Rites of Passage / Sunday Service

Calla Norman

I grew up going to church on Sundays. My parents sang in the praise band, and sometimes I’d join them, harmonizing with my mom to worship music from the ’90s. The setlist remains unchanged to this day. If I’m being honest, as I got older, I spent less and less time in service and more time goofing off with my friends in the youth group room in the basement.

Still, the patterns and rituals of Sunday service are deeply embedded in me. Now, when I go back for holidays, I get a kick out of mouthing along with the pastor’s benediction (which has also never changed) to my childhood friends across the aisle from me, our eyes lighting up with recognition, mockery, and nostalgia. Though I avoided church as much as I could growing up, complained endlessly about its routine nature, and wrestled with my discomfort with spirituality, I look back and find it comforting how, even as numbers dwindle and the congregation gets older, the routine remains the same.

Around the time my friends and I began playing hooky from our church services, I first encountered the Indigo Girls, who have been my spiritual conduit ever since. My first encounter with the Indigo Girls was also in a basement, my parents’; I found a copy of their album Shaming of The Sun, was intrigued by the creepy dolls on the cover, popped it into my little CD player, and have loved them ever since. I don’t really know how to describe how I feel about them except to quote their song “Virginia Woolf:”

And here’s a young girl
On a kind of a telephone line through time
And the voice at the other end comes like a long lost friend

I’ve always felt like they’ve gotten me, long before I knew I was queer, and long before I came to terms with accepting that. I got every copy of their CDs that I could get my hands on and loaded up my car with the thin, shiny cases that had cartoon drawings and portraits of Emily Saliers and Amy Ray frolicing in corn fields or posing on desertscapes. I’d end up playing these on repeat until I had memorized the musical contours of each album, picking up different harmonies as the mood struck me, imitating Amy’s yearning, butchy growl, and wishing I had half the poetic chops of Emily. The Indigo Girls have always been mapped onto my life, from my first concert to the soundtrack of car rides to and from college.

Have you ever listened to an album so many times in a particular situation—the drive to school, a walk around your neighborhood—that the songs feel linked to that place or that activity forever? I realized I could map out an Indigo Girls album to the rhythms of a church service. It made sense to me; what else is worship but a quiet moment alone in the car, singing along to a CD?

The most fitting record for this exercise seemed to me to be Rites of Passage, a title that I realize is incredibly on the nose. With a bit of rearranging, I connected the songs and their messages, melodies, and emotional textures to the various parts of the church service which I’ve always found comforting. Listening to the album in this way may not have been what Amy and Emily intended—or maybe it is! After all, nearly every song in this album has some sort of Biblical reference in it, and Emily, the daughter of a reverend, has even published a book on music and worship, so why wouldn’t this apply to her secular work?

I hope you spend time listening to the rearranged album, accompanied by a few notes for each song, and come to see either Rites of Passage or the rites of a Sunday worship service in a different light. I highly recommend trying this exercise with your favorite albums: rearrange them, put the album on shuffle and see what changes. What rituals can you map the music of your life on to?

Sunday Service — Rites of Passage

(playlist of the album rearranged)

Greet one another in love / Three Hits

The “greet one another in love” part of the service is one of the most endearing and one of the most disappointing. A shake of the hands, “Peace be with you,” and a polite Midwestern smile usually seals the deal, but I’ve always wanted more of a sense of belonging to the community.

“Three Hits” extends a joint out to you with a smile (not that I smoke, but I appreciate the commensality of the gesture), and welcomes you into the circle with all of the week’s triumphs and problems.

Well I dream you constant stranger
With your best bloods and your anger
You say Mother, do you claim me
My beloved do you blame me?

Call to Worship / Chickenman

The Call to Worship invites you to come out of the real world and into the experience of the service. As my parents would sing, ”Come, now is the time to worship. Come, now is the time to give your heart.” It’s time to set everything aside and come into the moment of worship fully.

I went looking for a car, found myself beneath the stars
I went looking for a girl, found a man and his world
Chickenman Chickenman Chickenman hold my hand

If you’ve never heard “Chickenman” before, it is truly like entering a new world, like slowly falling asleep to a documentary on road-dwelling derelicts you turned on at 3 a.m. The sharp edges, desperation and violence of the week are softened and forgiven. You’re reminded that you might go into this seeking one thing—comfort, community, forgiveness, praise—and come out finding something altogether different: boredom, confusion, even complacency. You are at once an only child, invited to dive into your own grief, carnage, junk, and conversation.

Invocation / Nashville

The Invocation invites God to be present, which really means inviting yourself to be present. To me, “Nashville” is about opening yourself up to face hard truths.

I came to you with a half-open heart, dreams upon my back, illusions of a brand new start

Amy Ray’s lyrics are full of frustration with the Nashville scene, subverting the country music trope of coming to Nashville dirt poor and innocent to become a star, saying, “As a songwriter trying to be heard, I found it extremely competitive and oppressive. As a Southerner, I feel free to criticize from ‘within the family.‘”

I could say the same things about Christianity. While I don’t identify as religious or “within the family” anymore, I can relate to the frustrations Amy felt trying to scratch out a place in Nashville from my own dealings in church and in the youth groups I attended. The song itself speaks to the yearning to be a part of that world on some level as well as the letdown when it won’t meet you on the terms you need from it.

I fell on my knees to kiss your land
But you are so far down
And I can’t even see to stand
In Nashville

Confession of Sin / Romeo and Juliet

I’ll start this confession with an embarrassing tidbit of my own: this was (and continues to be) my angsty scream-sing-in-the-car song. It’s a cover of Dire Straits’ song that ties together neon lights cutting through haze, West Side Story playing on cable, and the feeling of not being able to remember the right words to express what you’re feeling, but saying something all the more meaningful in your spluttering frustration.

We both come up on different streets, and they were both the streets of shame
They’re both dirty, both mean, yes and even the dreams were the same

In the Sunday service, the confession of sins is a rote script that everyone follows, confessing to vague misdeeds of the past week in order to get a bulk absolution. That’s one joy of being a WASP: wholesale forgiveness. However, what I love about this song is how it speaks to very very specific feelings over the backdrop of two of the most popular and overdone pieces of star-crossed love in literature and in pop culture—Romeo and Juliet and West Side Story.

Also, Amy Ray’s voice in this is just so incredibly sexy and unhinged. I had to say it.

Assurance of Pardon / Galileo

Coming right after the confession of sin, the assurance of pardon tells you that despite your sins, you’re alright. “Galileo” is one of the Indigo Girls’ most recognizable songs, because it perfectly represents the mixture of whimsy, sarcasm, and existential ennui that characterizes the best of their writing.

I find this song so comforting because it speaks to the interconnectedness of life by paying attention to how all our past lives have impacted our present ones. To me, “Galileo” says it’s okay to have fears, but these fears are ultimately futile because they’re echoes of our past. You’re okay, you’ve already overcome so much, and you’re making things better for the next life to come.

But then again it feels like some sort of inspiration
To let the next life off the hook
Or she’ll say look what I had to overcome from my last life
I think I’ll write a book

Passing of the Peace / Joking

It turns out my own memory of the church service is hazy, and I’m getting parts mixed up. The Greeting that I mentioned earlier is actually just the reverend saying “Hi, church,” and getting the ball rolling, and this is the part where we all turn to each other, shake hands, and say, “peace be with you.”

“Joking” has some of the same beats as”Three Hits” except it is much more lighthearted. It always reminds me of the friendships that occur in liminal spaces where you go *through something *together. Whether it’s the rigors of a long shift or the emotional manipulation of a church retreat, you all have a deeper understanding of each other that goes unspoken.

You said the world was magic
I was wide-eyed and laughing
We were dancing up to the bright side
Forget about your ego
Forget about your pride
And you will never have to compromise

Prayer of Illumination / Jonas & Ezekiel

“Jonas & Ezekiel” feels like an old testament reading. As Amy puts it, “It’s a political song about people who put their faith in prophecy, who’re walking toward disaster instead of doing anything about it.”

It summons fire and brimstone, calling upon a higher power to hear you and speak through you. I love it because it evokes spirituality outside of the sanctuary—driving down the highway, hearing voices in the woods and in the mountaintops. This is something I always connected to greatly. It may sound cliche, but I find more spiritual connection in movement and being out in the world, watching the landscape change and my thoughts go with it.

Sermon / Ghost

Honestly, the sermon is the part I always ended up drifting away to the youth group basement for, and “Ghost” is always the song I end up skipping, so it fits.

The last truths we ever came to in our adolescent war

Affirmation of Faith / Love Will Come to You

The affirmation of faith is part testifying that you have faith, and part asserting that what’s been being said this whole time. This song reminds us both of the steadfastness and the precarity that love brings to our lives.

Love will come to you
Hoping just because I’ve spoke the words that they’re true

Prayer of Intercession / Virginia Woolf

The prayer of intercession is about praying through a deity, saint, or in this case, the written words of Virginia Woolf on behalf of yourself or for others. In the live album 1,200 Curfews, Emily begins saying, “I wrote papers about her in college, but I didn’t know what I was talking about.” It was when her mother gave her a copy of Woolf’s abridged diaries that Emily felt a connection to her and was inspired to write this song, saying that Virginia Woolf became her friend and that she feels a connection through space and time with her through these words.

I absolutely love this, that feeling that you’ve been heard—that beautiful feeling when a text, a song, or a prayer speaks to what you’re going through in a certain moment. In the same way that Emily felt like her thoughts were being heard through Virginia Woolf’s diaries, this song makes me feel validated.

It’s alright, life will come life will go
It’s alright, someone just sent a letter to your soul

Doxology / Airplane

This song is nothing if not a song of praise, what I see as a feeling of lightness paired with groundedness in one’s hometown, so it’s the obvious choice for the segment when in a normal church we’d sing “Praise God, from whom all blessings flow…”

And I’m up the airplane (up on the airplane)
Nearer my God to Thee (nearer my God thee) (count on the plane)
I start making a deal
Inspired by gravity (inspired by gravity)

Charge / Let it Be Me

In my church growing up, the charge was always a song that went, “Go out with joy!” and this song I feel captures that feeling but a bit more grounded in reality.

Let it be me (this is not a fighting song)
Let it be me (not a right for a wrong)
Let it be me
If the world is night
Shine my life like a light
I mean, duh.

Benediction — Cedar Tree

This song is both sorrowful and uplifting and to me is a perfect ending. It’s about a man who, after losing a wife, plants a cedar tree in her memory. I would mouth along with the pastor during the church service benediction I grew up hearing, as she told us to go out with “the light that casts out fear, the hope everlasting and the love the conquers all.” I always kind of saw it as hokey, if I’m being honest.

If you haven’t been listening through already, I highly recommend turning on this short song. I love how it starts out mournful, then in an Irish folk-music like flurry, it jolts into something joyful. This is how I’d like to leave my form of worship, rooted but delighted.

I dig a well
I dig it deep
And for my only love
I plant a cedar tree
The best…
The best we ever had…