thank you holy fools...

Now that our pilgrimage into a Celtic Advent has come to a close - a quiet time of reflection, silence, song, prayer, and creative wandering for 40 days - I've been wondering

where our Sunday morning reflections might be headed for the New Year? (For those who are interested, you can find the video series here @ https://www.facebook.com/Be-Still-and-Know-913217865701531/videos) My heart suggests that for most of us 2021 will

continue to be unchartered territory - an evolving pilgrimage of sorts - where the challenge and invitation will be to experientially honor a new manner of emotional, physical, political, spiritual, and creative meandering by faith. Fr. Richard Rohr speaks of our time as an unveiling where, "despite the uncertainty and disorder, our present moment is an opportunity to awaken to a deeper transformation, love and hope." He adds that finally "learning that we are not in control situates us correctly in the universe."

If we are to feel at home in this world, we have to know that we are not steering the ship. That teaching is found in the mystical writings of all re
ligions. Mystics know they are being guided, and their reliance upon that guidance is precisely what allows their journey to happen.

A few clues keep climbing into consciousness. Christine Valters Paintner insists that paying attention to the threads of synchronicity that keep showing up in our lives - following them, listening to them, observing them, and honoring them - is one way to live into the holy wandering of Celtic pilgrimage. The ancient monks did not move towards a fixed destination as theirs was neither a linear pilgrimage nor a goal as is common in the West. Rather, theirs was an expedition of the heart, a quest for inner resurrection where our best self is revealed and renewed. It is where our truest songs are heard and sung. It is where our soul finds safety and succor to resume our odyssey into mystery. And while our heart's resurrection always rings true deep within, discerning where it will show up next is always a surprise.

Before Advent, I found myself reading about Alana Levandoski and listening to selections from her most recent album: Hymns from the Icons (check her out @ https://gumroad.com/alanalevandoskimusic) Awhile back I'd seen some press for her work with James Finley - particularly Sanctuary - but truth be told I am so done with worship and praise music that I stayed away. In retrospect, that was my mistake because it is a powerful collection, but as they say, "only when the student is ready will the Buddha appear." I liked the artists she covered on Icons - Leonard Cohen, Bob Marley, Mary Gauthier, Bob Dylan, Grateful Dead, Johnny Cash and others - they are among some of my favorites, too.  And while listening to "Mercy Now," there were tears in my eyes. 

Frederick Buechner wrote in his masterful, Whistling in the Dark, that we should pay attention to our tears:

YOU NEVER KNOW what may cause them. The sight of the Atlantic Ocean can do it, or a piece of music, or a face you've never seen before. A pair of somebody's old shoes can do it. Almost any movie made before the great sadness that came over the world after the Second World War, a horse cantering across a meadow, the high school basketball team running out onto the gym floor at the start of a game. You can never be sure. But of this you can be sure. Whenever you find tears in your eyes, especially unexpected tears, it is well to pay the closest attention. They are not only telling you something about the secret of who you are, but more often than not God is speaking to you through them of the mystery of where you have come from and is summoning you to where, if your soul is to be saved, you should go to next.

So I went to her website, found that she was offering a collection of CDs before Christmas, and put in an order. Coming from Canada took a bit of time and when they finally arrived I was wrapping up my own Celtic Advent and L'Arche Ottawa writing. I thought, "Let's just wait until the 12 days of Christmas and take this new music slow." Last night, however, Levandoski put out a steam-punk song based on lyrics from Alfred Lord Tennyson she calls, "Ring Out the Bells." It is brilliant - and her own precise and insightful description of why and how she put it out warrants sharing.

In 1850 Tennyson published a requiem called In Memoriam, written as he grieved the sudden death of his sister's fiancé, who was also a beloved friend. The poem Ring Out, Wild Bells, oft-used to ring in the New Year, was part of that requiem. In my own more roots-oriented style, I composed music for this poem because I was drawn to the universal hope and longing contained within the poem. It is overreaching, and perhaps naive, especially in light of the colonialism of Tennyson's time, and that two world wars were on their way, that would catapult a technology that was rooted in destructive ideas, rather than life-giving ideas. Still, I was drawn to how universal the sincerity of the longing was. 

I decided to have a steampunk-themed video, because steampunk was inspired by early tech and the victorian era... and as a contemplative Christian, I wanted to push the envelope a bit... in terms of the boxes we put ourselves into. This year has been strange and difficult, and filled with suffering. And invoking a bit of the sacred clown energy, I decided to bring in a bit of burlesque, to offset the "awful solemnity" (as Thomas Merton called it) I am seeing, especially in spaces of comfort and privilege. I sometimes struggle with awful solemnity... and it renders me unable to find the infinite possibilities for traction that we have... to work collectively toward true equity, which is what, I think, this song is longing for. 

I think this song is a prayer for JUBILEE. Forgive us our debts. 

And... from a 21st century perspective, part of my work is to draw attention to the debts owed to people of colour, and indigenous people. When I sing this song, and invoke the words "purer laws", I imagine (at the very least), archaic policies in Canada, harmonizing with the United Nations Declaration of Indigenous Rights. When I sing "ring out the narrowing lust of gold", I imagine a time when a critical mass of people who own more than their fair share of land, participates in a phenomenal movement of land reparations, and all the young people of colour who want to farm, can own land, and have total sovereignty. When I sing "ring in the Christ that is to be", I imagine a day when the over 27,000,000 people still who are enslaved today, are raised the very highest of all. 

In other words, I didn't record this song as an excuse to bypass the heavy lifting that is ahead, for especially people who live with more comfort than is good for them. I wrote, and recorded this for the longing... and the vision... and maybe it was naïve of me... but I still hope for epiphany... which is just around the corner from New Years!!!

And AGAIN with those tears - and once more later today while doing errands and listening to Point Vierge in the car. Tears, tears, and more tears. Tears of gratitude and joy. Tears of confession and clarity. Tears of synchronicity and sojourn. That's when it all came together for me: the sacred clown. She has been my mentor since "Godspell" days. The holy fool impelled me bring Frank Zappa music into church back in the day. The Beatles, Joni Mitchell, Leonard Cohen, the Eels, U2, Sarah MacLachlan and Joan Osborne too in a later incarnation. The holy fool and the feast of fools was at the center of my doctoral dissertation, While My Guitar Gently Weeps: A Spirituality of Rock'n'Roll and so much of what we did in ministry back in Tucson and Pittsfield. No wonder I copied this from note from Carrie Newcomer's "Speed of Soul" reflections over the weekend and saved it:

"You've made this day a special day, by just your being you. There's no person in the whole world like you, and I like you just the way you are."
— Fred Rogers

I have to admit, I totally love Mr. Rogers. He was never afraid to speak directly to a three year old. He didn't worry if people made jokes about is communication style, he just put on his sweater and spoke about love and kindness, community and neighborliness. He wasn't talking to adults, although he didn't mind if we listened. He was speaking to the hearts and ears that needed to hear they were special, they were whole and that the bedrock of their very being was good stuff. 

What I learned from Mr. Rogers was to never be embarrassed of being tender. That I could go ahead and speak from the goodness of my heart and the truth of who I am, go ahead and say out loud, "I love you." "There is no one in the whole world like you, and I'm so grateful you are in my life" or "I believe in you" or even, "I'm so sorry." 

So today - think of it as a little Mr. Rogers exercise - Tell someone in your life you care. Tell them a specific something you love and appreciate about them. Maybe just a text saying, "This thing you do and are...I so deeply appreciate", or a phone call or email to say, "I know this is hard, but I believe in you." Tell someone in your life today what Mr. Rogers hoped 4 year olds ( and who they became when they grew up) could learn to say to one another and to themselves, " You are special, You are whole and the bedrock of your very being was and is good stuff."

Fred Rogers, in his own humble way was a holy fool challenging the cruelty of the status quo with tenderness. While on sabbatical in Montreal, I heard my heart urging me to go deeper into what I was calling a "spirituality of tenderness" that was more profound than the peace-making of my youth and more foundation just music alone. Listening to the song of the sacred clown led me to L'Arche - and keeps me connected. It is one of the few truths that remains strong in my heart after living through the desecration of the current political regime's manipulation of Christ's church. And, upon careful reflection, that holy fool was my inspiration for spending 40 years in ordained ministry. In middle class Protestant America, there was not a lot of interest in contemplation and simple living. There was even less interest in sacramental spirituality let alone the importance of beauty as one of God's voices.  Yet that's where God called me - and for years I thought I had made a mistake - but now I realize it was one incarnation of the holy fool who: "attempts to live calmly in the middle of chaos, productively in an arena of waste, lovingly in a maelstrom of individualism, and gently in a world full of violence." (Sr. Joan Chittister)

So that is what I am sensing we'll explore as we resume our pilgrimage into 2021 during the age of contagion, chaos, solitude, and disorder. Thank you, Alana Levandowski! Thank you Joan Chittister! Thank you Frederick Buechner! Thank you, Harvey Cox! Thank you, Celtic pilgrims! Thank you, Christine Valters Paintner! Thank you, Henri Nouwen! Thank you, L'Arche Ottawa! Thank you band mates in Tucson and Pittsfield! Thank you, Martha! Thank you, Pam! Thank you, don E! Thank you, Frank Zappa, Beatles, U2, Sarah MacLachlan, Joan Osborn, Leonard Cohen, Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell, Joan Armatrading, Bob Marley, Tom Waits and so many others. Thank you, Richard Rohr! And especially thank you, Di! It seems like now is the right time to honor "being small rather than strong, valuing joy over pleasure, avoiding positions of power, and enjoying rather than avoiding moments of insecurity, fear, and awkwardness." (Jon Sweeny in The St. Francis Prayer Book)

merry christmas at l'arche ottawa

Merry Christmas: Christmas Eve Homily at L'Arche Ottawa

Something we are all thinking and feeling this year, but not saying out loud, is how hard this past year has been for all of us mostly because of that blasted Covid-19 virus. It has turned everything upside-down and inside-out: it has brought suffering and sometimes death to those we love, it has thoroughly disrupted our routines and securities, and it has caused us to be creative and unusually patient amid the agonizing stress, anxiety, and confusion. And while I join you all in praying, wishing, hoping, social distancing, masking, and hand-washing that this dark time of disease will be over soon, I am also aware that in ways that are mysterious and far greater than my understanding the contagion is showing me just how much we are like the vulnerable Christ Child Jesus born this night in the city of David as our Savior.

What I mean by this is that God came into the world for us as a baby – a small, helpless child born into a cold night to humble parents who were trying to make sense of life in a nation occupied by a sometimes cruel and always demanding invading army – and this wasn’t an accident. For this infant to thrive, it was essential that someone held and caressed him, loved and clothed him, changed his messy diapers, sang to him, fed and nurtured him, too because he couldn’t do it himself. I’m not being sentimental or coy here: the smallness of the one we call Messiah was not an accident – and tells us two surprising truths about the blessings and responsibilities of Christmas:

First, the Christ Child makes clear that God is found in what is small, what is

weak, what is hidden. Fr. Henri Nouwen, who spent his last years in community at L’Arche Daybreak in Toronto used to say that most of us look for the Lord in big, impressive, and loud happenings that document the Creator’s power. We expect God to show up in “spectacles, power plays, significant and extraordinary events” that will change the course of history. We, ourselves, are often taken-in by wealth, prestige, and sparkling things that glitter and shine. We can be so easily distracted. Perhaps that is why the Lord chose to come to us as a small child of Palestin-ian peasants in an insignificant stable surrounded by animals and shepherds. The way of God’s kingdom is humble, simple, small, and so very vulnerable. The first surprise about Christmas is that the holy shows up for us in the most unlikely little places – and if we refuse to look for God in what is small, Fr. Nouwen suggests, we will likely give-in to despair.

The second surprise about the Christ Child’s birth is that each of us has a small, tender, afraid, wounded, and little place within our hearts, souls and memories that needs the same comfort and caring as the baby Jesus. We don’t like to 

confess this: we’d rather look strong, significant and in control. But that vulnerable infant part of us still cries out to be loved, still aches to be held, still yearns to be cherished and comforted in a harsh and frightening world. During this blasted pandemic I rediscovered how afraid and confusing life can be – and how much I need God’s comforting presence as well as the love and encouragement of others I trust to be safe and kind, too. During these covid days, I am keenly aware of the Christ Child within me.

One of mysteries of suffering is that it reveals some of the ways we must change; some of the ways we are still small, broken, and tender; and some of the ways we can share God’s love with other who are hurting and anxious. Our dark days are not dissimilar to the night into which Jesus was born once – and continues to be born among us still in small, childlike acts of love and trust. For me, and for our community, this is where I believe God’s good news is being revealed this Christmas. And for that I say: Thanks be to God!

a heretical spiritual imperative...

 

living into solidarity...

It was snowing lightly for a moment this morning, all but gone now in

anticipation of returning another day, but still lovely. The weather guy - or "snow" man at the Greylock Snow Day blog site - says that the glorious white blanket that currently graces our hills will vanish by Christmas Day as rain and above average temperatures "do major damage to our snow base." He laments this - as do I. Once upon a time, I hated the stuff. But, as time has passed and I relinquish a measure of my prissy demeanor, we've become friends. I love the way Lucie frolics in the frost like a pup despite her arthritis. And I have discovered the sacred silence of the air as snow falls and muffles all earthly distractions except the stillness for a spell. The Belfast poet, Louis MacNiece, hints at these layered truths in his composition called simply: "Snow."

The room was suddenly rich and the great bay-window was
Spawning snow and pink roses against it
Soundlessly collateral and incompatible:
World is suddener than we fancy it.

World is crazier and more of it than we think,
Incorrigibly plural. I peel and portion
A tangerine and spit the pips and feel
The drunkenness of things being various.

And the fire flames with a bubbling sound for world
Is more spiteful and gay than one supposes—
On the tongue on the eyes on the ears in the palms of one's hands—
There is more than glass between the snow and the huge roses.

From our secluded solitude surrounded as we are by snow, trees, and wetlands, it is hard to grasp the horror that so much of the rest of the world is experiencing. Author and historian, Diana Butler Bass, recently wrote that as she and her family were watching the TV news headlines, her college-age daughter gasped: "We are in hell. We are in freaking hell." She adds:

When the medieval church assigned “Hell” to the Fourth Sunday of Advent, I’m certain they wanted to scare people about their eternal state — to straighten up and get right with God to prepare for Jesus’ coming. I’m equally certain that those preachers weren’t thinking about the hell that we humans make right here on earth. But we’ve got a whole lot of hell this year. Right here. And people are scared about what is going on in the world.

There is every good and bad reason to be scared about what is going on right now - and hell is a fitting description. It feels disorienting and surreal to affirm this pain from where I sit in silent isolation, but hell is precisely true - even necessary. Editor, David Leonhardt, put it like this in today's New York Times newsletter: "For many Americans, the coronavirus recession has done almost no damage to their finances."

They still have their jobs, and their expenses have gone down while they've been stuck mostly at home. Their homes have not lost value, unlike the financial crisis of 2007-9. If they are fortunate enough to own stocks, their portfolio is probably worth more than a year ago. Of course, millions of other Americans are struggling mightily. Nine million fewer people are employed than a year ago. Others are coping with big medical bills. Many small businesses have closed or may soon. And state and local governments are planning deep cuts.

Talk about parallel universes! The gap between we-of-privileged solitude and they

-of-economic-vulnerability is every bit as massive and incomprehensible as that between fanatics consumed by delusional conspiracy fantasies within the Trump regime and the rest of us. Such separation breeds fear, and fear too easily morphs into hatred and violence towards all that we don't understand. Or know. Or even see. Dr. Bass puts this contrast into a context for those of us exploring an Advent spirituality: "The horrible headlines (of our day) have me reflecting on these verses, familiar words for many, from Luke 2:"

"But the angel said to them, ‘Do not be afraid; for see — I am bringing you good news of great joy for all the people: to you is born this day in the city of David Savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord. This will be a sign for you: you will find a child wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a manger.’ And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host, praising God and saying: ‘Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace, goodwill among people!" It is a beautiful vision — the angels, the heavens singing. No matter the angelic announcement, however, the world was still in the shadow of sin. Jesus was born. But Caesar was on the throne. The Messiah had come. But Israel was occupied, a client state of Rome. Peace and goodwill were proclaimed. Yet violence remained the power of empire. Peace! Hark! Peace - and yet no peace.

The band U2 crafted a song in the wake of an IRA bombing in Omagh in 1998 that captures the anguish of our social chasms. They link our "hell" to the dreams we celebrate during Advent/ Christmas. I consider it one of their finest compositions. When they shared it after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, it took on added significance - one that warrants our renewed interest and attention.

Bass, U2, and many people of goodwill can't help but wonder right now how we might reach across the divide of hell to live into solidarity with sisters and brothers who are our walking wounded. The way of Jesus was never meant to be an other-wordly, inner peace only faith. Not for a Messiah we claim to be the essence of God's word made flesh. My hunch - and experience - suggests that one ingredient must be lament. Tears can be God's presence breaking our hearts open. We do not need more abstractions, theories, or feelings of debilitating fear. This is time for a love that is greater than despair. And if we don't grieve deeply now, when we have the time and space to weep and own this horror, it is unlikely it will happen after our vaccinations. I quoted Fr. Henri Nouwen earlier this week when he clarified what it means to live through despair into joy:

Joyful persons see with open eyes the hard reality of human existence and at the same time are not imprisoned by it. They have no illusion about the evil powers that roam around, “looking for someone to devour” (1 Peter 5:8), but they also know that death has no final power. They suffer with those who suffer, yet they do not hold on to suffering; they point beyond it to an everlasting peace.

Increasingly, I have come to trust that incarnation - magnifying the Lord like Mary or making the ideas of the holy part of our fleshy habits - requires Fr. Henri's insights to be embraced by the poetry of Lucille Clifton. Together they express an embodied grief in love that breaks our hearts. As we feel connected to all of life - the beautiful as well as the broken - then we can choose what small ways we can nourish and strengthen it. As our spiritual cousin in Judaism often say: "L'chaim! Here's to LIFE!"

people who are going to be
in a few years
bottoms of trees
bear a responsibility to something
besides people
          if it was only
you and me
sharing the consequences
it would be different
it would be just
generations of men
          but
this business of war
these war kinds of things
are erasing those natural
obedient generations
who ignored pride
          stood on no hind legs
          begged no water
          stole no bread
did their own things

and the generations of rice
of coal
of grasshoppers

by their invisibility
denounce us

(generations by Lucille Clifton)

Merry Christmas 2020

As Advent slowly gives way to Christmas, and the Winter Solstice promises that more light will soon break through our darkness, life here feels wistful: sorrow mixing with quiet anticipation. Throughout this year we have known both grief and joy, uncertainty and hope both at the same time. Clearly, we are being called to learn living with paradox, but it’s been rough going – even from the relative safety and solitude of our small, quiet home in Western Massachusetts. Some lives continue-on with real albeit modest inconveniences while others are consumed by chaos, suffering, anxiety, fear, and death.  From within our bubble of privilege, we are learning what St. Paul meant when he told the early faith community in Rome that we must learn to practice waiting in patience:

The Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, so that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words. And God, who searches the heart, knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. (In this we can trust that) all things work together for good for those who love God and live according to the wisdom of creation.

This year I have learned that the early Celtic Christians refused to waste their waiting. Believing that when the Word of God became flesh at Christmas, God was reminding us that what was true in the beginning is still true today: the Holy created humans in the sacred image so we, like creation, are infused with original blessing, not original sin. Each day becomes another opportunity to live into God’s goodness in our ordinary lives. This regularly floated to the surface for me over the past ten months as I rediscovered what is most important: love, using limited resources wisely, going deeper into prayer, beauty, silence, and nature and giving new attention to small acts of tenderness. The Irish poet, John O’Donohue, wrote:

At Christmas, time deepens. The Celtic imagination knew that time is eternity in disguise. They embraced the day as a sacred space. Christmas reminds us to glory in the simplicity and wonder of one day; it unveils the extraordinary that our hurried lives conceal and neglect. We have been given such immense possibilities. We desperately need to make clearances in our entangled lives to let our souls breathe. We must take care of ourselves and especially our suffering brothers and sisters.

To hallow each day as sacramental is to claim time, love, words, prayers, thoughts, songs, house-cleaning, dishwashing, laundry, home-cooked meals, short walks in the wetlands, and whatever time remains as gifts too precious to take for granted. For when they are cherished and savored, these little things become restorative. I've long suspected that the "small is holy" and now we’re learning what that means from the inside out. Henri Nouwen put it like this:

Joyful persons see with open eyes the hard reality of human existence and at the same time are not imprisoned by it. They have no illusion about the evil powers that roam around, “looking for someone to devour” (1 Peter 5:8), but they also know that death has no final power. They suffer with those who suffer, yet they do not hold on to suffering; they point beyond it to an everlasting peace.

Many of my plans did NOT happen in 2020 the way we planned, but what DID take place became holy ground – and I am so grateful to have shared some of it with you. May all that is holy continue to ground you in grace and love you from the inside out.

Grace and peace,

James

such is the way of advent...

Such is the way of Advent: a bit wistful as sorrow mixes with quiet anticipation, a hint of joy weaves throughout a day defined by deep grays, and always, always, a lingering taste of oatmeal pancakes, butter, and maple syrup from our breakfast pancakes. Today we grieved Mick's passing. We also put on snow shoes that have laid too long awaiting and hoofed through 14 inches of wetland snow. Our winter hound, Lucie, reveled in the romp and seemed to shake years off her aging countenance. Now she's crashed out on our bed snoring with blissful abandon. 

As befits late Advent, we're dining tonight on a potpourri of leftovers -

everything from pasta and meat sauce to last night's mashed potatoes and a few as still unnamed delicacies - to clear out the refrigerator of the past in anticipation of the feast of the new born Christ Child on Christmas Day. It is time to let the old be old as we move toward the order of a new day. I have been having a rough go at this trying to write our annual Christmas letter. To date it's been a bust but I'll give it another shot tomorrow after the live-streaming Advent reflection I share on Face Book each Sunday at 9:55 am. (If you're interested, check it out @ https://www.facebook.com/Be-Still-and -Know-913217865701531/) We've been on a virtual pilgrimage of sorts into a Celtic Advent. Given that this has been a year like no other in my lifetime, it seemed fitting to explore Advent in a new way, too. Using David Cole's useful little book, A Celtic Advent, as a jumping off point, I've invited a handful of friends from across the US to join me for a six week journey of prayer, silence, song, study, and spiritual wandering: a full forty days of candle lighting and song. I've learned a ton in preparation - which has only whetted my appetite for more - so after the Feast Day of the Nativity, I hope to read more Pelagius as well as early Celtic Christian history.

One thought that continues to float to the surface through these failed attempts at crafting a Christmas letter is how resourceful we have had to become during this season of contagion. Fr. Richard Rohr suggests that among the peculiar gifts of the Covid era, many of us have rediscovered what is most important in our lives: love, using our limited resources wisely, going deeper into prayer, beauty, silence and nature and giving new attention to small acts of tenderness. Rohr says that: "the Gospel is not about an ideal world where everybody loves everybody. The tragic, absurd sense of life - that's the Gospel - where the reality of disorder always gives way to the hopeful possibility of reorder." That rings true to me and I like what the late John O'Donohue adds:

At Christmas, time deepens. The Celtic imagination knew that time is eternity in disguise. They embraced the day as a sacred space. Christmas reminds us to glory in the simplicity and wonder of one day; it unveils the extraordinary that our hurried lives conceal and neglect. We have been given such immense possibilities. We desperately need to make clearances in our entangled lives to let our souls breathe. We must take care of ourselves and especially our suffering brothers and sisters.

 

As each day in our small world has been hallowed over the past ten months, home cooked meals have become sacramental. So, too a simple kiss or embrace. Time, love, words, prayers, thoughts, songs, house-cleaning, dish-washing, laundry, short walks in the wetlands and whatever time remains are recognized as gifts too precious to waste. When they are cherished and savored these little things become restorative. I've long suspected that the "small is holy" and now I know it in from the inside out. Before our solitude, I didn't know you could make chicken soup stock from bone broth. To be honest, I probably would have been revolted by the mere suggestion. But now, I am honing the process and look forward to it. Truth is I can't wait to give turkey and rice soup a try after this year's Christmas feast. I've started to learn how trees speak to one another and mother trees care for their offspring. I am rediscovering the beauty of a simple acoustic guitar played with a bit of skill and a lot of soul. I'm reconnecting with my creative and artistic friends in the region and even stepping outside my comfort zone with some poetry/music collaborations. The late Henri Nouwen offers this perspective that seems to resonate with my heart:

Joyful persons see with open eyes the hard reality of human existence and at the same time are not imprisoned by it. They have no illusion about the evil powers that roam around, “looking for someone to devour” (1 Peter 5:8), but they also know that death has no final power. They suffer with those who suffer, yet they do not hold on to suffering; they point beyond it to an everlasting peace.

 

the challenge of winter's charism...

A change has clearly come to these old hills as each day becomes incrementally

more grey. It is not painful, mind you, just a noticeable shift from the passing chills of autumn to the steady frost and increasing darkness of the approaching winter solstice. Today we will have eight hours of sunlight. There is a dusting of snow blanketing us, too that adds its own buffer and beauty to the day. Our aging dog, Lucie, adores this time of year - she is a true snow hound - who seems to grow younger and more playful as the season ripens.

On the other-hand, I continue to make peace with Mother Nature having once dreaded and despised the inclemency: frigidity hurt my face and the relentless puddles of icy slush caused my feet to cramp and rebel. In Cleveland, where wind screams across Lake Eerie with a skull penetrating ferocity and the sun goes on sabbatical for full five months in late October, I felt trapped. Overwhelmed and oppressed. There was no escape so endurance became a battle of the will. I found beauty in the magical flurries, of course, and reveled in the silence of the city enveloped in a winter storm. God knows, I made good use of the snow days, too. But the pain - always the blistering, belligerent pain that was relentless -remained. 

Until Di cajoled me into walking by the lake-shore during a blizzard. To say I was reluctant would be generous. Simultaneous resentment and terror grabbed me by the throat as we drove from the warmth of our little house to the harshness of the lake. And then we got out of the car - and saw waves freezing in mid crash! Wind whipping the snow across the shore in small cyclones. Energy beyond comprehen-sion surging all around us as we stood in what I sensed to be the center of a sacred invitation. In that instant, the storm became sacramental - an outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace - where matter and spirit embraced. Truthfully, I could not bear it too long. The emotional intensity more than the cold became more than I could manage. With tears freezing on my face it was time to retreat to our trusty Jeep and regroup. And thaw out. And return thanks for what was still incomprehensible. 

Slowly after that I began to make peace with winter. Yes, we took a ten year hiatus in the Sonoran Desert, another enchanted land of mystery and blessing with wild weather all its own. But upon returning to New England, the pilgrimage resumed. "It is all about your gear," the wise, old natives told me. "If you have the right thermal underwear, insulated socks as well as down vests, warm knit hats and top of the line gloves you'll be just fine." They took me cross-country skiing in a snow storm. The led me on  hikes along the snowy banks of the silent Housatonic River. We wandered the woods behind our home as well as the forest on our daughter's place in hill country. Our children gave us snow shoes for Christmas. And I began to watch the sky for the changes that gave off clues about what was to come. I'm still coming to grips with all of it - the first real burst of freezing wind that slaps my face still hurts - but I am starting to see it as blessing now - not curse.

the blessings of banality: pausing on the journey

Celtic Advent Four Reflection Notes: December 6th, 2020
A tender melody crafted by John Michael Talbot, the North American former rock’n’roller turned Franciscan oblate, continues to keep an ancient Celtic prayer of the Hebrides alive. It has been calling to me for weeks – and today feels right for sharing:

Healer of my soul - Keep me at even
Keep me at morning, keep me at noon, healer of my soul 

Keeper of my soul - on rough course faring
Help and safeguard my means this day, keeper of my soul 

I am tired, astray, and stumbling
Shield my soul from the snare of sin
 
Today is the Feast Day of St. Nicholas, 6th century Bishop of Smyrna in what is

now Turkey, as well as the culmination of the fourth week of our pilgrimage into a Celtic Advent. Often the middle Sun-day of Advent is set aside as a small break to both take stock of what has transpired thus far, and, to regroup for the remainder of our exploration. Within our practice of peregrinatio we note that in just 20 days, we will let go of this journey for a moment to bask in the Feast of the Nativity – the birth of Christ Jesus our Lord – Messiah coming into the world as a tiny infant born in an obscure Palestinian peasant cave and hidden from all things powerful, important, and valuable.

The symbolism of the Christ Child arriving in the dead of night points to a mystery overlooked by a world addicted to productivity and bottom lines. That this child is surrounded by shepherds, his weary parents, and farm animals underscores the concealed blessing of this obscure birth. Fr. Henri Nouwen wrote: “When the liturgy announces that a shoot shall come from the stump of Jesse, and from his roots a bud shall blossom upon whom the spirit of the Lord shall rest,” we’re being told:

That our healing comes from something, small, tender, and vulnerable, something hardly notice-able. God, who is Creator of the Universe, arrives for us in smallness, weakness, and hiddenness.

Ordinarily, in our culture, this is a time of rejoicing, celebration, and festivity in community: we gather in our various faith communities, sing our favorite Christmas carols, raise a lighted candle through our tears to “Silent Night,” and experience, at least for a moment, that illusive and inchoate sense of hope that God continues to be at work in the world. Fleeting as it may be, for a moment, we dare to trust that there will be joy to the world for love has come down at Christmas filled with tidings of comfort and joy.

This year, however, our feasting shall be much more subdued – even shrouded in solitude for some – for this Christmas is unlike any other most of us have ever known. I won’t belabor the point except to say that in the United States alone one of us is dying every 30 seconds to the contagion: Just three weeks ago, it was one death per minute and now the terror has been doubled. While the best and brightest are clear that we know how to avert more death and suffering, too many have chosen a stubborn stupidity over wisdom moving about with a pig-headed and cruel disregard for the least of these, our vulnerable sisters and brothers.

Within the tragedy, this heart-breaking reality filled with fear, anger, emptiness, grief, and surreptitious danger, my faith causes me to wonder if there might also be within the darkness a spark of light? In the proclamation that Messiah shall arrive among us as a small, tender, and vulnerable blossom, could God be telling our generation what the Scriptures said to the self-absorbed rulers, scribes, and sages of privilege in ancient Israel: just before the Christ Child’s birth? That the holy does not arrive within the loud, impressive events that reek of power. The pomp and circumstance distract and seduce, of course, but they blind us as well to the presence of the sacred in the shoot that shall sprout from the stump. Fr. Nouwen notes that this is the paradox of faith:

When I have no eyes for the small signs of God’s presence – the smile of a baby, the carefree play of children, the words of encouragement and gestures of love offered by friends – I will always be tempted to despair. The small child of Bethlehem, the unknown young man of Nazareth, the rejected preacher, the naked man on the cross, he asks for my full attention. The work of our salvation, you see, takes place in the midst of a world that continues to shout, scream, and overwhelm us with its claims and promises. But the promise (of the Lord) is hidden in the shoot that sprouts from the stump, a shoot and a blossom that hardly anyone notices… It is hard to believe that God would reveal the divine presence to us in the self-emptying, humble way of the man from Nazareth. So much in me seeks influence, power, success, and popularity. But the way of Jesus is the way of hiddenness, powerlessness, and littleness. It does not seem a very appeal-ing way. Yet when I enter into true, deep communion with it, I find that this small way leads to real peace and joy.

This past week has been for me one of trusting this littleness – this presence of the sacred in what is small – particularly a few threads that wake me up: a seemingly random poem, the cycle of the seasons in nature, an overlooked sentence about Celtic pilgrimage. Christine Valters-Paintner writes that, “one way to practice perigrinatio – pilgrimage - in our lives is to ‘follow the thread,’ which for me means to listen to the synchronicities and patterns that are being revealed daily.”

Pilgrimage begins when we take responsibility for how we live – especially when we are living in exile, loss, and rejection – choosing to look for a deepened awareness and commitment to the holy rather than staying stuck in the bitterness, despair, and longing. (Valters-Paintner)

This Advent and Christmas seems to be ALL about exile for us – with a whole lot of emptiness and longing, too. That’s probably why I am able to notice those little, sweet random clues that could so easily be overlooked. As last week ripened, it was clear that once again I wasn’t giving much attention to the big and serious disciplines I’ve wanted to cultivate this Advent. I’m still tip-toe-ing my way ever so slowly into Centering Prayer – getting into it a little bit – but only modestly. Those threads, however, those synchronicities and patterns keep speaking to me of taking stock of my pilgrimage and what I have learned thus far. “We all have an inner pilgrim,” Dr. Valters-Paintner writes, “and in different seasons this archetype speaks more strongly than others.” Clearly, as autumn perishes and winter gains ground, my inner pilgrim has been inviting me to pay more attention to the cycle of seasons. I had to repair and replace a few rotten planks on our wooden front porch this week before the snow showed up – and that meant I had to move our pumpkins.

Those who know me well know that I ADORE pumpkins – everything about them

brings a smile – and come October I can’t get enough of them. We go out to one of the local nurseries and wander the fields in search of the GREAT pumpkin. In the process we laugh, tell one another stories, sometimes have our grandchildren with us, and bring home 8 or 10 beauties of various sizes and colors to decorate our home along with gourds and some First Nations decorative corn as well.

There were still 7 pumpkins gracing our porch, but they were starting to turn to mush. So, I hauled them back to one of our small, raised garden beds, and in a new ritual for me, tossed them in the air, returned thanks to God for their beauty, and watched them smash and shatter on the winter soil in all their worn-out glory. I feel like a kid again watching them collapse. I also feel very old, too because right there, in front on my eyes, I saw the cycle of the seasons revealed: what was once young and fecund gradually ripens and matures only to return to the earth from which it came – ashes to ashes, dust to dust – where humus and seeds join forces with the sun, soil, and water to bring to birth new life.

It was a humbling, energizing little ceremony that called me to take stock. The possibility of a week end snowstorm simply underscored the importance of living into the cycle of the seasons in my soul. In The Soul’s Slow Ripening, Dr. Valters-

Paintner writes:

 

Winter invites us to gather inside, grow still with the landscape, and listen for the voices we may not hear during other times of year. These may be the sounds of our own inner wisdom or the voices of those who came before us. It is a season that calls us into the grace of descent. We spend so much of our spiritual lives trying to ascend. Descent is the path of having everything that offered comfort stripped away. In the mystical tradition (of the Celts) the descent is also the slow revelation of the true face and incredible mystery of God. ( pp. 120-121)

That was one small thread that grabbed my attention last week. Another was the holy whispering to me through three different poems. Like trying to figure out the gifts of the Holy Spirit that always require another person’s wisdom and perspective to clarify, correct, or validate our own, our souls need the words from others, too to name what is taking place within us. Those who know better than I say that, “poetry has a way of expressing things of the heart beautifully, of holding the paradox of life and inviting us into a contemplation of the mysteries” we know we desire, but need help embracing. One small poem I’ve been holding since the start of the pandemic by Ganga White says:

What if our religion was each other? What if our practice was our life and prayer our words? What if our temple was the Earth? If forests were our church? If holy water – the rivers, lakes, and ocean? What if meditation was our relationships? If the teacher was life? If wisdom was self-knowledge. If love was the center of our being?

This is Celtic incarnational spirituality in spades, right? A way of growing in

compassion and wisdom – living in unity with the sacred – by being woke. Aware.
Letting the holiness in our humanity ripen so that we can see the face of Jesus in all of creation. The Celts have taught us that nature is the first word of the Lord; and this little poem cuts through all the fancy words to ask what would it be like if all our spiritual practices were grounded in God’s creative reality? Former Irish priest and poet, John O’Donohue, suggests that:

Spirituality is the art of transfiguration. We should not force ourselves to change by hammering our lives into any predetermined shape. We do not need to operate according to the idea of a predetermined program or plan for our lives. Rather, we might practice a new art of attention to the inner rhythm of our days and lives… If you work with a different rhythm, you will come easily and naturally home to yourself. Your soul already knows the geography of your own destiny. Your soul alone has the map of your future, therefore you can trust this indirect, oblique side of yourself… If you attend to yourself and seek to come into your presence, you will find exactly the right rhythm for your life. (Anam Cara)

I don’t know why this little poem popped up again on Face Book when it did except to say I needed it to remind me of my own unique rhythm within the cycle of the seasons. Taking stock of it opened my eyes to a second poem on the internet entitled “Banality” by Gregory Djankian:

There's something to be said for banality, 

the way it keeps everything on a level plane,
one cliché blithely following another 

like cows heading toward the pasture.
How lovely sometimes not to think about Russian Futurism, 

or the second law of thermodynamics, 

or how thinking itself requires some thoughtfulness.
I'd like to ask if Machiavelli ever owned a dog named "Prince."
I'd like to imagine Rosalind Franklin lounging pleasantly by a wood stove.
Let the mind take a holiday, the body put its slippers on.
It's a beautiful day, says the banal, and today, 

I'm happy to agree with its genial locutions.
Woof, woof, goes the neighbor's dog. 

The sun is pouring in through the window,
heating up the parlor, the blue sky is so blue, 

and the cumulous clouds are looking very cumulous.
I'm all for reading a murder mystery, 

something with flair but forgettable.
Or some novelette whose hero's name is Hawk or Kestrel,
a raptor bird soaring above his ravished love.
I'm lying on the couch with easy puzzles.

I'm playing a song that has no accidentals.
Life's but a dream, comme ci, comme ça.
No doubt, tomorrow I'll be famished for what's occult and perilous,
all those knots in the brain, all the words that are hard to crack.
Today, I'm floating like a feather, call me Falcon

look me up in the field guide under Blissful,
Empty-headed, under everything that loves what it does today,

and requires no explanation.

Isn’t that exquisite? Simple, perfect, and true? At this stage in my life, I’m not ashamed to confess that I, too crave the banal from time to time. Especially at the end of the day – in the middle of this pandemic pilgrimage – especially when winter is closing in just around the corner. Such banality is a small blessing, what that wise but all too anxious Reformer, Jean Covin – or John Calvin as we know him – might call a common grace: a blessing given to all people regardless of their theological acumen or commitment. These days I am all FOR common grace – trusting like the Iona Community affirms that “God’s goodness is planted at the heart of humanity more deeply than all that is wrong.” Being open to the birth of the small child of Bethlehem – the promise hidden in the shoot that sprouts from the stump – helps me see and honor these little blessings even within the banal. Those working in the realm of contemporary Celtic spirituality want us to know that there is a:

Profound kind of humility demanded of us on our journey. We are called to recognize that we don’t know what will happen to us on this pilgrimage. We don’t understand how we will be changed by this experience. We don’t know the meaning of the times we stumble and fall because when you’re walking a path without a map, it is impossible to plan ahead… that is why from time to time we must pause to take stock… these holy pauses are essential for discerning meaning in what we have experienced. (Valters-Paintner, Soul of the Pilgrim, p. 19)

So, we pause. We listen. We observe the cycle of the seasons. And the serendipitous songs and poems that float our way. And we learn, incrementally, to “live with a wild, open heart that is ready to see God on every horizon.” Even the painful ones – which is what the third poem said to me. It is by Rilke called “Let This Darkness Be a Bell Tower.”

Quiet friend who has come so far

feel how your breathing makes more space around you.
Let this darkness be a bell tower
and you the bell. As you ring,

what batters you becomes your strength.
Move back and forth into the change.
What is it like, such intensity of pain?
If the drink is bitter, turn yourself to wine.

In this uncontainable night,
be the mystery at the crossroads of your senses,
the meaning discovered there.

And if the world has ceased to hear you,
say to the silent earth: I flow.
To the rushing water, speak: I am.

These are terrifying times – saturated with darkness – it often feels like the sorrow is beating ALL the life out of us. On Thursday, I was watching the PBS News Hour interview with the chief admin-istrator of a large medical complex in Texas who said that in addition to the fatigue and burnout her staff is experiencing during this surge of covid, beyond the anguish everyone feels caring for desperately sick individuals, there have been 6 suicides in the past 3 months on her staff. Without warning, I burst into tears hearing this, awakened yet again to the magnitude of misfortune, fear, torment, and anger we all are trying to manage. And this was just one medical complex. In one state. From one newscast. 

That’s when it hit me that the time is now for our religion to BE one another and our spiritual practices how we live our lives. Being on this Celtic spiritual pilgrimage with you helps ground me. Knowing that you are wrestling with the same things I am helps me take the next step by faith through my tears. Trusting that God’s love is greater than all our insecurities feeds me from the inside out, too. So, the last thread of synchronicity that spoke to me last week in my holy pause of discernment came again from Henri Nouwen.

You know, Fr. Henri is NOT a Celt, he’s just an anxious older religious guy – in many ways like me – who kept on trusting, failing, listening, praying, studying, getting back up, and trusting some more. And the more Henri fell, the more he learned that he wasn’t alone: there were others who loved him and there was always God who cherished him. On one of his many wandering pilgrimages to find himself and his true calling – and there were many throughout his professional life – this time he went to a comunidade de base in Latin America, a spiritual community base of conscientized believers, where Nouwen found out he wasn’t cut out for the life of a religious revolutionary. In a little book he called Gracias he wrote: “the great mystery of Christmas that continues to give us comfort and consolation is that we are not alone on our journey. God comes to us.”

The God of love who gave us life sent his only Son to be with us at all

times and in all places, so that we never have to feel lost in our struggles but always can trust that God walks with us. The challenge is to let God be who God wants to be. A part of us clings to our aloneness and does not allow God to touch us where we are most in pain. Often, we hide from God precisely those places in ourselves where we feel guilty, ashamed, confused, lost, or simply little and insignificant. Thus, we do not give God a chance to be with us where we feel most alone. Christmas is the renewed invitation not to be afraid and to let God – whose love is greater than our own hearts and minds can comprehend – be our companion…

… especially in those places within and among us where we feel the most vulnerable, the small-est, the most afraid or ashamed. This week, while not planning to do it, I was inspired to pause and take stock of how little I feel right now. How empty I am at times. How uncertain everything in life seems and how little control I have over so much. I took stock of the end of autumn and the start of winter – outside my life – so that I might sense it within. I noticed, again and again, the small synchronicities that pop up as tiny blessings and encouragements. And, mostly, I felt a trust that the inner pilgrim and monk within me wanted me to know that it was perfectly alright with the holy if I honored my own peculiar and unique rhythms. In fact, it was essential. 

In this, it was a good week. It was a humbling week. It was terrifying, heart-breaking, and reassuring week all at the same time, too – and now its time to get back on the pilgrimage road to Bethlehem. 

https://fb.watch/2cTc-lHoya/