Footwashing is Killing Congregations (especially in Nebraska)

As with many Christians across the globe yesterday I celebrated Maundy Thursday. The day has a deep liturgical tradition in Christianity, and it begins the great Three-Day worship ending with the Easter Vigil on Saturday. (Good Friday is the third worship.) But even though I celebrated Maundy Thursday, I did not participate or even a view a footwashing ceremony. That would be stupid.

The ceremony--it is not a ritual, as I have never seen everyone in a congregation participate in the ritual, usually just a few are involved in some kind of ceremonial sideshow--involves someone wrapping a towel around their waist, splashing some water on a person or two's feet, and wiping them dry. A moment of dramatic silence follows, and then we are on to the offering. Did you like our show?

As easy as it is to make fun of footwashing, we should note that for many people in the world, shoes are not an option. Footwashing is in deed for many still an act of service and hospitality. And in places where shoes are only for the wealthy, footwashing might still carry the theological and religious freight of a new commandment. (The word "Maundy" means commandment.)

But that ain't so in our world...everyone wears shoes. And socks too. I wear Birkenstocks (and yes this may be a plug, but they are the only sandals I wear) about 10 months out of the year. I don't wear them if there's  a lot of rain or snow. But I do wear them if the temperature is 0 degrees. My feet sweat at all temperatures. But even as often as I wear sandals, and as dirty as my feet might get, to have someone else wash my feet is not an act of service. It would be an act of slavery.

Footwashing goes against the very grain of having freedom in the first place. It's why it was problematic for the disciples when Jesus did it to them, and it's even more problematic for us today. It's denying the freedom we have been given to wash our own feet. In a world that assumes freedom (even if all people aren't free), footwashing becomes an act of slavery. And slavery, just to remind everyone, is bad. So why would you want to ceremonialize an act of slavery? Just because Jesus did? He died on a cross too, but we don't have people going up on crosses just to show how painful that love can be?

Consequently, footwashing in our culture looks fake (it is, but not because it's sacrilege not to wear socks and shoes, but because it denies us the freedom we were granted on the cross 2000 years ago.) In order for footwashing to have any kind of valid reason we must assume we were not freed by the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. But why would we assume that? What's the point of assuming we're not free? Something might trap us from exercising our freedom, but it is probably not our feet.

If you really want to commemorate the service to others Jesus mandates in the new commandment to love each other, stage a play between a mortgage banker and a single mom trying to get a house. At least there we don't have to pretend Jesus didn't free us, in fact, we have to hope he did; or, what chance does the mom have?

The issue I have with footwashing ceremonies is not because they are stupid or even counter-cultural. Christian congregations do a lot of things that are stupid and counter-cultural, and they are important and valuable to God's mission for world. The issue I have is that in order for the ceremony to make sense I have to set aside the very freedom of the new commandment I was given in order to pretend to do the new commandment. That is play-acting. It is not worship. And people know this, instinctively in most cases, because a secular version of freedom is indoctrinated into all of us.

If you want to help your people don't force them to believe the freedom they were given was not given to them by Jesus so that they can show you how they serve. Rather, help them see the freedom they were given, and how that freedom translates into serving others. And it's not by washing feet. That doesn't serve anybody in a culture dominated by socks and shoes. The new commandment is way more than washing body parts, but it is sad that so many people only saw that version of the commandment ceremonialized last night. And, if they believe Christianity is about something as trivial as that, why would they return?

And over the last 60 years many of them have not returned, because it turns out that footwashing is just one of many things congregations have been play-acting with instead of worshiping God and celebrating the gift of freedom from sin and freedom to serve. People leave congregations not because they do strange things but because they do trivial things. Footwashing, as an act of love, is about as trivial as you can get. And that trviality is killing us.

May your tables be full and your conversations be true.