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Remembering in Grace

Teresa Stricklen

by Teresa Lockhart Stricklen 

Christianity lives by remembering, yet memory can be a tricky thing.  In addition to having emotionally-laden events seared into memory, there is a kind of memory that is intentional, whether we're aware of it or not.  This kind of memory remembers what we deem important out of all the myriad perceptions that comprise the flow of life, letting the rest fade into the background.

We each value something different, depending upon our past experiences and our present intentionality for a future purpose.  This is why family members recalling a common shared event will remember things differently.  One sister may remember what we were eating, a brother may remember the dog Harold snoring in the corner, while yet another sibling remembers the tone in Mother’s voice.  And none may have any recollection whatsoever of what the others remember.

Therapy works by dredging up memories and re-remembering in the light of more knowledge and maturity than we had at the time.  It is a remembering to set things right for the purposes of more peace and well-being than we currently have.  This is a remembering for the purpose of restoration.

The movie Memento shows us the process of remembering as it goes frightfully wrong.  Obsessed with finding his wife’s killer, who also left him with a memory disorder so that he can’t make any new memories, the protatgonist leaves written notes to himself and tattoos of certain facts he needs to remember on his body in order to solve the crime.  The problem is (spoiler alert) that he deliberately chooses to leave himself clues that will kill the wrong person.    Hence memory’s importance of intentionality for future action. 

The Judeo-Christian tradition is born of memory and lives by narrative memory of the God Who Acts in Christ.  We remember the death and resurrection of Christ, we remember his teachings, and in remembering, the past is brought into the present so that we can move confidently into the future with faithfulness to God's will for creation.  This is known as anamnesis, a major component of worship, particularly at the Lord’s table where we remember so that we can give thanks for God’s past actions now as  we rehearse how to live in God’s future, God’s Dominion that is coming to pass on earth as it is in heaven.

We’ve been preparing resources for the Tenth Anniversary of September 11, including the importance of remembering rightly with deliberate intentionality. There’s a way in which we can remember that perpetuates violence.  For example, some Christian communities in the twentieth century still vilified the Jews for killing Christ on Good Friday.  Members left Good Friday services and vandalized Jewish homes and businesses.  This is a remembering that has lost the intentionality of Christ himself as the one crucified, the One whose teaching was nonviolent for the purpose of the salvation of the whole world.  Similarly, we can remember how church used to be and constantly complain that things aren’t what they used to be, which ends up destroying what is now, and shutting down possibilities for the future.

So we need to be intentional about remembering with the intentionality for the shalom of God’s Dominion, letting what needs to be forgiven fade into blessed memory of the Lord, highlighting and valuing instead that we live by the grace of God alone.   

• Posted at 3:39 p.m.
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Tags: anamnesis, memory, remembering, september 11