In the midst of of all the hubbub surrounding the Seinfeld finale I kept asking myself why this thing is so popular? Why would a show that is admittedly about nothing and is filled with absurd chit chat be so big? Worse, why would we miss a program that has as its main characters people who are so shallow, so immature and even nasty?

The outpouring of sentiment suggests that the program has struck an emotional, cultural, and I would suggest even, a theological nerve. Living in such fast paced and numbed society we really need to have our nerves, touched from time to time.

But what nerve, exactly, is being stimulated?

Many commentators have observed how the show accurately expresses a sad sense of detachment and disconnectedness that is part of modern life. New York City, has become a metaphor for contemporary existence... urban, impersonal, hostile, and detached from traditional groupings and families.

Except for Jerry's apartment, no one has a home nor do folks have a center. The players live more like kids in a college dorm than adults.

These negative comments aside, I think there is another important aspect to Seinfeld that has not been identified and deserves mentioning and helps us to understand why the show was so successful.

I believe Seinfeld was popular because it displayed people who took the time to talk, just talk ... about nothing of importance.

In an age where time is so tightly budgeted and runs at such a fast pace, Seinfeld meanders along, taking time to not only notice the small absurdities of daily life but to comment and even pontificate on them.

One of my favorites was George's question to Jerry about what was better if one was captured by aliens, to be put in a zoo or a circus. I can't completely explain it but there is something very important in being able to have these kinds of conversations.

In deed the occasions for conversation were not haphazard or accidental but in fact grew out of a deeply sacramental structure of the show's life.

For all of their personal shortcomings and flaws, the characters of Seinfeld live in a deeply sacramental world in which grace and love are present. Maybe the acceptance of one another and the humor, mixed in with the folly and disappointment, is what we like in the show and long for in our own lives.

Theologically, I believe the power of Seinfeld lies not in the ethical quality of the characters but in what might be seen as the rituals of grace and friendship. Despite the frailties, despite the ups and downs of individual fortune, the group goes on. No matter what happens there is the ongoing constancy of the conversations that occur in the sacraments of the coffee shop meals and the drop- ins at Jerry's place.

As a pastor I see these conversations as moments when the sacred mysteries of life are touched upon. The episodes of Seinfeld are popular and significant not because they offer shining models or reveal answers but because they express both the need for accepting-supportive conversation in life when no answers are available or forthcoming.

Further they help us to see and to appreciate that life is sustained and transformed not by special knowledge but by rituals and company which we share day to day.

The acceptance expressed in the rituals of gathering and offered to one another in the group, are the things we like best about the show and which are most theologically profound.

The amazing thing about the show which is "about nothing" is that it affirms the soulful part of our nature which can not been reduced to intellectual understanding or scientific manipulation. The ritual is maintained and continues even though we don't "learn anything" from it.

At a deeper level, Seinfeld is a protest against the view that sees life as redeemed by scientific progress on one hand or absolute moralism on the other. It expresses the truth that much of life is not made up of progress or noble acts but is in stead filled with the fragile and fallible.

Further, it helps us to see that life is sacramental even in the modern age. The everyday rituals and in the company of friends are the activities which renew and sustain our spirit through the low and difficult and simply empty times of life. Maybe that is the message we need and will miss most with the programs ending.

Seinfeld's realism and lack of pretense was what I liked best. It did not posture or fall into pharisaic moralisms. It depicted life with all its warts and blemishes and yet somehow revealed that with humor and friendship humanity is, however imperfectly, preserved.