So where can we pay attention in our ordinary lives to the extraordinary impact of the Resurrection? Where can the holy break through into the ordinary? Perhaps WASHING DISHES can help us?
We used to say ‘you wash, I’ll dry’. Nowadays its often ‘you load, I’ll unload’.
Some people sing while washing the dishes, some stare out of the window and zone out of all that’s going on around them.
There’s a sense in which we wash dishes because
We have to
For some, it’s taking their turn to help when their other half has done the cooking.
We want to show appreciation
We want to show our love
We want to show our thanks for what’s gone before
We want to show our readiness to go through it all again
We realise there will always be more to do. . .
Whatever the reason, on reflection, there’s always an element of love (and suffering) to it. It takes effort, it costs us, to pay attention, to do a little work.
So. . . Washing up’s a bit like the Resurrection: we may not understand everything – how people can use so many pots, pans dishes and plates etc.. We quickly learn there is always more to do, that it involves some suffering and loss for the sake of others and that it leads us to joy ~ the prospect of another meal. . . Washing the dishes can lead us to see the bigger picture, to catch a glimpse of the resurrection in an ordinary place in ordinary time, even when we find ourselves saying ‘Why do I have to do it again?
Father Chris Heaps is the parish priest of St James Church in Reading, writing on behalf of Churches Together in Reading
