The ideal that I think lurks in people's minds: smiling grandmotherly ladies baking tens of dozens of scrumptious homemade cookies and pastries and pies, bringing them to the church, serving them to the congregation at coffee hour in their smiling grandmotherly way, then cleaning up, washing all the dishes, putting everything away. Week after week, year after year, all for free.
This may have been possible sixty years ago, when there were a lot of women who did not work outside of the home and who took Church Work very seriously. My aunt Geneva was one of them; as a volunteer, she and one other lady cleaned her little country church every Saturday from top to bottom. And whenever they needed cookies, or baked goods, or something more substantial, she would pitch in. And stay with the task until the last person had departed, the kitchen was spotless, and the floors swept and vacuumed. All for free, because she loved the Lord – and, if one were to scratch the surface a little, she did have some pride in a job well done, and enjoyed having a chance to show off her cooking.
The modern Aunt Geneva works two part-time jobs and can barely cook for her own family, much less for church events.
It has become fashionable to disdain “inward-focused” activities in a church. Everything is supposed to be geared toward Mission, whether that be social service activities, or (around here) political activism on behalf of the environment or any number of other Liberal Causes. Baking cookies for coffee hour is not part of this. Nor is anything else that pertains to the ongoing maintenance and nurture of the congregation. Last Sunday, one of our young men put out a plea for people to help him mow the lawn this summer. The results: Zilch. Not a single person volunteered.
Sometimes it devolves on the church staff. On Maundy Thursday, our director of Christian Formation and her eldest daughter prepared a soup-and-bread supper for about forty people, with linen tablecloths, the church's good china, candlelight. It was splendid. But she did all of this because no one else would.
To be fair, several of the older women saw the situation and pitched in to help the two of them wash dishes and clean up afterwards (I did, too). Otherwise, I don't know how they could have gotten it done – and that was at the front end of four very busy work days for all of us – including the older women who helped, for all of them are on the Altar Guild – another “inward-focused” activity that struggles to find enough people to carry it forward. Pretty much all of them here are elderly, in their seventies and eighties and beyond; I suspect it is that way everywhere.
Times have changed. But one thing remains: these “inward-focused” maintenance activities that are essential to healthy congregational life, these activities that are humble, mostly out of the spotlight, and very often involve hard work and long hours – they are, every one of them, the work of a Servant. A slave, if you will. Just like the one whom we call Master and Lord.
Verily, verily, I say unto you, The servant is not greater than his lord, neither he that is sent greater than he that sent him. If ye know these things, happy are ye if ye do them. (St. John 13:16-17)
I cannot leave this without saluting those people who DO follow their Master in this; in our congregation, we have several ladies (and a few men, such as C.C. who does most of the Shrove Tuesday pancake supper every year) who do all that they can.
It is worth noting that while Mary sat at His feet and this “good part” is not to be taken away from her (St. Luke 10:38-42), it was Martha whom Jesus loved the most (St. John 11:5). And he said that on the last day, “he shall gird himself, and make them to sit down to meat, and will come forth and serve them.” (St. Luke 12:37).
Music for the Week:
Improvisation on O filii et filiae (O sons and daughters, let us sing)
“My pierced side, O Thomas, see:
My hands, my feet, I show to thee;
Not faithless, but believing be.”
Alleluia.
(Jean Tisserand, tr. John Mason Neale)
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