Washing clothes and souls by the river

by Sarah-Leah Pimentel

My life would be really hard without a washing machine.

Years ago, when I left home and moved into my first apartment, I had only a few hand-me-down pots, a fridge, a single bed, and a washing machine. I felt that navigating the world of “adulting” would be a little less overwhelming and more comfortable if I had these four items.

My next-door neighbour was also a starting-out young professional. She didn’t have a washing machine. She would handwash a few clothes every night after coming home from work. After a while, she started using my washing machine. We all want to make our lives easier and more efficient.

I recently read an article that described washing machines – invented in 1851 but only commercialised for domestic use in the 1950s – as a transformative invention for 20th-century women. However, the article then posited that the washing machine has also become a symbol of modern loneliness.

In previous generations, women would gather daily by the river to wash the household clothes. Yes, it was a laborious job, but it provided an opportunity for social connection. While washing clothes together, the women would speak about their families, voice their concerns, seek guidance or counsel from their peers, and sing and laugh together. These hours of camaraderie and solidarity broke the daily routine of household chores.

Now, the clothes wash themselves, and we calendarise our social interactions except that we find that we’re too busy, tired, or depressed to seek out the company of others. We retreat into our heads. Our problems become insurmountable. We miss out on the potential of creative solutions to life’s daily challenges. We have become isolated and lonely.  We exchange flesh-and-blood encounters for comments on an Instagram post or a meme. Sometimes, our closest friends and family are only accessible via a screen.

Our isolation and the demands of fast-paced, modern life distance us from God’s beautiful vision of the fullness of life: “I have come that they may have life, and have it abundantly” (John 10:10).

God came among us in human form because he desired an intimate relationship with us. He understood how hard it was to have a personal relationship with a God we could not see. Christ came to share in every aspect of our human lives and, simultaneously, to invite us into a deeper union with his divine life. Community. Communion. This is what fully alive means.

Our relationship with God includes the gamut of our relationships with one another. We are made for relationships. That is why we gather as a community to praise God. We can pray in the privacy of our homes, but there is something life-giving about sharing in the communal worship of God and partaking together in the sacraments. We come because we know that as much as we need God, we also need one another.

We no longer come to the river to wash our clothes. Instead, let us look for opportunities for meaningful connections with one another and with our God so that we can unburden and cleanse our souls.