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Home , Altar, Home altar

The Home is the new “Victory Garden”

If you have not already built a , it’s time for that gift.

April 6, 2020 The Rev. Dr. Tricia Lyons Virginia Theological Seminary

US government War and Victory Garden propaganda posters from World War I (right ) and World War II (left). Images reproduced under Public Domain. Center image: our home altar with bowl of water, , , , , 100-year old family and Book.

Some of you might have or have had a grandparent, family member or community member who lived through World War II. If so, you may have heard their stories about ‘ration cards’ for butter or other foods in order to preserve the food supply for a country at war. But in addition to the ration limits put on the purchases of foods, gasoline, metals and other essential products across the country, there were also calls to the nation to practice community and ingenuity in a time of scarcity. “Victory Gardens,” also called “War Gardens” or “Food Gardens for Defense,” were vegetable, fruit, and herb gardens planted by individuals and families at apartments, homes and public parks in America, Canada, Britain and Germany, during both World War I and World War II. Around one third of the vegetables produced by the United States came from victory gardens in the 1940s. By May 1943, there were 18 million victory gardens in the US – 12 million in cities and 6 million on farms.1 Think about that: twice as many gardens in cities than on farms. The invitation to make and maintain your own source of nourishment and empowerment touched and inspired all kinds of people.

War-time governments encouraged people to plant ‘victory gardens’ not only to supplement their food rations but also to generate hope and joy from watching food grow in your

1 "18,000,000 Gardens for Victory". Popular Mechanics. May 1943. p. 1.

1 own home. Planting created a sense of shared purpose and empowerment among all those not on the battlefield. It was George Washington Carver, the renowned African-American agricultural scientist, who wrote the most popular agricultural on ‘Victory Gardens’ and helped ignite the American version of the Victory Garden movement. But these gardens were also considered a national morale boost because gardeners of all ages could feel energized by their collective contribution of love and labor to a greater good. While the bloody war raged on for years, Victory Gardens allowed those left behind to put their worry to work. Victory Gardens strengthened a sense of shared participation in and awakened the belief in human productivity. It was a life-giving act in times of otherwise paralyzing fear and contagious dread. The practice of planting real goodness in the intimate space of one’s own shelter or home reminded people, of all ages, that humans are creators and not just creatures on earth; planters and not just pawns in plans or plagues beyond their control.

Lately and in light of the stay-at-home orders across the country, many of you may have seen posts, blogs, pictures or videos online about ‘making a home altar.’ And yet, I talk with leaders, lay and ordained, in faith communities that have heard little or nothing about the practice. It is my deep conviction that one of the most powerful gifts leaders can give their flocks in this COVID-19 time is to make a home altar yourself and do formation among your people in the importance of constructing a sacred space or altar in the room or home or dorm or cell or shelter or hospital in which they live. For all of the same reasons and to seek so many of the blessed benefits of the Victory Gardens of old, I implore all Christians to build home and teach others to do the same. At this perilous moment in our history, when both the strong and the weak are drowning in fear and uncertainty and looming waves of death across the country, it is time to plant gardens of hope, faith and love in the spaces in which we are commanded to shelter in place. There is so much grief across all religious communities for the beautiful buildings and the infinitely more beautiful communities of souls from which we are in exile, indefinitely. This is not the time to starve ourselves unnecessarily from all the powerful teaching symbols of our buildings and . As Christians we are defined by the baptismal font, the ambo from where the Word of God is read and the altars on which we lay our gifts and feast on the Body and Blood of Christ.

We have been warned by responsible authorities that 2020 will be the first week of many that will unfold the worst death waves of the virus that we have seen, bringing more death into more families and more communities than in any time in living memory. It is impossible, in a Holy Week that includes the Jewish Passover, not to think of the Angel of Death that blew through Egypt and struck down the living, in house after house, from the poor to the Pharaoh. For the first time in my life, I am watching news full of warnings to prepare myself for crushed emergency rooms, refrigerator trucks outside hospitals for the piles of body bags, and more dead people than can be named or mourned. The Angel of Death is already here.

But in that sacred story of the Passover, the people of God marked their houses. Notice that their act of faith did not stop the death moving across Egypt. And God did not need to be shown where God’s people were living. So why did they mark their houses with a sign of their faith? First, they were commanded to. Second, in that act, the marked houses and those in them showed Death and the world that the Israelites defined themselves not by fear but by faith. We are in that moment of darkness right now, when the winds are full of dread and death. And worse

2 than in ancient Egypt, through the doors of our radios and screens the news and images of death are entering our homes and our imaginations. It is time to mark our homes with faith so that we bear witness to the world (and to ourselves) that we are a people of God in the face of destruction and that “nothing can separate us from the love of the Lord .” In this war with COVID-19 it is time to plant our garden where we can. We need spiritually powerful Victory Gardens now. I need a sacred and hopeful project like the Victory Gardens that will expand my nourishment, connect me with others in seeking more life, add to the meek rations of information and clarity on the news and remind me of the deepest Anglican conviction about human beings: that we are co-creators with God in the world.

Why an altar?

Why is an altar different than a religious candle or calendar in your home? The history of altars in as utterly unique pieces of sacred furnishing is complex, mysterious, miraculous, inspiring and instructive for our current moment and immediate COVID-19 spiritual needs. The earliest Scripture reference to the altar is in St. Paul (1 Corinthians 10:21) when he speaks of the "table of the Lord" (trapeza Kyriou in Greek and eventually, mensa Domini and altare Dei in Latin) and contrasts it with pagan altars of his time. Christians and Jews did not invent altars. Rather, they took the pagan act of constructing altars to the gods and adopted and adapted the practice to worship their God.

The earliest altars were wood, identical to common tables for eating and fellowship in homes. These were the simple wood tables you see depicted in the Eucharistic celebrations of first and second century catacombs across the ancient world. By the sixth century, the hierarchy of the legislated that altars be made of stone, a sign perhaps of the increasing power and prestige of Christianity across the Empire. The earliest stone altars were often tombs of martyrs and later stone altars were poured with of martyrs contained in the stone. For centuries, has been celebrated on the cover stone of these graves of , joining the hopeful living with the faithful dead in the communion of Saints feasting together. The Reformation brought a revival of the more simple, wooden altar tradition, in opposition to the Roman practice of increasingly extravagant stone altars. To this day, you can find both stone or wooden altars in Anglican churches, a glorious example of the Anglican conviction to hold both Catholic and Protestant wisdom and worship together.

How to Build Your Altar

I share some of the history of altars to convince you that there is no correct altar in the Christian sacramental tradition. Over the centuries we have used grassy ground, whittled wood and solid stone. But at all times and in all places, we were creating tables on which to feast on eternal food with the living and dead. So make that kind of sacred table in your home in these times of viral fear. Make your altar your own victory garden as an act of devotion, community connections and spiritual nourishment. Construct and decorate an altar so that you can read scripture and say your and light your candles in a dedicated space of peace and hope and worship of God. Use any surface in your home that is close enough to motion to share the currents of life in the home and yet safe enough to be free from the careless bustle and bumping of daily life. Use the construction of your altar to teach yourself and those in your home the

3 colors of the and the themes of each season that those colors represent. Read for yourself or read as a family the meaning of the seasons of the year as you change the colors. Let your symbols of the liturgical year pull you into the story of God in history, of what God has done and will do, on earth as it is in heaven.

Represent the essential symbols of our faith with objects (or pictures or paintings of them) on your altar. Remember that we are sacramental people of the font, ambo (lectern that holds the Bible) and altar. These three objects in every form what liturgical theologian James Farwell calls the “sacred geography” of our church spaces. Find a bowl and fill it with water and put it on your home altar to be your font. Look in the (pp. 306-307) at the blessing of the water at Baptism and read it out loud as you fill that bowl. Find a Bible in your life, preferably one that has been read and perhaps loved by you or someone who loved you. A beautiful phrase for the Bible that has been mostly lost in modern speech is this: the Scriptures are “the lively oracles of God.” Put those lively oracles on your altar not just to read at times of prayer but to stand as a sign that God’s saving Word is ever within our reach. Find symbols of the Eucharistic meal: a chalice, a plate, a bread bowl, a glass. Place them on your holy table to remind you and all that see your altar that we know God in the breaking of the bread and the pouring of the wine and in those elements we feast on life everlasting. Let the symbols of the Last Supper remind you that Christ shed his blood and offered his body for our redemption and resurrection. And let these symbols of feasting remind you and others that we are called into relationship with God who loved us through a human body and wants us to bring our whole bodies into our relationship with God. Let your home altar remind you that “we feed on Him in our hearts, with grace and thanksgiving.”

Put a candle on your altar to symbolize that Christ is the Light of the World. Learn from the ancient church altars the power of bringing an artifact of a unto or into your altar and into your worship and prayers to remind you that we live and prayer with the Communion of Saints across time. So add a picture or treasure from a saint in your own life – a gift, a photo or a piece of art given to you by someone who shared their faith and prayers with you. And let flowers or plants bring vibrant life and transformation to your sacred table. Remember the Victory Gardens were not home museums. They were practical sources of food and shared hope. They literally fed their farmers. Make a home altar that can feed your soul with treasures and truths that set you free. Do not crowd your altar. Give each symbol room to speak.

The Altar is a Place and a Portal

And lastly, do not commit the sins of many generations that built altars and fell into worshipping them as idols. Think of your home altar as a portal not just a place. Borrow a perspective from our Orthodox siblings and see your home altar as an icon: a thing through which the grace and gaze of God shines through and falls upon your face and life. The holiness of altars comes through them not from them. Do not make a museum of objects but instead, make a space for the living and Triune God to meet you and dwell with you as you pray together. No one lives alone who invites the living God to dwell in their home. If possible, turn your altar facing East, as all altars in Christianity are. And if you can’t turn the altar to the East, then turn your sacred objects upon it facing East, a sign of our Biblical and creedal hope and expectation that Christ will return to the earth from the East.

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Remember that is a of symbols not superstitions. Building an altar will not necessarily protect you against COVID-19 or any other malady. An altar is not armor, it is an . You are not building a piece of furniture in your home, you are instead installing a doorway. We gather symbols upon our altars to intensify for all five senses the truths of God’s love and resurrection that are present everywhere and always in the world, but that we often forget or ignore. Think of your altar like an electrical outlet in your home where you and others can plug in and experience the palpable and transformative power of God’s love surging into your life through prayer, reading scripture or singing .

The Altar is Evangelism

And lastly, don’t miss the chance to use your home altar for evangelism. First, evangelism within your faith community. My friends, I swear to you that if we know anything about faith formation it is this: if a person or family makes their own altar and practices their faith with it, they will never look at any altar in the world the same again. None of us can unlearn or unseen that process of building our own altar. You will change lives and deepen faith if you shepherd your people in this practice. And then there is evangelism outward from your faith community. Take a picture of these altars and share or post them for your extended family and friends to see online. Let the world see that you know God, that you are sealed as Christ’s own forever and that you have built a door for God’s presence, light and love to flow into your home in these dark times. Ask your faith community to share their pictures on Facebook pages or your church website.

Imagine non-church people looking for a faith community and seeing a church website that had a collage of home altars. That visitor would know that your people know God well enough to want and invite God into their homes. The seeker would see that your community members know the symbols of their faith well enough to find them and gather them with intention from the common collection of things in their lives. Let visitors see that your community finds God in both Church and world, in sanctuaries and homes, in public and in private. Isn’t that the skill – finding ways and means to connect with God - that all spiritual people long to practice and share in community?

I hope that when this virus is done, that every church changes its website to include images of the altars we made in exile, altars that linked us to each other and to the church altar in our sanctuary. Let people see our Victory Garden altars and read the testimonies of the nourishment we found from God while dwelling near them. I long for the day when a home altar is not a symbol of your church’s main altar, but rather that the central altar in your church becomes the symbol of the home altars we make in the depth of our lives. That old Celtic prayer is correct: “We do not have much time to gladden the hearts of those who walk this way with us,” so resist the darkness, renounce the powers of death and build your victory altar now.

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