The memorial service in Tuscon was fascinating, moving and disturbing at the same time. Set in a gymnasium at the University of Arizona, it began as a combination pep rally and marketing effort for the University, as the University President tried to cast the institution as a locus of community, healing and hope. Those in attendance did what spectators at basketball games do. They applauded the team, whooped and hollered. As at all sporting events, the university provided t-shirts.

At first, the turn to scripture, Hebrew and Christian, was jarring, but as President Obama began speaking, he wove a tapestry of scripture, reflections on the lives of the dead and wounded that helped all of us think in new ways about the tragedy and about the future of our nation. His prepared remarks are available here. His words made the place, and the service itself, sacred.

Better scholars than I will be able to place this event in the context of the continuing evolution of civil religion in America. There’s been a great deal of discussion over the last few days about the decline of political rhetoric. All of that may be true. But it seems to me that President Obama was able to give a speech that placed the events in the historical context of the United States and to offer a trajectory of hope.