A Lenten Devotion by Mary Memmott
But if some of the branches were broken off, and you, a wild olive shoot, were grafted in their place to share the rich root of the olive tree, do not boast over the branches. If you do boast, remember that it is not you that support the root, but the root that supports you.
Romans 11: 17-18
There is an image that was published recently to explain the science of “social distancing” — a stick figure person, connected in a branching pattern to many other stick figure people, in a web of exponential connections. When the stick figure person cuts off connection with a few people in their immediate network, a whole cascade of future infections is prevented. It’s meant to be a hopeful image — look how many infections can be prevented! But it is also sad, because that broken connection represents a person cut off, broken — a branch pruned from the trunk.
I was thinking about that image in terms of my own life in the past few weeks. First, I was sent home from my teaching job — a whole web of connections to students and fellow teachers severed. Then church was canceled and more connections fell. I’ve avoided dropping by my brother’s house — another connection gone. The library — not even on my radar — the YMCA — I dropped that before school closed. The pruning is necessary, I know, to save the tree, but it feels harsh and antiseptic, every cut ruthlessly applied.
But in the midst of this pruning, there has also been growth in connections — a “grafting” that doesn’t heal the wounds necessarily, but does provide some sustenance. There are some apple varieties that can only be grown by grafting. A sapling from one variety is cut and tied to the wound of a trunk from another variety. The base tree is made to support the new growth — and a full apple tree grows. I can see little bits of grafting happening when I take walks in my neighborhood. Kids have decorated their driveways with obstacles courses in chalk, and messages of hope. Old neighbors I haven’t seen in months or even years are more chatty, and looking to share information. And at home my phone rings more — my family checks in, I check in on them. Church goes on, and ninety year-old’s learn how to “zoom” along with all of us.
This new grafting doesn’t feel quite right yet. I’m worried about my students at home with too little to do, and I’m worried about many of their parents, doctors on the front lines without the equipment they need. I’m worried about my own parents in their small hometown far from their children, and my Dad’s cough that I can hear over the phone. But I am hopeful that some of the grafting we are doing now will take, and provide healing, so that the pruning will not be in vain. In this time of need our roots of love and faith must find a way to new branches, whether through a “Zoom” church service, or a chalk drawing, or a simple phone call.
Bless us, O God, that our roots of love and faith may find a way to new branches. Amen.