Silence/Presence

o “Become empty of yourself and realize inner silence.” Lao Tzu - Tao

o “Be still and know that I am God” Psalm 46:10 – Judeo/Christian

o “Thus, only true Silence is eternal speech, the Heart-to-Heart talk.”

Swami Satyeswarananda Giri - Hindu

o “Be silent that the Lord who gave you language may speak.” Jahal – Al – Din Rumi -Islam

o “Silence is a privileged entry into the realm of God and into eternal life. For silence is a language that is infinitely deeper, more far reaching, more understanding, more compassionate, and more eternal than any other language.” Meister Eckhart – Christian

o He (the American Indian) believes profoundly in silence – the sign of perfect equilibrium. Silence is the absolute poise or balance of body, mind, and spirit. Ohiyesa – Native American

o “When you pray…you yourself must be silent; let the prayer speak.” Archimandrite Kallistos Ware – Greek Orthodox

o "It is as we join with others in a way that only human beings can, in a shared engagement in a common vision, that we find ourselves in the presence of another presence that is the final source of our hopes and intentions, and that undergirds and sustains them." -Rabbi Judith Plaskow - Jewish

o "The most precious gift we can offer others is our presence. When mindfulness embraces those we love, they will bloom like flowers." Thich Nhat Hanh - Buddhist

(From Spiritual Directors International email 3-25-08)

Please pray!

Please pray for 18 year old Kiel, who is struggling with drugs. He relapsed after being in out-patient treatment and needs to go away to a residential facility, but refuses. Pray that he agrees to go there. Pray that Kiel will be saved.

Gartenfische posted this quote awhile ago, but it is what I keep thinking of now:

Life smooths us, rounds, perfects,
as does the river the stone,
and there is no place
our Beloved is not flowing
though the current’s force you
may not always like.

-Teresa of Avila

Smooth the way for Kiel's healing, O Holy One. Amen.

"Body of War"

My daughter posted this video on her blog. I was so struck by it that I felt that I should copy it here.

Body of War is a documentary that will be released this Spring.




See if it's showing in your city and go watch it.

Who? What? When? Where? Why?

Eckhart Tolle writes in A New Earth:

"I usually congratulate people when they tell me, 'I don't know who I am anymore.' They look perplexed and ask, 'Are you saying it is a good thing to be confused?' I ask them to investigate. What does it mean to be confused? 'I don't know' is not confusion. Confusion is 'I don't know, but I should know' or 'I don't know, but I need to know.' Is it possible to let go of the belief that you should or need to know who you are? In other words, can you cease looking to conceptual definitions to give you a sense of self? Can you cease looking to thought for an identity? When you let go of the belief that you should or need to know who you are, what happens to confusion? Suddenly it is gone. When you full accept that you don't know, you actually enter a state of peace and clarity that is closer to who you truly are than thought could ever be. Defining yourself through thought is limiting yourself." (90)

I'm not there; I'm confused.

Grandpuppies!

We have no grandchildren yet, but CB and I do have two grandpuppies. You met Troy last November, when he was three months old. He and son BJ visited us during last weekend, and Troy was energetic, rambunctious, and sweet, all at the same time. This is what he looks like now:Of our own two dogs, Baillie, the 11 year old Cocker, usually ignores Troy by growling and walking away. Troy badgers Cisco to play; even though Cisco is now slightly smaller than Troy, Troy remembers Cisco's superiority and will still give in to this 5 year old Shepherd mix.

For Easter, son DC and wife AA came to visit with their 11 week old miniature Bull Dog, Sampson. He is roly poly, cute, and much more laid back than Troy. Sampson affected our dogs differently than Troy--Cisco left Sampson alone, but Sampson aroused Baillie to watch and supervise him rather than sleep, as usual.

I never thought I'd like a Bull Dog, but I fell in love with Sampson:

He is Risen!

	He is Risen
	Dr. He Qi is a professor at the Nanjing Union Theological Seminary and a tutor for master candidate students in the Philosophy Department of Nanjing University. He is also a member of the China Art Association and a council member of the Asian Christian Art Association.
Date:	2001
Artist:	He Qi

Easter

Day Before Easter

Holy Saturday
by Roxolana Luczakowsky Armstrong

Roxolana Luczakowsky Armstrong was born in Stanislaviv Ucraine in 1938. Her family, victims of Soviet persecution, fled to the West in 1945 to settle eventually in Philadelphia in 1950. Her art education started with study under reknowned Ucrainian painter Pietro Mehyk, and at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine arts in Philadelphia. She is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania and an active member in the Fellowship of Catholic Scholars. Roxolana, along with her teaching commitments, works at church decoration, book illustration, icons, as well as architectural and landscape painting. Her artistic endeavors may be seen both in museums and private collections on both sides of the Atlantic.

Astonishing Light

I wish I could show you
when you are lonely
or in darkness
the astonishing light
of your own being.

~~Hafiz

Hafiz quote is from Inward/Outward. Subscribe here.

Jesus' Reminders by Philip Yancey

"The image Jesus left with the world, the cross, the most common image in the Christian religion, is proof that God cares about our suffering and pain. He died of it. Today the image is coated with gold and worn around the necks of beautiful girls, a symbol of how far we can stray from the reality of history. But it stands, unique among all religions of the world. Many of them have gods. But only one has a God who cared enough to become a man and to die.

"Dorothy Sayers says:

For whatever reason God chose to make man as he is - limited and suffering and subject to sorrows and death - he had the honesty and courage to take his own medicine. Whatever game he is playing with his creation, he has kept his own rules and played fair. He can exact nothing from man that he has not exacted from himself. He has himself gone through the whole human experience, from the trivial irritations of family life and the cramping restrictions of hard work and lack of money to the worst horrors of pain and humiliation, defeat, despair, and death. When he was a man, he played the man. He was born in poverty and died in disgrace and thought it well worthwhile.

"To some, the image of a pale body glimmering on a dark night whispers of defeat. What good is a God who does not control his Son's suffering? What possible good could such a God do for us? But a louder sound can be heard: the shout of a God crying out to man, "I love you." Love was compressed for all history in that lonely, bleeding figure. Jesus, who said he could call down the angels at any moment and rescue himself from the horror, chose not to - because of us. For God so loved us, that he sent his only Son to die for us.

What practical effect does Christ's identification have on the person who actually suffers? A dramatic example of the effect of this truth was seen in the ministry of Dr. Paul Brand while he was working among leprosy patients in Vellore, India. There he preached a sermon, one of his best known and best loved. At the time, Brand and his workers were among the few in the area who would touch or closely approach a person with Hansen's disease - townspeople quarantined them. Brand slipped in late to a patients' gathering, sitting on the mat at the edge of an open courtyard. The air was heavy with combined odors of crowding bodies, poverty, stale spices, treated bandages.

"The patients insisted on a few words from Dr. Brand, and he reluctantly agreed. He stood for a moment, empty of ideas, looking at the patients before him. His eyes were drawn to their hands, dozens of them, most pulled inward in the familiar 'leprosy claw-hand,' some with no fingers, some with a few stumps. Many patients sat on their hands or otherwise hid them from view.

"'I am a hand surgeon,' he began, and waited for the translation into Tamil and Hindi. 'So when I meet people, I can't help looking at their hands. The palmist claims he can tell your future by looking at your hands. I can tell your past. For instance, I can tell what your trade has been by the position of the calluses and the condition of the nails. I can tell a lot about your character; I love hands.'

"He paused and looked at the eager faces. "How I would love to have had the chance to meet Christ and study his hands! But knowing what he was like, I can almost picture them, feel them."

"He paused again, then wondered aloud what it would have been like to meet Christ and study his hands. He traced the hands of Christ, beginning with infancy when his hands were small, helpless, futilely grasping. Then came the hands of the boy Jesus, clumsily holding a brush or stylus, trying to form letters of the alphabet. Then the hands of Christ the carpenter - rough, gnarled, with broken fingernails and bruises from working with saw and hammer.

"Then there were the hands of Christ the physician, the healer. Compassion and sensitivity seemed to radiate from them, so much so that when he touched people they could feel something of the divine spirit coming through. Christ touched the blind, the diseased, the needy.

"'Then,' continued Dr. Brand, 'there were his crucified hands. It hurts me to think of a nail being driven through the center of my hand, because I know what goes on there, the tremendous complex of tendons and nerves and blood vessels and muscles. It's impossible to drive a spike through its center without crippling it. The thought of those healing hands being crippled reminds me of what Christ was prepared to endure. In that act he identified himself with all the deformed and crippled human beings in the world. Not only was he able to endure poverty with the poor, weariness with the tired, but - clawed hands with the cripple.'

The effect on the listening patients, all social outcasts, was electrifying. Jesus - a cripple, with a claw-hand like theirs?

"Brand continued. 'And then there were his resurrected hands. One of the things I find most astounding is that, though we think of the future life as something perfected, when Christ appeared to his disciples he said, "Come look at my hands," and he invited Thomas to put his finger into the print of the nail. Why did he want to keep the wounds of his humanity? Wasn't it because he wanted to carry back with him an eternal reminder of the sufferings of those on earth? He carried the marks of suffering so he could continue to understand the needs of those suffering. He wanted to be forever one with us.'

"As he finished, Paul Brand was again conscious of hands as they were lifted, all over the courtyard, palm to palm in the Indian gesture of respect, namaste. The hands were the same stumps, the same missing fingers and crooked arches. Yet no one tried to hide them. They were held high, close to the face, in respect for Brand, but also with new pride and dignity. God's own response to suffering made theirs easier.

"T. S. Eliot wrote in one of his Four Quartets:

The wounded surgeon plies the steel
That questions the distempered part;
Beneath the bleeding hands we feel
The sharp compassion of the healer's art
Resolving the enigma of the fever chart.

"The surgery of life hurts. It helps me, though, to know that the Surgeon himself, the Wounded Surgeon, has felt every stab of pain and every sorrow."

Philip Yancey, “Jesus’ Reminders,” from Where Is God When It Hurts?. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, copyright © 1977 by The Zondervan Corporation.

Scientist Tells of Unity

Bob Seal at Non-Duality Cartoons has posted an 18-minute video made by Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor, a trained and published neuroanatomist. She specializes in the postmortem investigation of the human brain. In 1996, she suffered a massive stroke and has spent the period since then recovering, or "rebuilding her brain--from the inside out."

Her book blurb relates what happened to her:

Jill Bolte Taylor was a 37-year-old Harvard-trained and published brain scientist when a blood vessel exploded in her brain. Through the eyes of a curious neuroanatomist, she watched her mind completely deteriorate whereby she could not walk, talk, read, write, or recall any of her life. Because of her understanding of how the brain works, her respect for the cells composing her human form, and an amazing mother, Jill completely recovered her mind, brain and body. In My Stroke of Insight: A Brain Scientist's Personal Journey, Jill shares with us her recommendations for recovery and the insight she gained into the unique functions of the right and left halves of her brain. Having lost the categorizing, organizing, describing, judging and critically analyzing skills of her left brain, along with its language centers and thus ego center, Jill’s consciousness shifted away from normal reality. In the absence of her left brain’s neural circuitry, her consciousness shifted into present moment thinking whereby she experienced herself “at one with the universe.”

If you watch the video, you'll actually see and hear Dr. Taylor describe her experience and observe her knowledge.

I'm wondering about reading her book My Stroke of Insight: A Brain Scientist's Personal Journey--which at Amazon has seven reviews that rated it with 5 stars (the best), with no other reviews. Maybe I'll have to buy another book!

TAKE THE TIME to WATCH THIS!

Spring Break Trip

Yesterday MJ and I drove to San Antonio for lunch and then on to Austin to visit her brother DC and wife AA. In between San Antonio and Austin we stopped at the Outlet Malls in San Marcos, where we felt like we were in the minority. During Holy Week, many Mexicans come up to the United States to shop and have fun.

We spent the night with DC, AA, and their new miniature Bull Dog puppy, Sampson. Sampson is very cute; he's roly poly with short legs. He is nine weeks old and hops around. He growls and/or barks when he wants attention, which is almost constantly. He loves to fall asleep on DC or AA's lap.

We drove through thunderstorms getting to Austin last night. It was much easier to drive home today! But our car, among many others, was spotted with red mud. Last night when I talked with my husband, he told me it was "raining mud," which sounded pretty weird. But that's what it was--and it happens when a dust storm meets a rainstorm! Texas is an odd state. . . .

Both yesterday and today we shopped for MJ's senior prom dress, but never found one. There was one she liked, but we didn't get it and probably should have. But Austin is 182 miles away from Corpus Christi, so we're not driving back there any time soon.

Windy Last Soccer Game

Shodo Art and Calligraphy

The wind constantly blew during MJ's last high school varsity soccer game this afternoon. It was about 75 degrees F. but seemed much cooler with wind gusts up to 40 mph. The girls played a San Antonio team, and MJ's team won 1-0. It looked hard to play with the wind sending the ball in unexpected directions and distances.

Our children have played 23 years of soccer, as our eldest child DC started playing when he was 6 years old. This was the last soccer game with our children playing. I guess CB and I are getting tastes of the "last" things with our youngest child and the "empty nest" looming ahead. MJ will go to college this coming fall.

China/Tibet

Originally from a French newspaper and found at Friends of Tibet.

Others have the words I cannot express about the horrors in Tibet, especially with China preparing for the Olympics. Here are a few places to visit. I'm sure there are more.

FranIAm
Mad Priest
Quaker Dave
Ageless Hippie Chick

And watch this--it only takes a minute.

Monday already

Well, it's already Monday morning. Happy Saint Patrick's Day? Are you wearing green?

But thanks to Katherine E., I now have some words of hope and will go to bed.

Do not look with fear
on the changes and chances of this life;
rather look to them with full faith that as they arise,
God – whose you are – will deliver you out of them.

God has kept you hitherto.
Do not but hold fast to God's dear hand,
and the Holy One will lead you safely through all things;
and when you cannot stand, God will bear you
in the divine loving arms.

Do not anticipate what will happen tomorrow.
The same everlasting God who cares for you today
will take care of you tomorrow and every day.
Either God will shield you from suffering or
will give you unfailing strength to bear it.

Be at peace, then, and put aside all anxious thoughts
and imaginings.
~~St. Francis de Sales

Dinner "party"

Dinner Party by Amy Cutler

I definitely am not that dressed up, but my mood is much the same as I rush around trying to get ready for a dinner party for my husband's group of retired friends and their wives. For years we have been in a "casserole club" with them, which means a monthly dinner together. The host and hostess provide the locale, entree, and drinks. Each other couple brings something to complement the meal. And tonight there will be 14 of us!

Husband CB has barbecued salmon and chicken several times, and last year I baked lasagne. Today I am trying something I have never done before, and I'm a little worried about this. . . .but CB really wanted Crown Pork Roast, which I've only seen once (before this one I ordered). So we'll see how this turns out. . . .and I don't even like pork that much.

It's funny to be the "youngest" couple in this group of seven couples. I don't think there's much difference among the men, but I find that I am a little "odd" with the women, who like to talk about fashion, shopping, decorating, and tv much more than I do. Maybe the effects of growing up in the hippie west coast are too great to overcome!

Well, my break is over. . . .back to cleaning and cooking!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Everything is cleaned up, and all went well. I would recommend a Crown Pork Roast for anyone who wants to have an impressive meat that is easy to cook! Using a meat thermometer helped me know when it was ready, plus putting aluminum foil over each bone sticking up, so it turned out beautifully. Yay.

Hot Spring (?) Day

At 2 pm on Saturday afternoon, it is 93 degrees F. here in south Texas. It is the beginning of both TX colleges' and public schools' spring breaks. My daughter MJ and her boy friend are at the (crowded!) beach this afternoon. It is so HOT that it's hard to imagine Suzy at Luminiferous Ether welcoming her first spring robin! I miss such robins and daffodils and. . . .but I know all the kids are glad to have such beautiful weather for the beach. And it's good weather to hang towels out on the clothesline, which I did this morning. Also, this is when I really appreciate air conditioning, which enables the only way I can live in Texas. But is it still spring???

From "The New Yorker"

From Missy at Saint Anne, Pray for Us who got it from Episcopalifem. Thank you!

Book: "Mystical Hope"

I am re-reading an excellent book by Cynthia Bourgeault, Episcopal priest, author and retreat leader, which is entitled Mystical Hope: Trusting in the Mercy of God. The second chapter can pretty much be summed up by the quote I posted yesterday on Happiness.

Bourgeault defines "mystical hope" as:

1. Mystical hope is not tied to a good outcome, to the future. It lives a life of its own, seemingly without reference to external circumstances and conditions.

2. It has something to do with presence--not a future good outcome, but the immediate experience of being me, held in communion, by something intimately at hand.

3. It bears fruit within us at the psychological level in the sensations of strength, joy, and satisfaction: an "unbearable lightness of being." But mysteriously, rather than deriving these gifts from outward expectations being met, it seems to produce them from within. (9-10)

My detachment post fits that description, especially of #3. As C. S. Lewis wrote, such experiences are being "surprised by joy." I have come to realize that detachment is much more than merely letting go--it seems to be a filling of God's peace, love, and/or hope.

But this book goes on much farther to describe God's mercy as all-encompassing in what is "like a 'luminous web' intended to connect and interweave everything, in which all the knot ends of reality come together in a huge tapestry of divine love." (32)

"So when we think of mercy, we should be thinking first and foremost of a bond, an infallible link of love that holds the created and uncreated realms together. The mercy of God does not come and go, granted to some and refused to others. Why? Because it is unconditional--always there, underlying everything. It is literally the force that holds everything in existence, the gravitational field in which we live and move and have our being. Just like that little fish swimming desperately in search of water, we, too--in the words of Psalm 103--'swim in mercy as in an endless sea.' Mercy is God's innermost being turned outward to sustain the visible and created world in unbreakable love." (25)

The author goes on to cite Jacob Boehme, who "saw mercy as 'the holy element': the root enerby out of which all else in the visible universe is made. The Mercy is 'holy substantiality'--the innermost essence of being itself. It is that 'river of God,' running like the sap through the tree of live." (30)

Oh, to know all this--to realize this is what the mystics of all religions have been trying to tell us.
Just as Thomas Keating, proponent of Centering Prayer, says:

"The notion that God is absent is the fundamental illusion of the human condition." (41)

Isaiah 50:4

This morning I got an email from my friend MB that I should read Isaiah 50:4-9a, as she'd thought of me when she'd read this lectionary reading. THEN before our lectio group started, she read it to me and asked me to read it aloud, too. Later today, she emailed me again and only wrote, "Read Isaiah 50:4 again."

50:4 The Lord GOD has given me the tongue of a teacher, that I may know how to sustain the weary with a word. Morning by morning he wakens-- wakens my ear to listen as those who are taught.

MB warmed my heart by connecting me to this verse. She sees me as a teacher and perhaps one who encourages others. I am glad; that is whom I would like to be.

But I think I need to be praying that I will awaken to listen each morning and be taught! I keep getting the message that I need to be more attentive. . . .

Happiness

“We are on this earth to be happy. God is happiness, because God is absolute security. If you have discovered God in yourself, if you feel loved by God, sustained by God, carried along by God like a wave is carried along by the ocean—that is the ultimate accomplishment. And you will find God through love through gratitude and gratitude through happiness. God is that non-dependent happiness that subsists through betrayal, trials and failure.”

~~Arnaud Desjardins

The Jump into Life, p. 159

Sad, but true

Thanks again to Ellie, this time at Child of Illusion.

Deep Listening in a Group

I facilitate a book study called The Wisdom Class every Tuesday at All Saints Episcopal Church. Last week a member brought information about the listening practices of Quakers. He suggested that we wait 10-15 seconds between speakers. I was in a position where I could watch the second hand on the wall clock creep slowly along and realized how long a time period those seconds seemed. I'm not sure that we all waited that long between talking, but there was a definite difference in the way we were listening to each other during the two-hour meeting.

I reflected on the depth of listening during the past week, and was surprised to find a relevant meditation from Henri Nouwen this morning in my email box:

Listening as Spiritual Hospitality by Henri Nouwen

To listen is very hard, because it asks of us so much interior stability that we no longer need to prove ourselves by speeches, arguments, statements, or declarations. True listeners no longer have an inner need to make their presence known. They are free to receive, to welcome, to accept.

Listening is much more than allowing another to talk while waiting for a chance to respond. Listening is paying full attention to others and welcoming them into our very beings. The beauty of listening is that, those who are listened to start feeling accepted, start taking their words more seriously and discovering their own true selves. Listening is a form of spiritual hospitality by which you invite strangers to become friends, to get to know their inner selves more fully, and even to dare to be silent with you.

From the free daily message found at the Henri Nouwen webpage. Subscribe.

This also brings to mind the attentiveness needed in listening as displayed in Meister Eckhart's story of the burro-- Love Offers Freedom. Listening opens a space of freedom and acceptance.

Today we met again as The Wisdom Class and reflected upon last week's process. We agreed to try again to listen deeply to each other and agreed upon these guidelines:

1. What is said stays here.

2. Listen to what each person has to say:

Be open, sensitive, and tender to others.

3. Do not interrupt another speaker

4. Do not speak too often or too long;

allow silence between speakers.

5. Keep 10-15 seconds of silence between speakers.

6. Try to be aware that our desire to be present to each other is also our desire to be present to the Holy One.

It's going to take lots of practice!

Now

Do not be daunted by the enormity of the world's grief. Do justly, now. Love mercy, now. Walk humbly, now. You are not obligated to complete the work, but neither are you free to abandon it.

-- The Talmud

Thank you to Ellie at Does Not Wisdom Call?

This Day

No one knew the name of this day;
Born quietly from deepest night,
It hid its face in light,
Demanded nothing for itself,
Opened out to offer each of us
A field of brightness that traveled ahead,
Providing in time, ground to hold our footsteps
And the light of thought to show the way.

The mind of the day draws no attention;
It dwells within the silence with elegance
To create a space for all our words,
Drawing us to listen inward and outward.

We seldom notice how each day is a holy place
Where the eucharist of the ordinary happens,
Transforming our broken fragments
Into an eternal continuity that keeps us.

Somewhere in us a dignity presides
That is more gracious than the smallness
That fuels us with fear and force,
A dignity that trusts the form a day takes.

So a the end of this day, we give thanks
For being betrothed to the unknown
And for the secret work
Through which the mind of the day
And wisdom of the soul become one.

~ John O'Donohue ~

(To Bless the Space Between Us)

Shalom

"If there is to be shalom, it will not be just for isolated, insulated individuals; it is rather, security and prosperity granted to a whole community--young and old, rich and poor, powerful and dependent. Always we are all in it together. Together we stand before God's blessing and together we receive the gift of life, if we receive it at all. Shalom comes only to the inclusive, embracing community that excludes none."

Walter Brueggemann. Peace. St. Louis: Chalice Press, 2001. 15.

Thank you to PS at Purpletologically Speaking for this Brueggemann quote that is near the top of her webpage.

Book Review: "Christianity for the Rest of Us"

Christianity for the Rest of Us: How the Neighborhood Church Is Transforming the Faith by Diana Butler Bass is the book that is being studied in small groups for Lent at my church. It was one of those books that I bought months ago, but never had managed to read; thus, having a study about it helped me to read it. (Being a bookaholic, I LOVE TO buy books and have too many around that I haven't read YET.)

Diana Butler Bass conducted a three-year study of 50 mainline Protestant churches in the United States that were vibrant and growing churches. She found that these flourishing mainline churches were promoting and mentoring members to a faith that deepens their trust in God's abundant love and strengthens their capacity to love others. These churches are not trying to "make members; rather they are trying to make pilgrims" (73).

She found that "mainline churches decline when they neglect scripture and prayer, discernment and hospitality, contemplation and justice" (45).

Most of the churches Bass visited had had periods of decline and had changed in the last decade (243). "In many cases, change was made inevitable by numerical decline, financial crisis, or neighborhood transition. Spiritual anxiety gripped the community, pushing the congregation to realize that it needed to be different. Whether threatened by spiritual boredom or facing church closure, each congregation has asked two questions that sparked deep change: Who are we? What is God calling us to do? They discovered a renewed sense of identity and a clear purpose in serving the world. They experienced a change of heart that transformed their communal understanding of who God had made them to be" (243).

The book is divided into three parts:
1. What Happened to the Neighborhood Church?
2. Ten Signposts of Renewal
3. From Tourists to Pilgrims

The second section is the longest part with ten chapters devoted to practices or signposts to point "Christians in the right direction, toward the wisdom of God, toward love, toward home" (74). These are Hospitality, Discernment, Healing, Contemplation, Testimony, Diversity, Justice, Worship, Reflection, and Beauty. There are questions to help groups study each chapter at the end of the book.

"From the earliest days of the Christian faith, Jesus' followers, known as people of the Way, were recognized by what they did--practicing hospitality and forgiveness. Too often, contemporary Christianity seems to a religion about belief, a kind of spiritual club that can be joined by agreeing to a statement of faith.

"But emerging Christianity is not about pure doctrine or agreeing with a set of philosophical presuppositions. The kind of Christianity enacted in the congregations where I traveled is more like a recovery group: 'Act as if. . . ' If you act like a Christian by joining in its practices, by following its tracings, you may well become one. Being a Christian is not a one-moment miracle of salvation. It take practice. It is a process of faith and a continuing conversion. And it can be a long walk" (74-75).

This book gave me a lot of hope for the churches in the USA. Studies keep coming out that they are declining, that only the mega-evangelical churches are "succeeding," but this book gives concrete examples of growing and VITAL churches that are communities committing to grow in faith together. I think they take seriously Micah 6:8:

And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly, and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.

Daylight Saving Time

Thanks to Hoss at Old Horsetail Snake, who was found through Miss Cellania. Lots of laughs at these places!

Let God Love You

Be silent.
Be still.
Alone.
Empty
Before your God.
Say nothing.
Ask nothing.
Be silent.
Be still.
Let your God look upon you.
That is all.
God knows.
God understands.
God loves you
With an enormous love,
And only wants
To look upon you
With that love.
Quiet.
Still.
Be.

Let your God—
Love you.

~~Edwina Gately

Thank you.

Very sweetly, Easter A. passed on this award to me.


I nominate everyone on my links list, because each of you make my world a better place to be. Thank you.

Pray Every Day!

The world now has the means to end extreme poverty, we pray we will have the will

We ask that every house of worship in every country pledge to say this prayer aloud at every worship service - until the millennium goals are met.

"The world now has the means to end extreme poverty, we pray we will have the will"

Countingprayers.org will count each prayer, and update the totals on the world wide web daily. Evidence that you are not alone, and that a manifested will is building that will not be denied.

Q. How many prayers will it take until the Millennium Goals are Met?

A. Let's get started and find out.

Q. How long will it take until the first million prayers are tallied?

A. It would take 200 congregations about ten weeks.

Q. How long until the number of prayers exceed the population of your country?

A. Surprisingly fast.

Q. How long will it take until a billion prayers are offered?

A. It would take about 50,000 congregations less than a year.

Q. What might our elected officials think when they witness our will manifest?

A. That there is nothing that concerns their base more than bearing witness to the end of extreme poverty.

Q. Is keeping the millennium promise a political issue?

A. No. It's a moral issue.

Not only houses of worship can be counted, any individual may, also, make a prayer pledge.

Episcopalians for Global Reconciliation

The MDGs are nothing new. Our scriptural story is full of accounts of God's people doing these things and of God calling us to do them, too. Check out "The MDGs - Straight from Scripture" for plenty of examples. Also, EGR diocesan contact Eleanor Braun (Virginia) has put together this extensive list of scripture passages with peace and justice themes.

LIVE!

I would love to live

Like a river flows,

Carried by the surprise

Of its own unfolding.

~ John O'Donohue~

Friday Five: Signs of Hope, Signs of Spring

Sally writes for the Friday Five of RevGals

It has been a difficult week here in Dowham Market, and yet in the sadness there have been signs of real hope, young people, often criticised have shown us how caring and amazing they are. It has also been a strange week; it snowed for almost the first time this winter, and yet many of the spring bulbs are blooming, and the trees are blossoming!

I believe that if we look carefully we can see signs of hope all around us.... as for signs of spring... well you tell me....

Bluebells in my garden, before the snow!

What have you seen/ heard this week that was a :

1. Sign of hope?

Psalm 130 in our lectio group this week, especially

130:5 I wait for the LORD, my soul waits, and in his word I hope;

130:6 my soul waits for the Lord more than those who watch for the morning, more than those who watch for the morning.

The sharing about the scripture were very hopeful. I felt like I was called to be waiting for God in expectation just as the father of the prodigal son waited in anticipation for his son's return.

2. An unexpected word of light in a dark place?

If you look at my post Detachment, you'll see how I experienced Light in what usually would be a very dark place in my own life.

3. A sign of spring?

The pink flowers pictured above are called by my friends in TX "buttercups" but I always think, "But they're PINK!" Where I grew up buttercups were yellow! Anyway, these pink poppies are the first Texas wildflowers I've seen--in fact, today in someone's yard!


4. Challenging/ surprising?

What is challenging that I have to plan a lesson on ten chapters of a book for Sunday, which seems impossible, so maybe I'll do half of those or a smattering. . .

5. Share a hope for the coming week/month/year....

I hope that I will choose HEALTH more consistently, especially in food and exercise.

Bonus play... a piece of music/ poem guaranteed to cheer you?

For the love of a tree, she went out on a limb.
For the love of the sea, she rocked the boat
For the love of the earth, she dug deeper.
For the love of community, she mended fences.
For the love of the stars, she let her light shine.
For the love of spirit, she nurtured her soul.
For the love of a good time, she sowed seeds of happiness.
For the love of the Goddess, she drew down the moon.
For the love of a good meal, she gave thanks.
For the love of family, she reconciled differences.
For the love of creativity, she entertained new possibilities.
For the love of her enemies, she suspended judgment.
For the love of herself, she acknowledged her worth.

And the world was richer for her…..

~ Charlotte Tall Mountain

Victims of War

At the beginning of the 20th century, 90% of war victims were soldiers and 10% civilians. In the wars of the last decade, 90% of the victims were civilians mostly women and children.’

Source: Newsletter Gender and Armed Conflict, 2007

Little Ego

Yesterday my friend JS talked about her little ego taking over. . . I hadn't heard the false self or shadow called that before, and then today I get Eknath Easwaran's reading, and he mentions just that! Everything that attracts me these days is about detachment, which is acceptance, the present moment--looking to God and not ME!

God expects but one thing of you, and that is that you should come out of yourself insofar as you are a created being and let God be God in you.
– Meister Eckhart

In those moments when we forget ourselves – not thinking, “Am I happy?” but completely oblivious to our little ego – we spend a brief but beautiful holiday in heaven. The joy we experience in these moments of self-forgetting is our true nature, our native state. To regain it, we have simply to empty ourselves of what hides this joy: that is, to stop dwelling on ourselves. To the extent that we are not full of ourselves, God can fill us. “If you go out of yourself,” says Johannes Tauler, “without doubt he shall go in, and there will be much or little of his entering in according to how much or little you go out.”

~~Eknath Easwaran

The Thought for the Day is today's entry from Eknath Easwaran's Words to Live By. (Copyright 1999 and 2005 by The Blue Mountain Center of Meditation.)

Select the Thought for the Day for any day of the year.

Weeping God

Jesus began to weep. So the Jews said, "See how he loved him!" But some of the said, "Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man kept this man from dying?" (John 11:35-37)

By Tom Ehrich

In their relentless push for power, wealth and control, religious establishments inevitably portray God as authoritarian: harsh judge, vengeful parent, rampaging monarch, elitist tribal chieftain, filled with the very disdain and anger that they themselves feel toward other people.

Having portrayed such a God and claimed their place as this God's only righteous allies, they stop at nothing to demonize their opponents, to punish nonconformists, to seize power, and to assert that "faith" means obeying their commands. It is tragic, and it is the cause of untold human suffering.

Unfortunately, this drive for power had a strong role in shaping the Bible. Authors of various books started with a desired goal -- Israel deserves to rule, Gentiles are evil, kings are good, kings are bad, Christians deserve to rule, Jews are to blame, women belong, women are evil -- and tells its story in a way that leads inexorably to that end.

Attempts! to portray the Bible as a single, seamless whole are absurd. The triumphalism of Exodus has nothing in common with the rage of Amos. The Jesus of Mark bears little resemblance to the Jesus of John. The apostolic mission of Paul and apocalyptic fancy of Revelation are quite different.

Every now and then, a glimpse of the genuine article pokes through. The patient God of Abraham negotiates with Moses. The passion of God shines forth in the prophets and psalms. The Jesus who actually was can be seen in his sayings and teachings.

I believe such a glimpse of the actual Jesus comes in John 11.35, "Jesus wept." This is perhaps the most authentic image of God. Read the pain that God felt when Adam and Eve hid. Read the remorse of God after the flood. Read the suffering that God endured in events leading up to the exodus, in the wilderness wandering, in the dalliance of David, in betrayal by evil kings, in the exile. This isn't a dispassionate monarch; this is a parent yearning to see the prodigal child's return.

Why did Jesus weep? In a sense, it doesn't matter whether he wept in sadness at Lazarus' dying, or in sharing the grief of two sisters, or in remorse for having caused their grief, or in frustration that his messianic duty required such machinations as deliberately arriving too late.

The point is, he wept. He suffered with the suffering. He revealed God as one who cares deeply enough to be wounded by humankind's travail.

Our hope, you see, doesn't lie in our finally controlling the world, or in our finally pleasing God. Our hope always lies in God's passion.

This is from On the Journey e-mail subscription for writings of Tom Ehrich. He charges an annual fee, but has a 14-day free trial.

Fasting

Inherent in a fast is a feast. When we fast from food, we feast on prayer and God’s bountiful love. When we fast from divisive patterns of relating with others, we feast on the amazing awareness that each face we see is the face of Christ. When we fast from building social, economic, and political walls, we feast on our universal oneness with the One.

- Marilyn Brown Oden
Wilderness Wandering

From "Verse and Voice," a daily e-mail reading from Sojo.net. To subscribe, go here.

We awaken in Christ's body

Read this aloud!

We awaken in Christ's body
as Christ awakens our bodies,
and my poor hand is Christ, He enters
my foot, and is infinitely me.

I move my hand, and wonderfully
my hand becomes Christ, becomes all of Him
(for God is indivisibly
whole, seamless in His Godhood).

I move my foot, and at once
He appears like a flash of lightning.
Do my words seem blasphemous? -- Then
open your heart to Him

and let yourself receive the one
who is opening to you so deeply.
For if we genuinely love Him,
we wake up inside Christ's body

where all our body, all over,
every most hidden part of it,
is realized in joy as Him,
and He makes us, utterly, real,

and everything that is hurt, everything
that seemed to us dark, harsh, shameful,
maimed, ugly, irreparably
damaged, is in Him transformed

and recognized as whole, as lovely,
and radiant in His light
he awakens as the Beloved
in every last part of our body.

~~St. Symeon the New Theologian

McCain and Bush

From my daughter and u-tube:

Nonattachment

The Desert Mothers and Fathers called the quality of paying attention in the moment "nonattachment." Their thoughts go quite well with the my post on "Detachment."

When Abba Macarius was in Egypt, he found a man with a mule stealing his belongings. Then, as though he were a stranger, he helped the robber to load the animal, and peacefully sent him off, saying: "We have brought nothing into the world, and we cannot take anything with us. The Lord has given, and as he has wished, so it has happened. Blessed be the Lord in all things."

Let go and realize everything is from God and is not mine.

From Listen to the Desert: Secrets of Spiritual Maturity from the Desert Fathers and Mothers by Gregory Mayers:

"Nonattachment is the attitude that comes from the acceptance of the fact that everything about my life and in my life comes and goes in its own time regardless of my preferences or aversions." (35)

"Trying to keep relationships, pleasant experiences, a sense of security, youth, or anything else from their natural rhythms is both disruptive and detrimental to ourselves and to others. Anything that we hold onto will throw us off balance and eventually kill us if we persist in possessing it." (35)

"Nonattachment is far more subtle and profound than a refined disdain for or emotional indifference to events and people. It doesn't mean that we change our likes into dislikes and our dislikes into likes. It doesn't even have anything to do with wanting and not wanting. It has everything to do with 'I' want and 'I' don't want. It is letting go of the 'I' in the wanting and not wanting. In the words of Saint Thomas More, it means not taking seriously 'this bothersome thing I call myself.' (35-36)

"'This bothersome thing I call myself' finds protection behind three basic emotions: fear, shame, and anger." (37)

"The source of our fear, shame, and anger is an insecurity about ourselves. When we see through and let go of fear, shame, and anger, what we enter then is not tranquility, but our insecurity, letting go of the way we think we should be. This is nonattachment--letting go of the self, the self shrunk to the size of our most painful emotions." (38)

"Attention leads to a searing and uncommon honesty about ourselves. We will not allow ourselves to be fooled. We no longer play the mind games that hid our true, real, or authentic identity. " (40)

"The 'purpose' of contemplation is to lose our self: 'He who saves his life loses it, while he who loses his life for my sake discovers who he really is.'" (41) --see Matthew 16:25--

The lifestyle of prayer and commitment to sitting in silence are necessary for this growth. I need this training to look at God and not myself.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Gartenfische has written beautifully about this here.

Detachment

I remember first hearing about “detachment” when I attended Al-Anon meetings in the 1990’s. At that time a friend gave me a meditation book for all the days of a year entitled Courage to Change. Looking at it tonight, I see that there are 14 days devoted to the subject of “detachment.” I went looking for the story I remember well of a woman displaying detachment by leaving her drunken spouse passed out on the floor and covering him with a blanket, which always puzzled me. That’s day’s reminder says:

"With my Higher Power’s help, I will keep a loving blanket of detachment with me. I will cover my loved ones with it, whether or not they struggle with a disease, keeping in mind that when I am dealing with other human beings, I am dealing with children of God." (22)

I never realized until today that that reminder describes the detachment I felt on Sunday. Meeting with my spiritual director today helped me to see that God gifted me with peace, which I now recognize as detachment, after a mini-crisis at home before church.

My husband did something that irritated me so much that I slammed the door when I went to get the morning paper! (I’m very good at passive aggression.) What usually would send me into anger and tears brought me to prayer instead. By the time I was in the church service, I found that I was praying for our hearts to be opened to each other and to God. When we kneeled side-by-side to receive the Eucharist, I found myself offering us to the Holy One. All morning I was bathed in God’s peace, with no resentment, my usual reaction, felt at all.

I was not intentionally asking for detachment or for forgiveness; I found myself giving myself to the Lord—and then offering us both. This did not feel like my will, but an expansion of Love opening up. The gift was revealed more fully today when I talked with Ani, my spiritual director. Until now, I never realized that detachment was so loving.

And this gift is pretty well described in Courage to Change:

"The most loving form of detachment I have found has been forgiveness. Instead of thinking of it as an eraser to wipe another’s slate clean or a gavel that I pound to pronounce someone ‘not guilty,’ I think of forgiveness as a scissors. I use it to cut the strings of resentment that bind me to a problem or a past hurt.

"When I am consumed with negativity over another person’s behavior, I have lost my focus. I needn’t tolerate what I consider unacceptable, but wallowing in negativity will not alter the situation. If there is action to take, I am free to take it. Where I am powerless to change the situation, I will turn it over to my Higher Power. By truly letting go, I detach and forgive.

"When my thoughts are full of bitterness, fear, self-pity, and dreams of revenge, there is little room for love or for the quiet voice of guidance within me. I am willing to love myself enough to admit that resentments hold me back, and then I can let them go." (289)

All the years of letting go and praying Bless ______, change me must have opened the way for God to bring me to this place of Love. Not me, but YOU. Thank you.

Such Hope and Love! It reminds me of my long-ago therapist telling me, "Trust the process." Trust the Lord. Trust Love.

Prayer for Desert Times

The journeys of our lives are never fully charted.
There come, sometimes, to each of us, deserts to cross,
Barren stretches
Where the green edge on the horizon may be our destination,
Or an oasis on our way,
Or a mirage that beckons and will leave us lost.
When fear grips the heart, or despair bows the head,
May be we bend as heart and head lead us down
To touch the ground beneath our feet,
And scoop some sand into our hands,
And receive what the sand would teach us:
It holds the warmth of the sun
When the sun has left our sight,
As it holds the cool of the night when the stars have faded.
And hidden among its grains are tiny seeds, at rest and waiting.
Dormant, yet undefeated. Desert flowers.
They endure.
Moistened by our tears,
And by the rain that comes to end even the longest drought,
They send down roots, and they bloom.

Oh, may we believe in those seeds,
And the seeds within us.
May we remember in our dry seasons
That we, too, are desert flowers.

Amen.

- Margaret
Keip

E for Excellent

Both Episcopollyanna and Gartenfische awarded me with a Blogger Excellence award last (!!) month. Thank you to both of you dear bloggers. Blogging has shown me a community that I never knew existed and which I am blessed to be connected with. Thank you.

The rules: By accepting this Excellent Blog Award, you have to award it to 10 more people whose blogs you find Excellent Award worthy. You can give it to as many people as you want but please award at least 10. Thank you out there for having such great blogs and being such great friends! You deserve this! Feel free to award people who have already been awarded…

An Orientation of Heart

Faith in Community

Meaning and Authenticity

Seeking Authentic Voice

Views from the Road

AND THE MANY OTHERS WHO HAVE ALREADY RECEIVED THE REWARD (or that I have forgotten).

Letter Writing

When I looked up "letter writing" on google, I came up with lots of posts and articles about the "Lost Art of Letter Writing." Many people lament, while others don't and praise the advent of email and computers (as I write on a computer. . . .).

Of course, I've reached a point in my life that I'd rather get an email than no communication at all, and email is the primary mode of written expression from my children, plus cell phone calling.

I grew up moving around to different military bases, and so letters were the main way to keep in touch back in the 1950's-1970's. Long distance telephoning was too expensive and there were no computers. I remember seeing my father sitting at the kitchen table each week, typing, on an old manual typewriter, a letter to his mother in Arkansas. I saw my mother writing letters to her parents and sister. And each time I moved, I kept in touch with friends through letters, which is a major reason why NKE and I are still such good friends, especially when one remembers that we only lived near each other once --when we were in Japan on a Naval Base.

I have an elderly cousin who lives in Alberta, Canada who writes lengthy letters--often over ten pages long. She writes a long letter enclosed in each book she gives my children and me each Christmas. I used to write letters like that, especially to NKE, but am more likely to write on notecards these days.

I am very touched when I receive a handwritten letter or note. I like to write them to people myself. When I see someone's handwriting, I can guess who the author is before I see a name. Some would say that handwriting indicates personality traits, but now few people spend much time handwriting at all.

When I cleaned out my parents' house after my father's death in 2002, I found a notebook full of letters that my mother sent to her parents while she served as a U.S. Marine in Hawaii during WWII. It is wonderful to have such a record of her in her own handwriting.

I view this as a thoughtful and heartfelt way to communicate, but others don't see it this way. (And I know time gets in the way.) I am thinking that I have a lost era's viewpoint about letters that modern people do not value, plus I may be succumbing to the ease and speed myself.

March 1

March 1 is the 60th day of the year (61st in leap years). There are 305 days remaining until the end of the year.

In seven days my second child AE will have a birthday. And in eight days we will have the time change where we'll feel like we "lose" an hour, with the time "springing" forward.

In TX, we don't really worry about the old saying that if March comes in like a lion, it will go out like a lamb, because our milder weather is probably mostly "lamb-like" throughout the month of March. This may be our spring, but also may be the beginning of our long, hot summer.

"Seeds Shed Unto the Wind"
Lisa Meyer Mandala

Prayer is an Egg

Don't do daily prayers like a bird
pecking, moving its head
up and down. Prayer is an egg.

Hatch out the total helplessness inside.

~~Rumi

Source: translated by Coleman Barks

Rumi quote is from Inward/Outward. Subscribe here.

Jesus Prayer

Κύριε Ἰησοῦ Χριστέ, ἐλέησόν με.
Kyrie Jesu Christe, eleison me.
Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me.

During the Shalem time, another "Shalemite" told me how he prays the Jesus Prayer in Greek every morning and has done so for the past five years. He eventually told me that it resounds in him during his daily life, kind of like a prayer wheel. That is when it has become the Prayer of the Heart.

I brought my prayer rope with me to the Shalem gathering, in hopes that I would pray the Jesus Prayer, which still comes to me in English. TB told that he found that he could pay more attention to the Greek words than the English, so I thought I would try that. Back at home, I am trying to do this sporadically.

Albert S. Rossi at St. Vladimir's Orthodox Theological Seminary's site of Saying the Jesus Prayer writes this:

"We don't say the Jesus Prayer, or enter wordless contemplation, to get "some benefit." We don't pray to reduce our stress, or strengthen our immune system, or lose weight, or add years to our life. On the contrary, we enter prayer to follow Christ, to become open to Him."

God brings about our prayer. My former priest and spiritual director always said that the Holy Spirit prompts the Jesus Prayer (and prayer of any kind)--not for "benefits" but for Love. Guess that's why I call my blog "Yearning for God."

Love offers Freedom

Meister Eckhart (trans. Daniel Ladinsky) about unexpected love:

"All day long a little burro labors, sometimes with heavy loads on her back and sometimes just with worries about things that bother only burros. And worries, as we know, can be more exhausting than physical labor. Once in a while a kind monk comes to her stable and brings a pear, but more than that, he looks into the burro's eyes and touches her ears and for a few seconds the burro is free and even seems to laugh, because love does that: Love offers freedom."

More about Prayer

When I wrote yesterday about prayer, using Ruth Burrows' quotes, I felt like I could not add anything else; it was too long already. So I am now going to put the rest of her words that follow St. John of the Cross' loosely translated words: "God is always at work and God's work is God," which you can see at Prayer is what God does.

"Such must be our certain faith. Given this understanding and the resolution to stand by it, there can be no problems about prayer, nor can there be any illusions. Anxieties, problems, doubts about our prayer can only arise when we are viewing prayer essentially as what we do for God; and so, of course, what we do becomes very important to us and we are anxious to get it right. Firmly grasping that this is not the case, but that prayer is always rather what God does for us, in us, through us and that our part is simply to be there, as simply and humbly as a child, for Him to act, we are always at peace, never discouraged. We might think that we fail all the time, that we 'can't pray', or that our hour of prayer seems, perhaps, a wash-out from start to finish. But we can smile at ourselves and tell ourselves it doesn't matter: the hour has been full of God because we have wanted to give God that time and receive from Him there all that He has to give." (178-179)

Burrows, Ruth. Essence of Prayer. Mahwah, NJ: Hiddenspring. 2006.

The Story of STUFF

From its extraction through sale, use and disposal, all the stuff in our lives affects communities at home and abroad, yet most of this is hidden from view. The Story of Stuff is a 20-minute, fast-paced, fact-filled look at the underside of our production and consumption patterns. The Story of Stuff exposes the connections between a huge number of environmental and social issues, and calls us together to create a more sustainable and just world. It'll teach you something, it'll make you laugh, and it just may change the way you look at all the stuff in your life forever.

Take the TIME--20 minutes--to look at this video!

Emotions





Cartoon by Dave Walker. Find more cartoons you can freely re-use on your blog at We Blog Cartoons.

Think of all the bottles to cast aside so that the wind of Grace can more easily blow us across the sea of life to the One, as described in The Spiritual Life.