Lecture at Starseed
Montclair, New Jersey, USA May 3, 2002

by Dally Messenger III

Tonight I want to talk to you about the nature of Rites of Passage and Ceremony and how, properly done, they enrich our lives. I would like to dedicate this talk to a great ceremonialist and ritual maker, Kathleen Mary Hurley, who died last year.

I would like to thank Genevieve, and to acknowledge Gaile and Pat Sarma and Charlotte Eulette of the Celebrant Foundation and the people of Starseed for giving me this opportunity.

And now a disclaimer. I come from a friendly but different colleague culture. Words in one country have different meanings and nuances, so if I say something that doesn’t sound right to you, please give me the benefit of the doubt; it is probably a misunderstanding of some kind.

THEME
Tonight I will speak about how the symbols of American Life bring the nation together and give it unity, stability, energy and life. How the symbols of individuals bring us together give our personal existence unity, stability, energy and life.

Tom Chetwynd in his Dictionary of Symbols tells us that “symbols release or draw energy from the subconscious.”

You Americans are a very mixed lot of people. On the tour around Manhattan the knowledgeable guide pointed out that the first five soldiers killed at Pearl Harbour were from five different nationalities and cultures. You all come from varying ethnic origins, all cultures, all colours, all religions and none, yet you all come together as one.

This nation has a remarkable unity and a passionate patriotism. How is this so? To an outsider this is a nation of physical symbols. So much so that I hardly know where to start. (Author’s note: I wrote these words nine months after September 11, 2001 when unity and patriotism in the USA was very strong.)

THE WORDS
Let me start at a beginning. Your are held together by wonderful words. e.g. The Declaration of Independence. In Washington DC the original document is draped on a wall in the National Archives, looking much like the high altar of a church, and in it is enshrined the famous words of Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)

“We hold these truths to be self-evident,— that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”

You are also bound together by the wonderful words of Abraham Lincoln written at Gettysburg in 1863: -

“Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. . . . .
that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”

There are the poems of Emma Lazarus, the speeches Martin Luther King Jnr and many others. Here is the poem of Lazarus, san extract of which is carved on the base of the Statue of Liberty.

The New Colossus
Emma Lazarus

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
"Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

THE FLAG
Perhaps, I should have observed firstly a different type of symbol, which is in your face, as we say in Oz, everywhere you go – the flag. It hangs from public buildings, it hangs from houses, it breezes by on the motorcar, it is stuck in the garden next to the pot plant. It is everywhere – connecting you all together – Anglo Saxons, Germans, Greeks, Jews, African Americans the whole melting pot.

Perhaps, I should have started on your music – the Star Spangled Banner, the marches of Phillip Sousa. Nothing, to quote Chetwynd again, draws or releases energy from the conscious or the unconscious like music.

And it is not just the music of National Anthems that I am talking about. You have other music that stirs your soul and gives you pride and status – the music of the Gershwins, Irving Berlin, and Leonard Bernstein.

ICONS
And it is not just the poem of Emma Lazarus but the poetry of Alan Ginsburg, and Langston Hughes and Robert Frost and a host of others. And the other icons like Joe Di Maggio, Babe Ruth, Frank Sinatra, Michael Jordan and Tiger Woods.

You have myths and stories, which by the recognized values, the beauty of the words, and the drama of the events connect you to one another and give you a feeling of pride and self worth. These symbols give you energy and inspiration. There is the myth of George Washington - how he chopped down his old man’s cherry tree. And you have the stories of Ellis Island – those who were let in to this country, and those who were sent back with a flick of the bureaucratic finger.

WASHINGTON
Let us leave the Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island, and the Empire State Building and go south. I spent a month in Washington DC. That place has to be the Jerusalem of the USA. Shrine after shrine, pilgrimage after pilgrimage, Lincoln, Washington, Jefferson, Roosevelt. Vietnam, Korea, The Wright Brothers, Lindbergh, Arlington, The Unknown Soldier, JFK and Jackie.

I met group after group of school children and spoke to them - from Los Angeles, from Ohio, from Tulsa, Oklahoma from everywhere, traipsing from icon to icon, being gently and properly indoctrinated into their history.

So why am I reflecting on all this? Aren’t I supposed to be talking about Rites of Passage and Ceremony? What is the connection here with births, deaths and marriages and personal ceremonies in general?

CEREMONY - BY DAVID OLDFIELD
I would like to give you a quote from David Oldfield.

“Ceremonies are celebrations that stand outside of time’s normal flow. They are occasions for stepping out of our routines and preoccupations, so we may touch something essential in life. We seek ceremony when we feel that something powerful and profound is happening.

The “passage points” in life require something more from us than our normal ways of operating offer. And so we dress differently, perhaps, or speak special words, in a voice different from that which we normally use. We change the atmosphere: the lighting, the sounds, the adornments — to create “a space apart”.

And we do things in ceremony that are consciously symbolic: tell symbolic stories, enact symbolic dramas, eat symbolic foods. Symbolism allows the depth of what we feel to shine through. Ceremony is a visible means for honoring that unseen world that we feel within.

But ceremony (should) . . . never (be) . . . imposed from external sources. The structure and content of the ceremony should grow out of the shared experience of those who gather. A ceremony that does not arise from and speak to the experience of (those) . . . who have made this journey is a dead ceremony, and a dead ceremony is far worse than no ceremony at all.”

So when we put a ceremony together, to make it powerful, we put in the symbols, the poetry, the prose, the choreography, the music, the dress, the lyrics, which come from our own personal culture. We choose that which speaks most powerfully to us, and our own family, and which speaks most powerfully to our own network of friends.

The wedding is the flagship ceremony of all cultures. And such a ceremony should have all the connection and beauty of which we have been speaking.

Look what we do in a wedding. We link two hitherto unrelated people into the closest and most intimate relationship, which exists on the planet. Not only do we link the two, but we bond both families, both networks of friends. And we not only do we do that; we make special bonds with those who are chosen as part of the ceremony. I refer here to participants such as the best man, the groomsmen, the matron of honour, the bridesmaids, the page boy and flower girl, the readers and the singers.

Our personal symbolism might include Nat King Cole “When I fall in love, it will be forever.”

Or it could be Blue Grass -
“I thought I’d been loved and I thought I’d been kissed,
but that was before I met you.”

It could be that wonderful love song -

For You - sung by John Denver

Just to look in your eyes again
Just to lay in your arms
Just to be the first one
always there for you

Just to live in your laughter
Just to sing in your heart
Just to be every one
of your dreams come true

Just to sit by your window
Just to touch in the night
Just to offer a prayer
each day for you

Just to long for your kisses
Just to dream of your sighs
Just to know that
I'd give my life, for you

For you, all the rest of my life
For you, all the best of my life
For you alone -Only for you.

Just to wake up each morning
Just to you by my side
Just to know that you're never really far away
Just to reason for living
Just to say "I adore"
Just to know that you are here in my heart to stay
For you all the rest of my life
For you all the best of my life
For you alone - Only for you
Just the words of a love song
Just the beat of my heart
Just the pledge of my life
My love, for you.

Or it could be - Can't Help Falling in Love -sung by Elvis Presley

Wise men say
only fools rush in
But I can't help
falling in love with you.
Shall I stay?
Would it be a sin?
If I can't help
falling in love with you.
Like a river flows
surely to the sea
Darling so it goes
Some things are meant to be.
Take my hand
Take my whole life too
For I can't help
falling in love with you
Like a river flows
surely to the sea
Darling so it goes
Some things are meant to be.
Take my hand
tale my whole life too
For I can't help
falling in love with you
For I can't help
falling in love with you.

THE STORIES AND MYTHS
Then we tell the story perhaps of how the bride and groom met, how they fell in love, how their relationship developed, what he likes and loves about her, what she likes and loves about him. We tell why they are getting married, hat their family means to them, what their friends mean to them, what are the dreams for the future.

Then, through their chosen poetry, and prose, they say what they want to say, and express the values they want to reinforce and transmit.

Take this last verse from a poem by Christopher Brennan

Then seek not, sweet, the "If" and "Why"
I love you now until I die:
For I must love because I live
And life in me is what you give.

Consider the values in these immortal lines of A.A. Milne in "Now We Are Six".

So wherever I am, there’s always Pooh,
There’s always Pooh and Me.
‘What would I do?’ I said to Pooh,
‘If it wasn’t for you,’ and Pooh said: ‘True,
It isn’t much fun for One, but Two
Can stick together,’ says Pooh, says he.
‘That’s how it is,’ says Pooh, says he.
‘That’s how it is,’ says Pooh.

What ceremony is and does:

1. John Nash/Russell Crowe in “A Beautiful Mind”

On 60 Minutes, one of Nash’s best friends told the story of how he was known to be a brilliant mathematician at the University where he hung about, suffering from schizophrenia. It was only when he was invited to the ceremony, which awarded him the Nobel Prize that his life changed around and he set out and substantially succeeded in conquering his illness. As his friend observed.

“Recognition is a cure for many ills”

(And ceremony is the human device by which we communicate recognition)

2. If we knew all about the unconscious, it would not be the unconscious;
it would be the conscious (quoted by Dr Frank Hentschker).

3. “Symbols have always been treasured as a means of releasing sources of energy from the unconscious.”
p.vii, Chetwynd, Tom, Dictionary of Symbols, Thorsons (Harper Collins), 1998 ISBN 1 85538 296 2

4. “By gradually integrating conscious with unconscious content in the psyche, they affect the quality of your personal life, bringing value and meaning to it.”
p.vii, Chetwynd, Tom, Dictionary of Symbols, Thorsons (Harper Collins), 1998 ISBN 1 85538 296 2

5. Re : a person has depth OR that person is superficial.
“How could that twig bear such fruit? They’ll wonder –
Not knowing you’re the tree, the root.”
Chetwynd, Tom, Dictionary of Symbols, Thorsons (Harper Collins), 1998 ISBN 1 85538 296 2

6. We usually talk of the subconscious as being affected by sudden dramatic events e.g. the big dog frightens the little child so the grown person, seemingly inexplicably, is frightened of dogs all his life.

But of course, the subconscious can be fed slowly with constant propaganda, as when the protestants and catholics in Northern Island feed and brainwash (as we say) fear of the opposite side constantly into their consciousness from birth. This is what we mean when we say “brainwashing”.

Or when a dieting woman keeps telling herself how harmful cakes, pastries, and chocolates are, so that in the end, she loses all desire for them.

7. In Noises Off, the Broadway Play, the director Loy comes out with the sentence.

“The wellsprings of human action are deep and clouded.”

8. Some things one can never shake. Like the priest who described the sufferings of hell in terms of being buried alive. The fear has never left me.

There is much more I could say, but the symbols that enrich the ceremony and all the other elements of the ceremony itself, we consciously feed into a memorable event, which then forms part of our unconscious. It contributes to how we feel about nearly all the events of human life, and modifies all our actions and attitudes, which follow thereafter.

Endnotes

Quote about the nature of Ceremony from David Oldfield, is in Louise Mahdi's book "Crossroads" - a book about adolescent Rites of Passage: - Full Reference -

from Oldfield, David ‘The Journey: and experiential rite of passage for modern adolescents’, in Mahdi, L.C., Crossroads The quest for Contemporary Rites of Passage, Open Court Chicago. Ill, 1996, p.163
--

*Gettysburg Address: Nov 19, 1863 (Full text)

“Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this. But, in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate—we cannot consecrate—we cannot hallow—this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”

Dally Messenger
at Queens College
University of Melbourne