 | It’s been nine months since I went to church. I go to the American Church in Paris, where they focus on loving people and helping out the community. Sermons are short, the music is good, and I do love me some good liberation theology. |
Then, COVID hit.
All French churches closed in March, during the first confinement. ACP went online, but I didn’t follow along. Without coffee hour or the physical pleasure of congregational singing, it just didn’t seem worth it. I was all Zoomed out.
ACP opened up for limited services over the summer, but I didn’t go. I knew they were following government guidelines and being responsible about masks and distancing, but I just wasn’t willing to risk getting coughed on. Or unwittingly pass COVID on to somebody’s grammy.
But last week, my friend Kate told me the services were nice. Helpful, she said. Even encouraging. Plus, it’s Advent season, all that dark-of-winter-leading-to-light business, and we’re in a metaphysical and physical dark winter’s night right now. Appropriate, she said.
2020 has been wearing even for optimists like me. Even though my personal life is magnifique, I haven’t seen my stateside kids since last Christmas, and it looks like mid-2021 before I can get vaccinated and get to them. Friends are out of work. People have died. Existential dread is exhausting.
Still, there was a tiny void in me that whispered, what have you got to lose?
Alright, Kate, I said. Take me to church.
It’s not as easy as it was pre-COVID. You have to sign up online and check “place of worship” on your virtual attestation before you leave home. At the church, in addition to the usual security guards, someone checked our names off the list, and told us to take off our gloves and gel up our hands. (100% of the people were masked, of course.) Ushers took us to our socially distanced seats, every other pew roped off, with at least a meter between people. There was plexiglass in front of the pulpits and the piano.
The organ burst to life, and my ears perked up. I hadn’t heard live music, except for street buskers, in nine months. It was refreshing, startling, oddly moving. Pastor Jodi gave the welcome, and I actually felt welcome, included, like we all had a close call but we’re still here.
All French churches closed in March, during the first confinement. ACP went online, but I didn’t follow along. Without coffee hour or the physical pleasure of congregational singing, it just didn’t seem worth it. I was all Zoomed out.
ACP opened up for limited services over the summer, but I didn’t go. I knew they were following government guidelines and being responsible about masks and distancing, but I just wasn’t willing to risk getting coughed on. Or unwittingly pass COVID on to somebody’s grammy.
But last week, my friend Kate told me the services were nice. Helpful, she said. Even encouraging. Plus, it’s Advent season, all that dark-of-winter-leading-to-light business, and we’re in a metaphysical and physical dark winter’s night right now. Appropriate, she said.
2020 has been wearing even for optimists like me. Even though my personal life is magnifique, I haven’t seen my stateside kids since last Christmas, and it looks like mid-2021 before I can get vaccinated and get to them. Friends are out of work. People have died. Existential dread is exhausting.
Still, there was a tiny void in me that whispered, what have you got to lose?
Alright, Kate, I said. Take me to church.
It’s not as easy as it was pre-COVID. You have to sign up online and check “place of worship” on your virtual attestation before you leave home. At the church, in addition to the usual security guards, someone checked our names off the list, and told us to take off our gloves and gel up our hands. (100% of the people were masked, of course.) Ushers took us to our socially distanced seats, every other pew roped off, with at least a meter between people. There was plexiglass in front of the pulpits and the piano.
The organ burst to life, and my ears perked up. I hadn’t heard live music, except for street buskers, in nine months. It was refreshing, startling, oddly moving. Pastor Jodi gave the welcome, and I actually felt welcome, included, like we all had a close call but we’re still here.
Next, meet and greet. Call me cranky, but I hate meet and greet. I was hoping it had been done away with since we can’t shake hands, mais non. They did this weird thing where you cross your arms over your chest and gesture toward people. Quelle horreur.
The service moved on, prayers for trouble spots around the world and trouble spots in Paris. The a cappella solo O Come, O Come Emmanuel almost broke me, the singer standing unmasked twenty feet away from anybody else and yet making me feel like Christmas can still happen. There was no congregational singing or choir, because group singing invites super-spreading. I miss singing.
People who prayed and read behind the plexiglassed pulpit took off their masks. It was nice to see their lips moving, to see them smiling, but they looked strange, vulnerable, a little too intimate. I miss faces.
The hand bell choir was reduced to three members, but instead of one bell in each hand, they all played about ten bells each, very calmly picking up and putting each bell down just in the knick of time, never missing a beat. Not only was it a sight to behold, the sound was divine. Calming.
Then Pastor Odette preached, and if it hadn’t been worth it before, it was worth it then. I don’t remember everything she said, but somehow I came away with the impression that we all love someone, and even if the world sucks right now, we can still love people and be loved--from near or far. Love from your past still counts, from your dead grandmother or your high school boyfriend or your sweet chubby little baby who is now a prickly, sweating teenager with a nose ring. All the love is good, and it’s yours to keep. I think that’s what she said. We’ll just go with it.
After church, out on the sidewalk, I saw people I hadn’t seen in months, was invited to be on two committees, and ordered a Christmas fundraiser pie. I haven’t felt this involved in anything since February.
Today, music soothed my soul, a gentle woman’s words equipped me for the week ahead, I saw that people can still be kind and thoughtful, and there’s a pecan pie with my name on it.
I had nothing to lose, and everything to gain.
The service moved on, prayers for trouble spots around the world and trouble spots in Paris. The a cappella solo O Come, O Come Emmanuel almost broke me, the singer standing unmasked twenty feet away from anybody else and yet making me feel like Christmas can still happen. There was no congregational singing or choir, because group singing invites super-spreading. I miss singing.
People who prayed and read behind the plexiglassed pulpit took off their masks. It was nice to see their lips moving, to see them smiling, but they looked strange, vulnerable, a little too intimate. I miss faces.
The hand bell choir was reduced to three members, but instead of one bell in each hand, they all played about ten bells each, very calmly picking up and putting each bell down just in the knick of time, never missing a beat. Not only was it a sight to behold, the sound was divine. Calming.
Then Pastor Odette preached, and if it hadn’t been worth it before, it was worth it then. I don’t remember everything she said, but somehow I came away with the impression that we all love someone, and even if the world sucks right now, we can still love people and be loved--from near or far. Love from your past still counts, from your dead grandmother or your high school boyfriend or your sweet chubby little baby who is now a prickly, sweating teenager with a nose ring. All the love is good, and it’s yours to keep. I think that’s what she said. We’ll just go with it.
After church, out on the sidewalk, I saw people I hadn’t seen in months, was invited to be on two committees, and ordered a Christmas fundraiser pie. I haven’t felt this involved in anything since February.
Today, music soothed my soul, a gentle woman’s words equipped me for the week ahead, I saw that people can still be kind and thoughtful, and there’s a pecan pie with my name on it.
I had nothing to lose, and everything to gain.
