Our Sabbath day - Lent I - was a time set aside for restoration and reflection. I made a Mexican omelette and Irish breakfast tea and let Rabbi Heschel speak to my heart about the essence of Sabbath:The meaning of the Sabbath is to celebrate time rather than space. Six days a week we live under the tyranny of things of space; on the Sabbath we try to become attuned to holiness in time. It is a day on which we are called upon to share in what is eternal in time, to turn from the results of creation to the mystery of creation; from the world of creation to the creation of the world.
Later we bundled up and headed out with Lucie for a long romp in the stillness of the woods and frozen wetlands. By late afternoon, it was time for more tea. We took my all too child-like drawings of our garden and, in consultation with the experts on New England plant life, talked through what new flowers and vegetables we'll add this spring as we gently remake our garden into sacred space. We are learning how to use native plants and seeds to evoke beauty as we partner with the butterflies and bees, play with the ways scent and sight add a measure of healing to our small part of God's creation, and do it all in a grand-child friendly way.
In my spiritual tradition, today was Lent I: wherein the faithful consider a story from Genesis II about Adam and Eve's curiosity trumping God's call for obedience, and, Matthew IV where Jesus is driven into the wilderness to wander for 40 days and nights after his baptism. Walking in the quiet of the winter woods, I wondered why Sabbath has been squeezed out of our contemporary culture. I understand our addiction to productivity and our obsessions with success. I know that many among us are working themselves into an early grave simply to pay for health insurance. Or to feed their little ones. And the agony built into our class struggle and the war against women that wounds and disfigures us all - albeit in different ways - is all too clear. And yet, as I find time and again, so many of us ache for something different but overlook how silence and a rest and reflection that goes deeper than mere entertainment are part of the healing.
A tender-hearted prayer written by Pádraig Ó Tuama invites us into the quiet promise of Lent - a time free from snark, a time small and humble rather than bold and revolutionary, a time grounded in rest and reformation - that goes like this:
Jesus,You sometimes left
so that people could face themselves.
May we face our
selves,
in the wilderness and the world,
and recognize
the forces that drive us,
so that they do not always drive
us.
Amen.
Soon I'll prepare a hearty Shepherd's Pie for our Sabbath supper before we take-in a Japanese mystery on TV. Our Sabbaths have become simple. On these days our conversation has becomes deep and complex. And, as the small Lenten prayer altar in the front room suggests, our hearts seek to ripen in tenderness for one another, with creation as well as with all whom we might encounter in the days that remain.
so that people could face themselves.
May we face our
selves,
in the wilderness and the world,
and recognize
the forces that drive us,
so that they do not always drive
us.
Amen.
Soon I'll prepare a hearty Shepherd's Pie for our Sabbath supper before we take-in a Japanese mystery on TV. Our Sabbaths have become simple. On these days our conversation has becomes deep and complex. And, as the small Lenten prayer altar in the front room suggests, our hearts seek to ripen in tenderness for one another, with creation as well as with all whom we might encounter in the days that remain.
the prayer altar in our front room
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