2020.04 | We are Cocooning
Yes, yes we certainly are.
The butterfly has always been one of my favorite images for the transition from Lent to the celebration of Easter. As Jesus emerges from his death into the new life of the resurrected Christ, so too does the caterpillar emerge from its cocoon, no longer an earth-bound creature that crawls but a winged beauty that inspires and delights us. In ordinary years, my focus, and subsequently the focus of some of the Church’s Easter art projects, has been on the beautiful butterfly that emerges. This year, as we enter our third week of “sheltering in place,” I find myself wondering what exactly happens inside that darn cocoon.
Entomologists (bug scientists) tell us that inside the cocoon, despite its outward appearance of restfulness, there is tremendous metamorphic activity. Inside is a chrysalis, which is a protective hard shell created by the caterpillar to protect its body while it is breaking down and being re-formed into a new body by the most natural of processes, its own digestive fluids. These fluids break down the caterpillar body into imaginal cells, which are undifferentiated cells that can become any type of new cell. These imaginal cells are used to form the new body of the butterfly, a process that can take weeks or in some cases, months while the cocoon creature waits out cold winter weather. Eventually, the new creature inside must leave the cocoon in order to complete its transformation, either by biting its way out or by secreting fluid that erodes the cocoon.
The scientific description of what happens inside the cocoon really resonates with what we’re experiencing at Eden Church this Lent into Easter season. We’ve dreamed and talked about online worship for years and this spring, out of painful necessity brought on by COVID-19, we de-constructed our in-person worship and re-constructed it as online worship within days. Within a week, we cancelled all in-person meetings and were holding online fellowship, Bible study, and book discussions. And, just like the changing insect inside the cocoon, all this has happened inside the protective bubble of the shelter-in-place order in a world as dangerous to us as winter weather is to the soon-to-be butterfly. Like many churches, we wonder: what will Eden UCC be like when COVID-19 is finally brought under control and we re-emerge into the real world?
Ever the optimist, I like to believe: 1) COVID-19 will be brought under control (no guess when), 2) the work we do on ourselves now — everything we try, everything that fails, everything that succeeds — in this our cocooned state, is transforming us in good ways, ways that will help us communicate our Christian values in the future, and 3) something beautiful and faithful to Christ will emerge from this experience, for both ourselves and for our community, and possibly for all of creation, which was already groaning for the kind of better care and stewardship that might have prevented this pandemic.
Until that time, remember that you too are cocooning. From the outside, your home and you yourself may appear quiet, but inside I know there is tremendous activity as you find new ways to live, work, and volunteer. May all the change you experience break down that which no longer serves you and build up new ways of serving Christ who calls you into the world. We look forward to seeing the new you when it’s safe for all of us to emerge from our cocoons.
--Pastor Pepper