The Power of Rituals

Strange to think that I was an English major back in college, but then I drifted into Economics, Theology, and Metaphysics.

To quote those fantastic spiritual teachers— The Grateful Dead — “What a long strange trip it’s been.”

But back in my English major days I remember being blown away by T.S. Eliot’s poem, “The Waste Land.” (“April is the cruelest month of the year…”)

Eliot said that the chief source for this path breaking poem was Jessie L. Weston’s landmark book, From Ritual to Romance. In this study, Weston explores the origins of the Holy Grail legend and she suggests that it dates back to a primitive vegetation cult and only later was shaped by Celtic and Christian lore. Weston finds that the Holy Grail legend came out of a mixture of Celtic and Gnostic rituals.

Eliot then poetically contrasts this rich, spiritual landscape to a modern culture which he believes is cold, flat, meaningless, and devoid of rituals. Eliot believed that rituals can lead to connection with a sense of transcendence.

It is with this in mind that I believe that Casper ter Kuile has written a book that is right up there with From Ritual to Romance. The title of ter Kuile’s book is: The Power of Ritual: Turning Everyday Activities into Soulful Practices.

Ter Kuile is a Ministry Innovation Fellow at Harvard’s Divinity School. He is also an important podcaster and his writings have appeared in the New York Times, the Washington Post, and PBS. He has also spoken many times at the Aspen Institute.

I think it is safe to say that ter Kuile would agree with T.S. Eliot that modern life all too often has become dull and meaningless for many. Also similar to Eliot, he would point to the lack of meaningful rituals in many of our lives as a key reason behind this emptiness. 

But then I think ter Kuile would part ways from the great Anglo-American poet. Unlike Eliot, ter Kuile does not think that many modern folks can — or are willing to — go back to ancient religious rituals for comfort and meaning. Also, he is much more optimistic than Eliot. He believes that we, people of the 21st-century, have the wisdom, zeal, imagination, and power to create new rituals that work for us in this modern world.

In essence, ter Kuile’s suggested path seems relatively simple. Ask yourself: What are some of your old and familiar habits? If they are negative and destructive habits, create rituals that help you to outgrow them. If the habits are life-affirming and positive, then create rituals that surround these patterns with meaning and transcendence.

Ter Kuile gives the following example: “As a teenager, I was convinced You’ve Got Mail was the greatest movie of all time. Kathleen Kelly and Joe Fox, played by Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks, meet online in the early days of AOL chat rooms. All they know about each other is that they love books and they love New York City, nothing else, not even one another’s real name,” he explains.

For ter Kuile, “It’s not an ‘Oh, what shall we watch?’ kind of movie; it’s an ‘I’m feeling lost and alone, and I need everything I’ve got to bring me out of this slump’ kind of movie.” He says that for him You’ve Got Mail “is sacred,” and he has developed beautiful rituals around watching the movie.

He believes that we should be “taking things we do every day and layering meaning and ritual onto them, even experiences as ordinary as reading or eating – by thinking of them as spiritual practices,” he comments.

Ter Kuile believes that noticing shifts in community behavior, isn’t just interesting. It’s important. "In the midst of a crisis of isolation, where loneliness leads to deaths of despair, being truly connected isn’t a luxury. It’s a lifesaver.”

He believes that rituals can deepen our connections across four different levels:

• Connecting with yourself,

• Connecting with the people around you,

• Connecting with the natural world, and

• Connecting with transcendence.

Interestingly, he uses a definition of spirituality proposed by Sarah E. Koss and Mark D. Holder: Spirituality is a feeling of connectedness — connectedness to something greater than oneself, experienced through cultivating a relationship with one’s community, one’s environment, and one’s perception of the transcendent.

Many of us remember Dr. Abraham Maslow‘s hierarchy of needs. The bottom of the pyramid was based on such things as food, safety, and security. The higher needs on the pyramid dealt with what Maslow called self-actualization. However, in his last years of life, Maslow moved a little higher than his pyramid, and he started exploring this notion of transcendence and what it could mean in a technologically driven world. Ter Kuile believes that rituals can play a key role in this process.

Ter Kuile devotes time to sacred reading, and so-called sacred modern texts include such things as Harry Potter. He believes that sacred reading brings us home to ourselves. He brings up the ancient practice of Lectio Divina (i.e., Divine Reading), where we read a text three times and between each time we meditate. Interestingly, different words or phrases come alive for us during each reading.

Also, appropriate for modern times is ter Kuile’s ideas about “tech Sabbaths” and a “Sabbath from others.” He also believes in “a Sabbath from work to make room for play.” Of course he sees eating together as a sacred practice. 

I am grateful for ter Kuile and his book. It has helped me look at the rituals in my life. One of the most important ones for me revolves around devotion to morning prayer and meditation — to daily weed the garden and muck out the stable. Remembering the layers of meaning surrounding what we already do every day builds our sense of purpose, and truly nurtures our souls.

I invite you to look at some of the habitual activities in your life and see how adding a layer of meaning and transcendence can raise your consciousness from ritual to romance.

Many blessings,

Rev. Rick