Anointed

Our church has just finished a yearlong renovation project. It is beautiful and today the bishop came to celebrate the re-dedication Mass. It began with the bishop accepting the keys from the pastor and blessing the water in the baptistry. I didn't see as much of it as I might have liked, because I was chasing a toddler unimpressed by miters and crosiers. There's one piece of the liturgy that I want to remember, though.

Before the liturgy of the Eucharist began, the bishop took off his golden chasuble and put on, no kidding, an apron. Someone brought him a vessel of oil -- not a dinky little cruet, but a big honking flask full of shining oil. He poured it onto the altar and rubbed it in, and I started thinking about writing this post (<-one of these days I will stop thinking about blogging during Mass). He wasn't done, though, not at all. Slowly he worked his way all around the altar, pouring the oil and rubbing it in. He took his time about it.

I remembered a retreat team I was part of, where one of the speakers talked about the ancient meanings of anointing with oil. He said that warriors would do it before battle, because it made them too slippery for their opponents to hold onto.

I thought about the young David, anointed with oil as a sign of God's favor.

I thought about chrism gleaming on my children's newly baptized faces. I am thinking now about my oldest, preparing for confirmation in the spring.

And I thought about the meaning of oil in cultures where food was scarcer -- where they could talk about "the oil of gladness" instead of asking for fat-free alternatives. I thought about the way that fat makes things taste more like themselves, makes them richer and more satisfying. I also thought about doughnuts for a while, because I am a deeply spiritual person. Really, though, there's a connection -- I was thinking about sufganiot and latkes, foods that celebrate an end to scarcity. There's an open-handed quality to those foods: it takes generosity to pour out that much oil in preparation for your feast.

By this time I was following Stella through the parish hall, but the Mass was visible on a big screen in there. I thought about the altar as a metaphor for Christian lives: a place that exists solely so the broken body of Christ can be lifted high. It prompted me to pray for our community: Make us too slippery for the enemy to keep hold of. Keep us faithful to our baptismal promises, faithful to your call. Pour out your goodness on us, and teach us to be open-handed in turn.

Also: thanks, God, for doughnuts.