Lenten Devotional by Rick Seaholm
March 24, 2017
“You are my hiding place; you will protect me from trouble and surround me with songs of deliverance.” (Psalm 32:7, NIV)
As I alluded to in a previous reflection here (March 10), the term “sanctuary” has a long-standing representation for me which is physical in nature, God’s sanctuary, as evidenced by the walls, steeples, windows, and instruments which we blessed on the First Sunday in Lent this year at Edwards Church. My connection with the many instances of “God’s house” in which I have served and worshiped has led me to feel quite comfortable in them, like home almost.
Historically, in some areas, one could cry “Sanctuary!” in a church and be free from persecution of a judgmental world. If a criminal chose to, he could get to a church and stay there indefinitely, safe from the law. Apparently, many criminals died after long periods living this way.
In the late 1990s, I was finding my way through early adulthood, a music student nine months a year, a popcorn monkey at Framingham’s General Cinema the remain three months, and always connected to the church of my youth. I would practice piano and organ, and sit by myself in that sanctuary for many hours a week, my safe space: a sanctuary by several definitions.
During those three months a year that I worked full-time at the theater, I developed a secondary sanctuary of my own. More of that in a moment.
Recently having taken the Myers Briggs personality tests, I have learned that I am an introvert. Colloquially, I think we all look at a quiet person or the nut with a lampshade on his head and assign to each the title of introvert or extrovert. In those terms, I struggle a bit, because although I’m often with my own thoughts, I’m equally comfortable leading a choir, teaching a class, or speaking up in a meeting. The MBTI test has taught me that these two terms are not a mark of how loud you are, but rather tell you where you get your energy. Through that lens, it’s abundantly clear that I am an introvert and have been my entire life. Which takes me back to that movie theater where I would be a life of the party sort of person behind the counter. The shift leads quickly learned that if I were chained to a cash register all night, it would be a misuse of my talents. Put me as a “runner” instead, and I would be able to build people up, make staff have a good laugh, and keep morale generally high. My actions were able to help those extroverts in our midst who needed strong personalities nearby to give them energy. Being an introvert, however, that shift work would drain me of my own energy! On my breaks, I would often sit in the car, listening to CDs, but just as often, I would schedule my breaks to coincide with the movie schedule. Having seen all the releases at the theater, I “collected”, if you will, numinous on-screen moments that caused the hairs on my head to rise up, a shifting in my entire demeanor. I would look at the start time of the various films, calculate what fifteen-minute break period I should take so that I could quietly make my way to the back row of an auditorium, witness one of these moments, achieve the visceral connection I’d hoped for, down a peanut butter sandwich, and head back to work, recharged.
The reason I bring this all up in a post about “sanctuary” is two- or three-fold. While those auditorium moments were an introvert’s dream come true, one particular scene was the accompaniment to me on nearly every shift throughout of summer of 1996, and its subject fits this Lenten topic perfectly. The film was Disney’s Hunchback of Notre Dame, an animated retelling of the classic Victor Hugo novel. I was fresh off a dream of being an animator (which by this point had devolved into simply being an enthusiastic animation patron), so I had great interest in any Disney release. Quasimodo was played by Tom Hulce, a favorite actor from a favorite movie (Amadeus), and the entire picture had its fair share of those moments I speak of. I was in heaven all summer.
Toward the conclusion, Esmeralda is about to be burned at the stake just outside of the cathedral. Quasimodo, hearing what’s going on below, risks his own life leaving the building, by way of swinging rope, to retrieve her from the platform and return her to the topmost levels of the bell tower. As he swings back up, the soundtrack reaching a climactic moment, he thrice screams “Sanctuary!”, a reminder of the medieval practice described above. This moment sticks with me to this day, and I sought it out on YouTube, having not seen the movie in the last fifteen years of so. I’m struck by so much about the scene, with not one but two moving camera shots, three dimensions of activity, early efforts in crowd scene digital duplication of people. There’s a treasure trove for an animation buff to love. But it is that “Sanctuary!” moment which to this day made the hairs stand up and sent chills up my neck.
God, you are our safe space, may we ever be aware, feeling your presence. Amen