I think about the word accompaniment in terms of Faith Matters these days. The word is plentiful in its meanings especially for those of us interested in committing to a spiritual path.
But there are also other manifestations such as the accompanying of school students on their strikes for climate justice — and in practical terms the word is meaningful when accompanying a parishioner, for example, to an appointment. I think about my friends in Ashfield who accompany each other regularly, walking out to Bear Swamp or the Hawley Bog. Maybe I overstate the case for the efficacy for accompaniment, but I bet that many reading this column are probably feeling a bit insecure or unsure about how well we are managing change especially at a public level in this past 18 months or so. So accompaniment as an action as well as a word comes with some comfort.
Of course, accompaniment also denotes midwifery; the skill of accompanying someone in labor with the expectant delivery of a newborn, a new life. At the springtime of the year that meaning is also resonant. The word has a musical quality in the word “accompanist” — the basso continuo for example provided by a harpsicord or cellist in Baroque music. But for the purposes of this article, it is spiritual accompanying that interests me.
Spiritual accompaniment or companionship is a devotional practice. Preparing for this article I learned there are distinctly Catholic interpretations attached to the practice; other sources indicated why it is never related to a job or transactional in any way. It is why — when you have a good enough partner, and/or a much-loved pet, and you go for walks with loved ones — a sense of true accompaniment can be experienced. Wait, can anyone “do” accompaniment?! I believe the answer is yes.
If we are all in need of God’s grace then surely everyone can be a person willing to walk alongside another human being in silence or in dialogue, in peace or in hard times. We see its outline, its beginnings in the work/play that parents do with children, perhaps in moments like cooking together, reading a book, planting bulbs in expectation of spring, or simply holding someone’s hand. Some writers have made a study of this kind of seasonal accompaniment. Winter nurturing is deeply needed for what Katherine May calls “Wintering” in her book that has the subtitle “The Power of Rest and Retreat in Difficult Times.”
The key features of accompaniment are presence, listening and attentiveness. To engage in accompaniment is to offer someone close, constant and generous attention. This kind of connection is not charity but/and it is very necessary. It is certainly possible to accompany other living things as Robin Wall Kimmerer tells us in her work as a botanist and indigenous scholar – such as the ways we — and they — can accompany the animals, the trees and the plants. All we have is each other and our “inter-beingness.”
And accompaniment is not only for individuals but also intended for organizations. The Rev. Dr. Clint Schnekloth* reflects on the online platform called Patreon how his church “published … a statement [about] Christian mission as accompaniment … how … churches [can] relate to one another, [and] focus on ‘the mutual respect of the churches that are in relationship, the companions. (My emphasis) The conversation is no longer between a giver and a receiver, but between churches all of which have gifts to give and to receive.” After all, as Ram Dass famously once said “We’re all just walking each other home.”
Hetty Startup lives in Amherst where she serves on the Historical Commission. Growing up in England, she moved to the US in the late 1980s to raise a family and continue working as an architectural historian. She serves as a trustee at the First Congregational Church/UCC in Ashfield.