Why Did Ceremony in Human Life Die out?

Question

For hundreds of years. ritual, ceremony and sacred rites filled every day life. Even until. the late 1800's, people had ceremonial ways of talking, dressing, acting, and living life. We had rites of passages for different ages, formal greetings and gestures, holy days, and an overall ceremonial structure to existence. Now that is wiped out and life is like a blank slate. We can live life as if it's sacred and meaningful, or as if it's just a bunch of mindless atomic particles that we participate it. How did the intrinsic ceremonial nature of existence die? I dont' want superficial historical reasons, but maybe more metaphysical/philosophical reasons. Thanks.

Answer 1

My thought is that this has to do with logos (logic/practical thought) being ascendant over mythos (meaning/spiritual thought) at present. "Empty ceremony" is a logos concept, indicating that the ritual doesn't seem to return enough practical value to justify spending the time. When enough people viewed ceremony as empty, it fell into decline.

With any luck, mythos is not actually dead (we do still have some cermonies left), but merely in hibernation. Perhaps mythos and logos will come back into balance some day.

Answer 2

Ceremony has not died out, but it looks different today. Consider ceremonial greetings used today like "What's up?" or "Hey." There seem to be ritualized forms of communication taking place with text messaging and emails. Think about the way most young people celebrate their 16th birthday by taking a driving test and their 21st birthday by getting drunk. Christmas may be commercialized, but isn't going to the mall to see Santa still a ritual? What about watching fireworks on the 4th of July? Staying up until midight on New Year's Eve? As for fashion, think about how "preps," "hippies," "punks," or "jocks" dress. They all follow a pattern. There are many more examples, which I'm sure you can think of, too.

Answer 3

My thought is the answer is in the 'melting pot' and migration.

On the US mainland ceremony and ritual came with Europeans, and existed among the tribes in static geographic areas, more-or-less.

The westward movement relocated all the people using these ceremonies from pockets, salted and peppered them all over the continent, unconcentrated. Fluid societies aren't a good medium for preserving such cultural behaviors.

This included, in most instances, the tribes and the cultural histories they incorporated.

The key point in the perpetuation of ceremony and ritual is the rite of passage of youths to adulthood. Communities of adult males and females formally instruct and recognize the transition from child to adult, instruct those passing what responsibilities, rituals, ceremonies, now belong to the adult as part of each individual society.

No static community of adults remained to provide the ritual of passage rites after WW I, mostly. Thus ended ceremony and ritual, for all practical purposes.

Answer 4

I don't think it did die out. I think maybe you are having trouble identifying it in modern forms...we still have a lot of what you mentioned, especially in organized religions of various kinds, from Catholic to Wiccan.. maybe you should attack this question by asking what the ceremonial structures are in different spiritual approaches to life.

Answer 5

Sadly, modern humans seem to equate ritual with archaic - even extinct - values, and deem them unnecessary, intrusive, and restrictive in today's culture.

Joseph Campbell's book The Power of Myth would really interest you - he answers this question in great detail. I would highly recommend it.

Answer 6

We realized the universe doesn't revolve around humans. Science brought us to terms with being animals.