While orbiting Earth in a spaceship with 5 others, Chie, an astronaut from Japan, learns that her mother has died. In the course of the novel, Orbital, Samantha Harvey recounts Chie’s experience of grief in the small spaceship, many miles and many months away from the rituals that surround such a painful passing. Among the astronauts, Chie talks about her mother. She cries and the tears have to be gathered for they float off in the zero gravity conditions and can cause technical problems. With no loved one to hold, she holds herself. But she cannot be part of the funeral or the rituals of remembering her mother’s life. She thinks about which bone she would choose at the bone picking ceremony after the cremation.
Chie is fulfilling her life long dream, her ambition, the culmination of her hard work and preparation, by being in space, and yet she wants to be on Earth. With her mother. Chie’s days in the spaceship are highly scheduled, every waking moment programmed, and yet grief creeps in. Finds a way. This is human. To suffer loss. Especially of someone as significant as a mother.
In these somber days of Lent, dare we allow our grief to creep into our reality? What grief are we holding? The death of a loved one, still cherished and missed? The death of Jesus which we will commemorate on Good Friday? The death of values that were once held dear? The ending of a relationship? Do we hold grief over the pain experienced by our beloved planet, Earth?
To allow our hearts to be heavy is to be fully human.
Prayer: The days of our lives are filled with attachments partly made beautiful by their fragility and finitude. May we create space for grief which lets in all the beauty of that which is no longer present to us. Amen.
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Devotion prepared by Rev. Kim P. Wells, pastor of Lakewood United Church of Christ in St. Petersburg, FL
The devotions this Lenten season will be based on the novel Orbital by Samantha Harvey. Orbital won the Booker Prize in 2024. It is a beautifully written story about the experience of a group of people orbiting the Earth in a spaceship. They see 16 sunrises and sunsets in a 24 hour period. The book is a reflection on the experience of living together and appreciating planet Earth in a new way.
Lakewood United Church of Christ 