Despite its generally secular reputation, one of the great charms of New England is its churches. I was forcefully reminded of this during my recent trip to Boston. Each city along the way boasts impressive churches that might be glimpsed even from the highway, and although there are now many taller buildings it is possible to imagine the days when the steeples stood over all. Boston’s historic churches remain stunning symbols of the power Christianity once held in this city. We first climbed off the T at Arlington in the shadow of the great stone Arlington Church. On the Esplanade the looming steeple of the Church of the Advent violently reminded me of the deep mysticism that drew me to the Episcopal Church even while I was a Methodist seminary student. Park Street Church, King’s Chapel, The Old North Church, the Old South Church, and finally Trinity Church in Copley Square invited us to gander and ponder. Almost like fossils, these churches remind us of the history of what made the city, or the nation, what it is.
Trinity Church lies nestled at the base of the John Hancock Tower, Boston’s tallest building. A blue glass Brobdingnagian, this prophet of capitalism represents the highest possible aspirations of our race, so we are led to believe. The material triumph over the spiritual. And yet the tourists stop to photograph the stunning church. It is on the street level, down here among us mere mortals. Upon closer examination, I noticed the statue of the tortoise and the hare in the plaza of Copley Square, the holy terrapin racing toward the sanctuary, it appears from my angle. It seems that I have unexpectedly received a kind of epiphany.
Look closely.
I first came to Boston many years ago as a spiritual seeker. In the intervening years during which I was attempting to find out what that might mean in a life that was intellectually honest, many bronze sculptures appeared in this city. The one commemorating Robert McCloskey’s Make Way for Ducklings, installed after I completed my studies at Boston University, would not have caught my pre-parental attention, as I had never read the book. Now you have to stand in line even to snap a picture. The work of local artist Nancy Schön, both “Make Way for Duckings” and “The Tortoise and the Hare” are part of Boston’s continual evolution of character. Officially, we are told, the turtle and rabbit are representative of the Boston marathoners who trudge the final feet past this church toward the finish line. To me, this sculpture suggests something more as the hare dawdles and the tortoise breaks toward the church. It may be a marathon, indeed, but the race, I remind myself, is not always about being swift.
