Five people can make a great community, but not necessarily a great choir, and we have trouble when we sing songs we aren't so familiar with. The problem is, when I am not confident, I don't sing very loudly, and when I don't sing loudly and all I can hear is Lena singing alto, accompanied by other not-so-confident voices, I can't help but laugh at our sorry attempt to create beautiful music. Sometimes, I can recover my composure by taking a deep breath, but if Amandine or anyone else cracks a smile or lets out an audible chuckle, it's all over. You might as well take my hand like I'm a three-year-old at church and lead me out the door. It's one thing if this happens when we pray by ourselves in our flat, but it's quite another if it happens, say, during Friday evening prayer around the cross with people from the community in attendance. Thank goodness my community members are better at plowing through a song like nothing's gone wrong, because laughing through a prayer can be really distracting!
But sometimes I think that maybe it's good to laugh through our prayers, at least from time to time, and that maybe it's even important to laugh at our ridiculous attempts to connect with God and find meaning in our lives through acts of faith. Don't get me wrong--I genuinely believe in the importance of prayer and my faith actually does give meaning to my life. At the same time, I know that my humanity makes it impossible to comprehend God and, at best, very difficult to prove the value of going to church, spending time in prayer, and doing things like heading to Germany for five weeks to live with women I don't know. Yes, indeed--my humanity make cultivating a spiritual life rather challenging at times (as in virtually 24/7), but laughing about this feels a lot better than getting frustrated or depressed.
Some anecdotal evidence:
On the second day of our community, I was in charge of morning prayer. We sang some songs. We read a Psalm and an excerpt from the Gospels. We spent some time in silence. And then.....it was time to share bread*. I had thought through this ritual and it was supposed to be easy. All I had to do was "break" the bread and share it with the others, right? In theory, yes. But have you ever tried to tear bread apart with your own bare hands? It's not easy. Bread does not want to tear, unless it is it sandwich bread, and who would ever want to use that in a prayer service? I sure didn't, and so I chose a nice, brown roll.
It looked Biblical enough, but breaking it was virtually impossible. After struggling with the roll for what seemed like eternity, I threw ceremony out the window and ripped the roll like someone who's just had free bread delivered to them at an all-you-can-eat Italian restaurant. There were crumbs on the floor, crumbs on my hands, and four pieces of bread that were too large to eat in one bite. After all of us received bread, we were supposed to sing, but be couldn't; our mouths were too full. What was supposed to be a somewhat solemn, reflective moment, felt more like snack time, and it was funny. I mean, really funny! Maybe you had to be there (or maybe not), but trust me, we laughed, and I may have laughed the most. I could hardly compose myself.
Some people say that God has a sense of humor. I believe it! And I also believe that we, humans, can take some of the credit. We do lots of things in the name of faith--good and bad things, quiet and loud things, ugly and beautiful things. But then, some things are just downright funny, and I have the sense that, as we fight back chuckles, God might already be doubled-over, rolling on the floor laughing with no hesitation whatsoever.
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| Lena and Amandine sang Taize songs in a hunting shelter. Did we laugh? Of course. |
*At Taize, Catholic have the opportunity to receive communion in the morning, and Protestants can receive bread blessed as their churches would have it blessed. Those who do not wish to receive either can still participate by receiving bread that is not considered part of any specific denomination's communion. In our community, we have been sharing bread during morning prayer as a way to follow Jesus' example and remember the times he broke break with members of his own community.
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