a spirituality of late summer redux...

The first flowering of goldenrod showed up by a fence at our place yesterday and I thought: "Slow down, man, summer is racing by!" We've been consuming our fair share of fresh native corn and tomatoes this year so it feels as if we've been living into the season reasonably well. Every day the pumpkins mature, the tomatoes ripen, the cucumbers grow and the herbs get bigger. But we're already talking about what the garden will become next year: summer is racing by. On Saturday, we'll do some serious repair on the back deck to replace rotting and/or broken wood; we need to do this in a timely way not only for the sake of safety and aesthetics but also because... summer is racing by.

I have become acutely aware of what this moment in August feels like and is saying to me if I have ears to hear. It certainly evokes a bit of melancholia for me as the days grow cooler and also incrementally shorter. But there is also a sense of letting go, too -  abandon - or maybe it is enthusiasm for what is real in this moment even as I take stock of what is about to be. Gemma Simmons at Thinking Faith (https://www. thinkingfaith.org/articles/20080801_1.htm  ) puts it like this:   

The liturgy (of Ordinary Time) tells us that times and seasons matter. Our bodies are attuned to the onset and passing of seasons of the year, our whole cycle of life as Christians is dominated by liturgy and sacrament – the embodied signs of what it means to be worshippers of the incarnate God. So, in that sense, we can talk about a spirituality of summer and be making sense... Liturgically, summer is ordinary time, when we let go of the drama of Lent and Passiontide and Easter and (let ourselves) begin to wallow in some of the big, extravagant feasts: Ascension, Pentecost, the Sacred Heart, Corpus Christi (and I would add the Feast of St. Mary Magdalene and Transfiguration.)  All of these are, in some measure, feasts of the body, where we come to terms with the absence of the earthly body of Christ and begin to get the measure of what ‘This is my body’ means in day to day terms...

I rather like the way the sacramental spiritualities of the Jesuits and Franciscans search for tangible, meaningful signs of the Word becoming Flesh in our ordinary lives. The late Henri Nouwen spoke to this also in a reflection posted yesterday that caught my attention just before we played a Bistro gig last night. Nouwen wrote:

You have to be really aware of the difference between fruitfulness and success because the world is always talking to you about your success. Society keeps asking you: “Show me your trophies. Show me, how many books have you written? Show me, how many games did you win? Show me, how much money did you make? Show me. . . .” And there is nothing wrong with any of that. I am saying that finally that’s not the question. The question is: “Are you going to bear fruit?” And the amazing thing is that our fruitfulness comes out of our vulnerability and not just out of our power. Actually it comes out of our powerlessness. If the ground wants to be fruitful, you have to break it open a little bit. The hard ground cannot bear fruit; it has to be raked open...

After we played for two hours, one of the true aficionados of the groove said to me, "I got here a little late, but when I walked in, the combination of your music and the connection between the people, the food, the ambiance made me feel like, "THIS is how it is supposed to be." My heart was full to overflowing. Yes, we felt like we were playing well - and having a ton of fun, too - but we were also putting ourselves on the line. Sharing heart and soul in a vulnerable way. So we grew more at ease as the crowd slowly grew. And stayed. And listened. And applauded. The symbiotic relationship between the groove, the music, the safety, the warmth, and the shared values all met to embrace for a moment. And it was palpable. Like the music man said, "It felt like this is how it is supposed to be." The English Jesuit, Gemma Simmons, notes that this is one of the delights of summertime:

...Lies in being able to shed layers and carry round fewer protective barriers between our bodies and the cold and damp of the external world. Behavior becomes less guarded: people sit in parks picnicking over lunch breaks, take coffee outside, sit at pavement cafes instead of huddling indoors. Summer becomes a time for reconnecting with the natural light, the greater opportunities for communal living afforded by being able to sit out of doors for longer, watching children playing and people talking outside instead of sitting enclosed. There is a sense of a general relaxing into the present, a willingness to linger over meals or encounters, savoring the moment, allowing the time to flow by... In the Ignatian tradition, the application of the senses is a way of praying over material for prayer that allows what has surfaced to be savored and tested through the medium of the senses. It is a more contemplative type of prayer and one that allows the body to verify what the mind and heart have groped towards during the day. The warmth and light of summer bring so much enrichment in sight and scent and touch and taste. Perhaps part of the spirituality of summer is an invitation to a more contemplative approach to ordinary things: the feel and scent and taste of food, of flowers and plants, sea air, sunlight and warmth, fresh wind and the sound of cities, streets and gardens unusually alive.

This feels particularly true in August in North Country because we know that just around the corner a more complicated and testy season awaits us. Now is the time to savor the beauty and grandeur. Simmons adds: 

Whether in the country or just passing neighbors’ gardens or public parks, summer reminds us of the insane generosity of God. Trees and plants flower and fruit in a way that can seem almost criminally wasteful. Bumble bees amble past, drunk on nectar. Neither animals nor humans can eat and use all the fruit that emerges from the trees and bushes. If a spirituality of summer tells us anything, it is that the fruition of the earth, the fruit of time spent contemplatively going about our daily tasks, is always going to be more than we can calculate and make use of in obvious ways. A sense of the sacrament of the present moment can liberate us from the tyranny of time, dominated by market forces and the idolization of work, of cost effectiveness, of productiveness as value. Wasting time with the God whose times and seasons are full of generous wastefulness can remind us of what truly matters. 

A spirituality of late summer - August - is not naively indulgent as if there were no tomorrows and today is all that mattered. Rather, it is one of savoring the blessing of the moment in all its richness because we know that this will not last forever. The late Jane Hirschfield evoked something of the wisdom of a late summer spirituality in her poem "Three Foxes by the Edge of the Field at Twilight." 

One ran,her nose to the ground,
a rusty shadow
neither hunting nor playing.

One stood; sat; lay down; stood again.

One never moved,
except to turn her head a little as we walked.

Finally we drew too close,
and they vanished.
The woods took them back as if they had never been.

I wish I had thought to put my face to the grass.

But we kept walking,
speaking as strangers do when becoming friends.

There is more and more I tell no one,
strangers nor loves.
This slips into the heart
without hurry, as if it had never been.

And yet, among the trees, something has changed.

Something looks back from the trees,
and knows me for who I am.