Sarx

My friend, Linda Strohmeier (Memory Eternal!), a priest and sometime ECUSAs evangelism officer, once wrote a piece called “The Religion of the Waspe”. Sadly, it seems to be missing from the web, but you can imagine what it was about (Despite the psuedonymn of the tribe). Basically, using the language of a 19th Century Social Scientist, Linda documented what is basically the most boring religion in the world - filled with people afraid to smile, afraid to touch, afraid to laugh, afraid to move - save in any regimented fashion. That Linda might seem on the level of skin, to the uninitiated, to be “one of the tribe” was irrelevant: Linda was a proud member of the Native American community and, all attempts to the contrary, she was immune to evangelism by the Waspe.

I didn’t set out to make an Ode to Linda - but she lept to my mind, recently, as I was reading a critique of my former parish.

Nothing says authentic “San Francisco Episcopal Church” to me like a room full of white people trying to act multicultural.

It seems to me that whenever white people stick to traditional white Protestant worship, they’re told they’re being “boring” and “stodgy.” When they try something different, they’re accused of “trying to act multicultural” (with the implication that it’s a failure or a fake).

Another commenter noted SGN’s “pep-rally” style liturgy.

One of the things that brought me in to SGN - and one way that they are *very* like the Orthodox: there’s a lout of loud noise. At Easter, no one at SGN can be very quiet for very long. There is yelling and clapping and stomping and dancing. There is laughter. There are tears. There is joy - and it is evident on everyone’s face. It is evident in everyone’s voice and, by two AM, when the drums are banging in the drum circle and the champagne has finally run out… it’s evident in the mashed mess of flowers and food all over the church (to be cleaned up on Easter Monday.)

I’m the first person to make fun of California white folks. Seriously. And there were (and I’m sure, are) times when folks at SGN are just, well, you know, Californians. I got my degree in California at the MOST Californian of Schools. I am allowed to say that.

But I left St Gregory’s and went to my first Pascha in an Orthodox church. The only way to describe it is Holy Chaos. Father coming out of the doors, censing the room over and over, people laughing and screaming out “Indeed He Is Risen!” at every turn. The choir trying to sing loud enough to be heard over the noise. The Bells ringing… My First Pascha, Fr Victor and I suffered from Geek Lock: when two people with glasses kiss or hug and get the edge of their frames interlocked. We were sweating and laughing and there was a line of faithful behind me waiting to greet Father. But we had to undo the Geek Lock.

Rumi said;
“With passion, pray.
With passion work.
With passion, make love.
With passion, eat and drink and dance and play.
Why look like a dead fish in the ocean of God?”

The Waspe Tribe looks through glazed fish eyes - and totally misses the joy.

I’m reminded of Robin Williams in “The Bird Cage”. There’s this magic moment of improv when Robin’s character, the director at a club in Miami, is trying to show a new dancer what he wants…

Feel all you want. Express all you want. Rock hard all you want. But keep it all inside. That’s the Waspe Creed. In the main, I think the demand for “traditional” worship spaces (by which they mean American traditional, for regimented seating in pews was an American Export to Europe) is based on the strong fear that someone might have to make eye-contact with another person.

One of the amazing things about the western liturgical tradition is that it is so varied. To look at the Tridentine Rite favoured by many Americans (and at least one German), you’d think the entire western tradition was cold, military and dysfunctional. But that is to forget that the same tradition produces the Passion of the Christ, Francis of Assisi, Hidegard of Bingen and hundreds of mystics and devout sorts for whom the 7 point ritual gestures would have been alien, non-religious expressions of something unknown.

Linda’s essay was criticised as being “racist” but after my return to the Waspe Rite, I begin to understand. (I’m working hard at introducing the “hug” to my new parish.)

But the problem is Race and Culture is too easy to blame. Just as in an earlier post where I wanted - but didn’t want - to blame liturgical coldness on generation, so also I must recognise that the vast number of folks who wrote the prayer book liturgy as it stands were white and also the vast number of folks who are breaking it down, taking out the boring parts and replacing them with something better. Just as the Romans and French (note: whites) were responsible for the incredibly stylised and cold religion we might call Liturgicolotry, so also (many) Romans and other Mediterranean cultures (note: also whites) bring us a form of Catholicism infinitely more vibrant, amazingly gory and wonderful alive.

The English Church brought us God’s Frozen Chosen, but it also brought us John Wesley. The Episcopal Church brought us St Thomas Church, 5th Ave. But it also brought us St Gregory of Nyssa Parish in SF.

Equally, some of the most boring, puritanical people I know from churches are younger than me (but not all).

This is not about race or age.

But it is about culture and maybe class, if the latter is taken not to mean one’s social standing but rather one’s consciousness of or one’s attitude about one’s social standing. Certainly both rich and poor people can have attitude problems: and it seems to be the attitude, rather than the wealth or lack of, that causes the issues.

But…

This attitude is tied to a certain style - and I know rather more Harvard grads with the problem than I know Yale Grads. I know rather more “blue bloods” and “Boston Brahmins” with the problem than I know good old boys. And, most importantly, I know a LOT more people who pretend to those things who have these problems. There is a certain prissy style among Anglo-Catholics of a Certain Age/Class/Breeding and Status. Equally so among many who opt for the Tridentine liturgy in Roman circles. It bears no semblance at all to the earthiness of Orthodox old-world cultures; and no semblance at all to the Judaism of Jesus.

But what is it, this religion of the Waspe?