energy is also lost. No one party gains from the other.
Over time, a resistance or refusal to respond to change depletes your energy and resource.
I experienced this a number of times in my early working life. The loss of a project, the change in a plan, the loss of a job. I clung and fought but each battle became harder to fight and each victory less sweet, such was the price of the battle.
So now, instead of fighting to resist change – I’m learning to surrender to it.
It may feel uncomfortable because in the Western world, our idea of surrender is most often associated with loss. We only surrender when we are in a losing position. But in Sanskrit, the word ‘surrender’ is translated to ‘give yourself wholeheartedly to something, to embrace the flow of your life.’
This idea of surrender is about where you put your energy and what you resist instead of embracing, what you embrace instead of resisting. A negative attitude towards change is a toxic learning environment. Learning should always be a by-product of change. A negative attitude towards change alienates and disengages you from those who would help you navigate it.
Surrender is powerful because it reframes our thinking away from bad conflict habits.
Surrender is powerful because you cannot embrace again without first letting go.
Surrender is powerful because it truly is the path of least resistance. Resistance is the enemy of hope in the face of change. We get to keep our energy for other battles.
Surrender is powerful because it focuses us on the posture we taking in learning, the resilience required to live with inevitable disappointment and the power of humility.
It is in surrender that you are embracing humility. Knowing yourself truly; good, bad and ugly. Confronting the secret and alone parts of yourself that are still laced with fear. Fear of the unknown, fear of being unsuccessful, fear of being unloved, fear of being wrong.
When I was confronted with the biggest change I’ve known as an adult; I fought it with all my might. I rallied in every conversation, I maintained an excruciating level of intensity because losing this project was not an option for me. I fought myself, my mentors, I fought with my friends and then I lost it anyway. I entered the dark shadow cave; confronted with loss and with blame. I felt ashamed that I hadn’t held onto what I had clung so tightly too in the past. Letting go felt like failure, but later I realised not letting go fast enough meant I had no time or capacity to embrace the lessons right in front of me. Change came and continued out without me, because I wouldn’t allow myself to get on board the train.
No matter what kind of change you’re undergoing, major or minor – we yearn for peace. We find it in surrender. Surrender to knowing that while we may not see the end result of change; change is assured. Change in of itself is not scary. Change can open new doors of discovery. Change can also be very, very wrong. But like a tsunami wave, it will not be stopped once started. Accepting change is a doorway to peace. Surrendering to the flow of your life is peace entering in.
Surrendering to change pushes us into the unknown, which is where we must be if we are to learn something new and to learn something new, we must ask the right questions.
- what will I learn
- how can I learn best from this
- how will I respond
- how will I help others
Surrender is the art form of leaning in, a gateway to vulnerability. As the world responds to us, change is quickened. As change is quickened, we are more truly ourselves. The more change we embrace, the more we have the opportunity to embrace the lessons that come with it.
by tashmcgill | May 29, 2015 | Church, Leadership, Youth Work
To my long-time love;
It has been a long time since I seriously considered calling it quits on our relationship. Even though I no longer depend on you, the Church, to tell me how to live, or to provide connection with other people of faith—I’ve stuck to the belief that somehow, we are better together than we are apart.
I am facing a choice because I don’t know if you are good for me anymore. The best way I can describe it is being ‘unequally yoked’. It reminds me of advice you gave when I was a teenager; warning me about my relationship with people who didn’t share the same faith or convictions.
Yes, I do think we are unequally yoked and it’s not me, it’s you. Monday to Saturday I have been listening to the edges of society where God’s Spirit is hovering. I feel myself being stretched and enlarged until Sunday, when I have to squeeze back into the shape and size you want me.
I never thought it would be possible, but maybe I’ve outgrown the shape you made for me. I’m bigger than you can handle, in so many ways.
Embracing the sacred and divine Feminine
I’m tired of broken promises and false hopes of shaping the future. I am a capable, intelligent, strategic and compassionate communicator and a visionary for the Church. Stop offering lip service to honouring and empowering women to lead and have a voice within your walls. You don’t need to tell us you believe in women, just let us lead not because of our womanhood but without regard for it.
We’ve known each other too long for you not to trust me now. When I say to want to contribute, don’t make me jump through hoops and knock on doors. If you don’t trust me, say it straight and let me move on. The power of my sex won’t change.
Embrace me, a reflection of the sacred Feminine in the real world—intelligent, gifted, passionate and willing. Embrace me or say no. Your ‘no’ won’t ruin me as much as chasing your ‘yes’ has.
Staking a claim for the significance of every human being
The political and sociological debates you engage with around LGBTQ issues let me know you’re thinking and talking about it.
I want you to start turning from conversation to action. How you respond to this group of people is going to define our future, the future of your relationship with me as well as ‘Them’, as you so often refer to my friends and fellow spiritual seekers. Straight people are leaving the Church because the tension you’re asking us to hold is untenable. We must live out our words.
But I think I know something you don’t. I’m The Generation. We’re all just in it together, one generation defined by being together and alive now.
Disrupt the conventions
I’m tired of hearing about the ‘Next Generation’. Did I slip straight from the ‘next generation’ where I was ‘full of potential’ to being past my use-by date in my thirties? You just don’t look at me the same anymore. I can’t seem to hold your interest.
But I think I know something you don’t. I’m The Generation. We’re all just in it together, one generation defined by being together and alive now. Young people aren’t any more likely to bring about hope than older people. We are all as close as each other to the grave, because life changes in a moment.
Disrupt the conventions and assumptions. I’m not suggesting you need to give up your hope for the cool kids, those twenty-somethings you’re so pleased to have held on to, but every denomination I’ve encountered is trying to engage with the ‘next’ generation while pacifying the baby-boomers who are still largely paying the bills.
Defining the relationship
When I try and talk this through, you say ‘you don’t want it to be over’ and that I need you, as much as you need me. I have to disagree. I carry Church in my pocket. My smartphone is all I need to read the Bible, download teaching, listen to worship tracks and even journal my prayers. I can tithe to Christ-centered causes and I can ‘fellowship’ in community via Facebook, Twitter, blogs and text messages. I can Skype and Facetime to pray with people I care about and sometimes, church happens around my kitchen table or fireplace. It happens Monday–Sunday.
I don’t know where we go from here. It’s not an ultimatum; it’s just a chance for us to be honest with each other. Maybe we’re both stuck, not knowing how to be what we need from each other. Where should we go from here?
Originally published for Christian Today.
by tashmcgill | Dec 28, 2014 | Culture & Ideas, Family, Mind, Strategy
You’re done for another year. You can put away the tree, the tinsel, the decorative napkins and put the furniture back into place. Throw the tents and sleeping bags into the back of the car with a cooler of left-over Christmas ham. You’ll stop at an orchard on your way to whichever beach or river is calling you. You’re in the safe zone – Christmas and Boxing Day done for another year.
Of course, that’s a Southern Hemisphere Christmas. But you get my point – regardless of snow or sun, there’s often a palpable sense of relief in the air once Christmas is done. So here are some strategies to help you have a considerable less stressful, angry, bitter and a more imperfect Christmas next year.
This year, our Christmas was quiet but entirely pleasant. People contributed food and drink, exchanged gifts, quality time was spent with people we love. But in the build up to the day, many of my conversations with friends revolved around the juggling acts of meeting all sorts of expectations and hopes from complex and emotionally weighty family situations.
What we don’t acknowledge regularly enough, are the ever-increasing numbers of people who experience Christmas as an annual anxiety trigger, full of non-consumer related stress and emotional trauma.
Christmas – That Myth Of Perfect.
The trouble with Christmas is not the commercial underpinnings or the trappings of food and wine that see us creeping back to the scales in shame. The trouble with Christmas, is how it perpetuates the myth of perfect. (more…)
by tashmcgill | Dec 20, 2014 | Culture & Ideas, Spirituality
The kitchen is thick and sticky and my skin feels damp like the back of a post-it note, catching every piece of dust and flour in the air. I’m drinking sweet bourbon on the rocks, feeling the condensation gather on my fingertips when I lift the glass for a sip.
This is what Christmas in New Zealand feels like, December’s slow crawl into oppressive 93% humidity. The rain doesn’t fall, it just sinks from a sky that’s become a thick grey blanket over the city.
It’s terrible weather for baking anything, let alone shortbread. Shortbread and gingerbread belong in a Winter Solstice for precisely the reason it is easier to work with buttery short crust when it’s freezing outside.
But it’s Christmas time everywhere, including here and the Western world is largely caught up in a wave of tradition – baking, feasting, carol singing, tree decorating, maybe even a church service or two. Traditions that have been formed over centuries and decades in order to create festivals of remembrance and stories of celebration. And I’m baking, because that’s what we do at Christmas even though I am not meant to eat sugar or gluten.
There’s a science to baking – use a trusted recipe and trustworthy tools. Measure, mix precisely and follow the damn instructions. Just do it the way people have been doing it for centuries and little can go wrong. Unless you’re trying to make Scottish shortbread in a New Zealand summer. Then you have to figure out how to keep the essence of the tradition alive with a method that works in your new environment.
Except I’ve fallen short. My mother has a recipe book full of childhood memories and her shortbread is the best. But the book has a frayed spine, faded ball point pen and sellotape that has lost its stick. It’s almost become too precious to touch and certainly too precious to borrow. So when I should be using my grandmother’s and mother’s fail-safe recipes, I’m using the Internet. Instead of copying by hand the recipe safely tucked into the handwritten kitchen treasure, I’m scouring Pinterest and Google. It’s a sham. There is nothing traditional about this baking exercise. I’m using my laptop instead of a recipe book and rather than being a trusted source, I’m just giving it a go. I’ll try a new one next year if it doesn’t work out.
But I’ll be leaving out the best parts of the story. What worked and what didn’t. How I managed to keep the butter in the crust cool, how I learned to test the oven for hot spots. There is so much that we miss if we forget to write our new traditions beside the old. Even the Christmas tradition we celebrate now, was built on top of another ancient tradition and we can’t forget that is not just about the product of our efforts but also the practice and journey towards it that matters.
Baking shortbread is about understanding the relationship of butter, flour and temperature. It’s as simple as that. Too warm, the dough won’t hold, too cold it won’t be malleable. Baking requires patience on an ordinary day; whether letting dough rise for cinnamon scrolls and bread or waiting for custard and ganache to set. In 24 degree heat, waiting becomes part of the tradition because the relationship requires it.
Similarly, traditions (or rituals) are the way we understand the relationship between the past, where we have come from, the present, who we are now and the future, including who we long to be. Think about the ritual of communion, of breaking bread at the beginning of a feast, of wedding toasts, of honeymoons, of bar mitzvah or coming-of-age rituals. They are ways of marking what has been, what is and what we hope for.
When you cast aside tradition too hastily, you risk losing a connection to what propels you forward. Advent requires a certain amount of ritual regardless of your spiritual belief because it connects to things of old and things of the future. Find me a man or woman who doesn’t recognize some symbology of newness or hope in the Advent/New Year season and I’ll show you a liar or a fool.
I am both trapped by tradition and freed by it. Trapped by always looking back into history but freed by learning from it. We urgently need a connection to the future that makes sense of our past, particularly when it comes to religion because our current traditions aren’t enough. But it appears we’ve stopped creating new traditions – instead we are trying to find more meaning than ever in the old ones. The trouble is, the old traditions need help expanding to meet the requirements of the new landscape.
When someone new joins the family, people have to rearrange their favourite chairs to make room at the table. Something old must make way for something new that adds new meaning.
In the same way I need to write down the recipes that are now mine – the ones I’ve tried and proven regardless of where they came from. A recipe book that ball point pen won’t fade from, pages that can take the heat of my Antipodean kitchen. I need ways of capturing the recipes that are shared with me, borrowed by me and the ones I create myself to share with others. And it needs to be permanent. A chronological recipe book that begins with my grandmother and moves through each generation including my own; collecting our traditions, what we’ve learned along the way and passing something into the future.
Religion is the same. There are dozens of families who will get up this Sunday morning and head to church services because that’s what they do at Christmas. A moment in time inspired by the past and possibly very disconnected from the future. We’ll likely be turning up all week at midnight masses, carol services and Christmas productions. What are the rituals of religion worth keeping and which ones should be recorded as part of our history but replaced or evolved to something new?
Why so urgent? Because for the next week I’ll be encountering people who need the shortbread and gingerbread I’m baking tonight. I’ll expand the metaphor – all this week, the Advent season brings all sorts of people into connection with spiritual communities because of tradition, but I don’t think that tradition is going to cut it.
There are plenty of traditions and rituals that have been meaningful and worthwhile through our history. There are also some that are probably long past due for retirement. Others that should be resurrected. We should be mindful that our spirituality is changing before us all the time, therefore our expression and our storytelling also must change to reflect that new environment. It is not a crime to reinvent tradition, in fact we do it every year.
Our traditions need to be both old and new – old enough to connect us to the essence of our story and new enough to point the way to a future that is approachable and makes sense in our new land.
