What was your topic and why did you choose it?
My thesis topics focused on grief and loss in regards to Covid-19. Considering the Christian tradition, I looked at the concepts of lamentation, hope, and ritual as ways to provide some “balm” to the pandemic and respond to the suffering and isolation that people in the world experienced; although, for the sake of length, I focused specifically on the United States.I chose this topic because the pandemic was the context I started my graduate studies in, and what continued to impact my time in grad school. Often, I noticed that the losses and grief from the pandemic surfaced throughout conversations in and out of the classroom because it affected everyday life. For me, something that became apparent with the pandemic is the lack of tools and ability for people to process this global reality that I even see as traumatic. While I wrote about this topic for others, I also wrote it for myself as I was looking for ways to continually cope with the pandemic.
Tell us more about what you explored in the theological and ministerial papers.
Threaded in both of my essays, I wrote about lament, hope, and ritual. Considering these three aspects, in my theological essay I wrote about theodicy, the role of the community, and the journey of the people of Judah in the Book of Jeremiah. I began with theodicy, or “why does God allow suffering?” I found this to be important to contextualize because people of faith have interpreted the pandemic in a variety of ways. For the thesis, we had to include a voice from the patristics. I chose to bring in Irenaeus because he used the story of Jonah for building his theological understanding of theodicy, which I found interesting and initially was a consideration for the scriptural aspect of my thesis. An alternative perspective to Irenaeus that I found helpful for considering the pandemic was Dorothee Soelle. Rather than focusing on the cause of suffering, Soelle is more concerned with the role of the community amidst suffering. Her theology helped me to name where I saw God in the pandemic, which was in communities. For scripture, I looked to Jeremiah because it was a community moving through tragic suffering together with a variety of responses to what they thought God was or was not doing; at other times they were in such anguish that they had no space to think about where God was in the suffering. Some of the commentary on Jeremiah helped me also to draw a connection to the trauma in the passages and to the pandemic in the present day. For my ministerial essay, I focused on the role of spirituals, compassion, witnessing, and naming loved ones who have died. I wrote about Bryan Massingale’s theology around “lament.” He points to the African American spiritual tradition as a powerful expression of lament. I also included Pope Francis’ concern with selfishness that he writes about in Evangelii Gaudium, which leads to a breakdown of community. I saw compassion as an antidote to selfishness. Pope Francis also writes about hopelessness, which I believe increased during the pandemic. In response to hopelessness, I turned to the tradition to consider the resurrection of Jesus Christ, but found that there is often a jump from Good Friday to Easter Sunday. As an alternative route from this “jump,” theologian Shelly Rambo speaks of witnessing and asks “what is the reality for the one who remains?” As the pandemic continues, the power in witnessing and hearing one another’s sufferings and stories and making space for them is a way to provide ground for hope to grow. Finally, I wrote about ritual and the significance of marking loss, which was disrupted by the pandemic. In addition to holding socially distanced funeral services and services over Zoom , I also wrote about the power of using the practice of naming all who have died as a way to mark the loss of their lives and to remember them.
Tell us about the project you designed.
For my project piece, I chose to write a prayer service. Although it’s not required, since I’m an experiential learner it was my hope to bring this service to life for a community. Although I would love to bring this service to other faith communities and parishes in the future (adapting it as needed), it was a gift I could offer my peers and learning community while at the CSTM. The prayer service consisted of songs, scripture, reflection and ritual. It was truly a gift to see it come to life and I loved how collaborative and student-led it felt.
Did anything surprise you?
There were several things that surprised me, but two in particular were the reality of writing about something that continued to change, and grappling with the question of “where is God in the pandemic?” First, choosing to write on something that continued to unfold was challenging, but it was also a reminder of how life is always in a state of change. Second, I found myself really contending with my own question of where was/is God in the midst of Covid? I had to continue to work and rework where my theology was going with that question.Even now that the paper is done, it’s a question I continue to grapple with.
What did you enjoy most about the process?
I really enjoyed being able to write about a topic that impacted everyday life and something that I was trying to make sense of, but that I also hoped could help others. I also appreciated engaging with a topic that has been saturated with science because I’m a firm believer that “theology doesn’t happen in a vacuum.” Writing about the pandemic was a way to engage theology with other disciplines, and to find the connections between them. While my paper did not give any answers, it was personally life-giving to embrace trying to write about the pandemic.
What’s an insight from your thesis that is important for all ministers to remember?
In writing this paper, I realized that the tradition needs to expand its notion of hope beyond the jump from Good Friday to Easter Sunday, and to consider the role of witnessing within the community, especially when it comes to suffering and trauma.