montréal reflections: day three...

NOTE: We are on holiday for rest and reflection in Montreal before a new year of engagement, teaching and creativity begins. This is the third in a series.

Today the rain has arrived after a few days of glorious sun and cool breezes. We have put in about five miles of walking each day, so chilling-out for a bit will feel grand. A morning poem, "The Momentum of Existence" by Ed Nixon, has evoked a bit of paradox for me: it seems to celebrate the buoyancy of life without ever honoring the place of silence and serenity. Have I missed the implied subtlety, or, is this an ode to mania? Could it be the exaggerated musing of a professional puer, or, just the groove of a guy who is averse to nuance? Something else? All of the above? I confess to being apprehensive whenever contemplation appears absent from consideration. And, at the same time, I sense some truth here, too.

Sometimes you don't get a chance
To pause and rest
Even to just take it all in
Sometimes life just goes too fast
And if you halt, even for a moment
You could get rolled over
By the momentum of existence
So, push yourself and keep going
Because once you stop
You may not get started again
And if you need a breather
Do it after the big stuff is done –
I guarantee you the view
Will be a whole lot better

My experience has been that it is precisely at those times when it feels like you "don't get a chance to pause and rest... just to take it all in" that it would be wise, healthy and creative to do so. The call to "be still and know" continues to ripen as my guide. Not that I always do it, mind you. I am often swept away by feelings, events and blind spots. St. Ireneus, the second century monk from Smyrna who helped strengthen Christian communities in southern France, taught that human beings were created imperfect. Mistakes, therefore, are not sinful but the way we ripen and become more like God. Divinization - or what the Eastern Church calls theosis - is the antithesis of Augustine's doctrine of original sin. Rather than being born corrupt, Ireneus affirms that the holy asks us to learn from our brokenness, go deeper into humility through our failures, and discover a rhythm to engagement and reflection that brings meaning to all that we do. Call it a quest for inner and outward balance, or a commitment to embodied contemplation, there is a place for learning how to be still. Like my friends in AA like to tell me: If you always do, what you've always done; you'll always get, what you've always got. 

In my heart, I suspect this poem by Andrea Cohen,"The Bargain," obliquely gets closer to the nuanced challenges of exploring the invitation into balance.

We paid him next
to nothing—less than the little
he’d asked for—to lead us

at dusk from the pyramids
on camels into the desert.
Such slim wages

to take us, without
complaint, all that way—
so far, without a star.

We were in the middle
of nowhere, or at its edge.
Friends, he asked, from

inside that blackness,
what will you pay me
to take you back?

This is another reason why we periodically like to get away from our routines to be in Montreal: as we walk and watch, speak and listen, engage and rest, we often experience small, quiet clues about what is already bubbling up from within that we've been too busy to recognize. Like that unplanned time of Taize worship four years ago at a monastery on Boulevard Mont-Royal. We had not gone to public worship for over four months. Consequently, entering the sacred space made me feel like a guest walking into Sunday worship for the first time. I was nervous. Uncertain of the drill. And it was all in French so there were to be extended times of confusion. Still I knew most of the songs. And - and this was transformational - we all sat on the floor. Horizontal theology and liturgy I called it afterward as it was an encounter of radical unity. There were song leaders, of course, and well-practiced musicians, too. There was a liturgical ebb and flow to sound, song and silence that was intuited and directed by still others as well. Yet everything about this time of horizontal worship worked to deconstruct physical and theological hierarchy. There is something humble and lovely about sitting together on the floor with strangers. (For those unable to do so, yes there were small benches and pillow, too.)  

When we left and re-entered the bustle of Boulevard Mont-Royal at 8:30 pm on a Thursday night, we both walked in silence for a time. Then Di said to me something like, "You're not done with the Church yet, right? Maybe local church work, but you were totally ALIVE just now, weren't you?" She was right. she often is. Later I found myself appreciating the way wisdom teacher and scholar, Cynthia Bourgeault, puts it in her small volume: The Wisdom Way of Knowing.

There can be no question that the future lying right before us demands a different attitude toward religion. Now we have to do better than ecumenism and tolerance. We have to positively appreciate what the many spiritual traditions have to offer us in our own spiritual search. At the same time, no one wants to merely sample the traditions, taking what we find appealing at the moment and co-opting them into our favored philosophy, or pilfering only the superficial bits that are not challenging.

After a full day of walking - chatting up our favorite Anglophone bookseller and buying bagels - we napped and showered before heading out to Diese Onze. We arrived early enough to hear a killer 18 person big band finish their set. After salads and hummus, we were able to move closer for Alex Bellegarde's jam. He played a variety of styles for 45 minutes before inviting young players from the region up to join him and try out their chops. I love Diese Onze: their food is great, their commitment to a wide spectrum of jazz is edifying and satisfying, and the care they share with their guests always makes me feel at home. At 1:30 am as I was walking home in the cool quiet, I gave thanks to God who has tenderly welcomed me into a way of holiness born of my humanity, tenderness, beauty, joy, sorrow, action, contemplation, sound and silence as well as all of my mistakes mixed with grace.