Being in sync

Recently, a group of parishioners at my parish returned from a mission trip to Whitesville, West Virginia.  The nearly 100 missionaries spent a week together following a similar rhythm:  breakfast, work, lunch, work, dinner, evening activities, bedtime.   Their being together and their sharing the same pattern of activities made them more united, unified, in sync with each other.   They came home changed.

The scientific word for this is entrainment.  Entrainment was first discovered in 1665 by Dutch physicist Christian Huygsen while working on the design of the pendulum clock.

Huygsen placed two clocks, with pendulums swinging at opposite rates, near each other.  He found that eventually the pendulums synchronized with each other, swinging at the same rate.  Entrainment has been used in everything from astronomy to music.   It has helped the scientific world to prove that two opposite oscillating bodies can have enough influence on each other to vibrate in harmony.

We could call the liturgy a ritual entrainment.  We come together and follow the same ritual patterns and rhythms: gathering, introductory rites, liturgy of the word, liturgy of the eucharist, communion rite and sending forth, singing, speaking, listening, standing, kneeling, sitting.   As well, we follow the same patterns and rhythms of the liturgical year which are guided by the patterns and rhythms of the moon and the sun. The liturgy synchronizes us so that we can be attuned to creation, to each other and to God, whose very breath began to swing the first pendulum of life.    As we come together in the liturgy, let us pray that we will be synchronized enough to, like the missionaries to Whitesville, bring God’s message of hope to the world.

O Lord, let us be your instruments of hope.  AMEN