Blessing the Neighborhood

 I tucked our palms from Passion Sunday into the birch basket on the front door. The forsythia branches in the basket signal spring and new growth. I like to think the palm branches, which scripture tells us were spread on the road as Jesus entered Jerusalem, wave blessings into the neighborhood. 

                            This blessing 
                            is making 
                            its steady way up 
                            the way 
                            toward you.
                                        Jan Richardson
                                        from Circle of Grace

This blessing is for you if you are Christian and moving through Holy Week towards Easter. Or if you are Jewish and in the midst of Passover. Or if you are Muslim or Hindu or Buddhist.

And yes, it is a blessing if you know yourself as an unbeliever or one who is unsure of your beliefs. Blessings know no boundaries, and it is good to remember that during these days of pageant and ritual. 

Here's what is most important to remember:

    An American rabbi was once asked what he thought of the
    words attributed to Jesus in St John's Gospel, "I am the way,
    and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except
    through me" (John 14:6). The rabbi replied, "Oh, I agree with
    these words." To which the surprised questioner asked further,
    "But how can you as a rabbi believe that Jesus is the way, the 
    truth, and the life?" "Because," answered the rabbi, "I believe that
    Jesus' way is the way of love, that Jesus' truth is the truth of
    love, and that Jesus' life is the life of love. No one comes to the
    Father but through love."
                                p. 119 A New Harmony, The Spirit, The Earth
                                and the Human Soul
                                John Philip Newell

The only way to God is through love. The only way to live, whatever your faith or unfaith, is through love. 

And that's the blessing the palms are proclaiming.

                            This blessing
                            looms in the throats
                            of women,
                            brings from the hearts
                            of men,
                            tumbles out of the mouths
                            of children.

                                        Jan Richardson

An Invitation
What happens when you extend a blessing? I would love to know. 

Spring and Our Own Growth

 A friend wrote that the life of faith is linear because "life with God moves always forward." Yes, but more and more the movement of my life with God feels circular, cyclical. 

Saturday we drove into the country on unfamiliar roads. Maybe we had been on some of them before, but not at the same time of earth's unfolding. The fields had an almost scrubbed clean look, steady and quiet, but I imagined the soil actively warming itself, preparing to receive the seeds of new growth. 

I saw trees at their barest, skeletal branches open to the sun, ready to welcome their own greening. They've done this before, but still it feels new. Against the unadorned landscape was the occasional hard to miss surprise of willow trees, forsythia yellow in color, leading the way into the exuberance of spring. Don't you love the reminder that not everything happens at the same time?

I saw an eagle's nest and caught a glimpse of a white head, like a ping pong ball, poking out from the nest. Eagles return to the same nest year after year. Some years their young survive, but not always. I think about how often I see eagles, even in my own urban neighborhood, but each sighting thrills me. In ponds and small lakes, wherever there was open water, I saw swans swimming, a fairy tale ballet with spring as the encore. 

We've been here, the tip of spring, but it feels stunning, astonishing every year. And we are part of that miracle, for we have moved forward from where we were a year ago to where we are now. We are not the same. Perhaps we look basically the same, but we know underneath the surface we have changed. 

We may have suffered losses. We may have worried and wondered and waited. We may have raged, but also been resilient. Perhaps even as we have recited litanies of what we miss, we may have found spaciousness and even focus for our energy, our gifts. This has been a time like no other, but even in that otherness, we may have experienced the movement of God and glimpses of who we were created to be. 

At one of our stops, an antique shop, I bought a bundle of twisty, curly pussywillows, another one of those signs of spring I count on. Normally, I buy them in the grocery store's flower section, and they are quite domestic looking, manageable and straight. This bunch of pussywillows, however, looks wild and unexpected. I can almost hear them whispering, "Spring will return, as it does every year, but maybe it will feel different, be different. Maybe you are different."

Here's what I think about moving forward in my life with God. Each single step feels like I am moving on a linear path, but when I look back after taking many steps, I see I am on a curve. The curve doesn't lead me back to where I have been, but rather carries me through the cycles of life, the cycles of the universe and invites me to find new growth. 

An Invitation
Spring is just beginning here in Minnesota. You may be in a different stage of spring. What are you noticing this spring? I would love to know. 

NOTE: It has been a heavy week. I invite you to pause and lift these names:        Soon Chung Park, 74;
                    Suncha Kim, 69;
                    Yong Ae Tue, 63;
                    Hyun Jung Grant, 51;
                    Xiaojie Tan, 49;
                    Delaina Yaun, 33;
                    Daoyou Feng, 44
                    Paul Andre Michels, 54.

One More Note: We celebrate our son Geof's 42nd birthday today. He is a blessing in our life. 

The Pandemic and Walking A Labyrinth

The labyrinth is an ancient meditation tool, a path to prayer, a path of prayer. Meditation in motion. A container for reflection and an intentional way to connect with God, the Holy, the Sacred.

Living during this pandemic reminds me of walking a labyrinth.

When I stand at the threshold of a labyrinth, I sometimes feel anxious, for I have no idea what my experience might be, and that is exactly how I felt a year ago when life changed so dramatically. The path ahead was an unknown, and all I could do as I tried to look ahead was take a deep breath and ask for guidance. 

Tentatively, I took those beginning steps, asking what was required of me. How am I to live during this time? The walk towards the center of the labyrinth is a time to release. And isn't that what we were asked to do? We put on our masks and released our normal ways of living and moving in the world, experiencing losses along the way.

Along the way, we adapted, finding ways to manage the challenges. Zoom meetings with friends and family. Online church services. Ordering groceries online or shopping at times that weren't busy. Our day to day rhythms changed, and we relaxed into a slower pace. 

And yet, daily we yearned for this time to end. 

On an actual labyrinth, there is the moment when the center seems close. That was where we wanted to be. Home and safety; a feeling that we made it. But the labyrinth plays a trick on us: the curving path swings us away from the center and we go round and round yet again. 

Life during the pandemic turned out to be much longer than imagined.

And reaching the center was not what we wanted it to be. We thought once we arrived in the center, the pandemic would be over, and we could return to our normal ways of living. No such luck.

Being in the center may have felt like nothing was happening, but on good days we felt this was a time to receive --greater clarity about what is important to us; an awareness of our own resilience and who we are; gratitude for our health and the love and support of our dear ones; and an appreciation for stillness and solitude. Perhaps we accessed our contemplative side and noticed the movement of God in our lives. 

Now that more and more of us have been vaccinated, we are ready to resume movement and the path away from the center is a time to return. That is a long path, too, however, and no less important than the walk to the center. This path is a time to ask ourselves new questions.

    How have I changed since I first stood on the threshold?

    What do I bring with me from the hibernation time in the center? 

    What has changed in my life and what are my intentions for life after the pandemic? 

    What have I learned? What choices have I made that supported 
    who I was created to be? 

Eventually, we will cross the threshold and leave this particular labyrinth, this specific time of our lives, but the lessons, the learnings can remain with us and prepare us for the next labyrinth in our life.

A Prayer from Henri J. M. Nouwen

        The choice for your way has to be made every moment of my
    life. I have to choose thoughts that are your thoughts, words
    that are your words, and actions that are your actions. There
    are no times places without choices. And I know how deeply
    I resist choosing you.
          Please, Lord, be with me at every moment and in every
    place. Give me the strength and the courage to live this
    season faithfully, so that, when Easter comes, I will be able
    to taste with joy the new life which you have prepare for me.
    Amen. 

An Invitation

What stage of the labyrinth are you on now? What are you learning? I would love to know. 

Book Recommendation: Caste by Isabel Wilkerson

I am not a white supremacist.

I suspect, however, as much as I don't want to be, I am a racist in some of my behaviors and attitudes. I am trying to become aware of those behaviors and attitudes. 

What is clear, especially after reading Caste, The Origins of Our Discontents by Isabel Wilkerson, is that I am a member of the dominant caste. And I am in the dominant caste because I am white. 

Normally, this is the kind of book in which I would underline line after line, paragraph after paragraph of relevant and well-written content, but in this case there would be little left unmarked. I marveled at the superb writing and agonized at the overwhelming examples of caste throughout the history of the United States. And I remain deeply saddened by the ways caste, mainly the division between the dominant and the subordinate castes, remains a firm reality today.

Here is one paragraph I did underline:

    What people look like, or, rather, the race they have been
    assigned or are perceived to belong to, is the visible cue
    to their caste. It is the historic flash card to the public
    of how they are to be treated, where they are expected
    to live, what kinds of positions they are expected to hold,
    whether they belong in this section of town or that seat
    in the boardroom, whether they should be expected to
    speak with authority on this or that subject, whether
    they will be administered pain relief in a hospital,
    whether their neighborhood is likely to adjoin a toxic
    waste site or to have contaminated water flowing from
    their taps, whether they are more or less likely to survive
    childbirth in the most advanced nation in the world,
    whether they may be shot by authorities with impunity. 
                                                    pp. 18-19

I am white and in the dominant caste, and if you are a Black American or perceived to be black, then you are in the subordinate caste. And being in the subordinate class means you are considered less than. You are considered not quite as human as I am. 

We have all been shaped by this rigid caste system.

Wilkerson compares the caste systems of the U.S. to both India and Nazi Germany. When Martin Luther King, Jr visited India in 1959 a principal of a high school introduced King to his students, saying, "Young people I would like to present to you a fellow untouchable from the United States of America." Wilkerson also documents how the Nazis studied the racial systems in America to plan their outcasting of the Jews.

As example after example is given of how African Americans are mistreated and abused mentally, physically, and spiritually, including the author herself, I find it hard to imagine how this long-standing system can be dismantled. I know that can't happen, however, unless we confront the truth about ourselves as white people, as the dominant caste--even those among us who are more aware and are working actively for racial and social justice. 

        Radical empathy, on the other hand, means putting in
        the work to educate oneself and to listen with a humble
        heart to understand another's experience from their 
        experience from their perspective, not as we imagine
        we would feel. Radical empathy is not about you and 
        what you think you would do in a situation you have
        never been in and perhaps never will. It is the kindred
        connection from a place of deep knowing that opens
        your spirit to the pain of another as they perceive it.
                                                p. 386

This week the trial of Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin accused of murdering George Floyd begins. What needs to be on trial is the racially disportionate treatment of Black Americans by the police--treatment that is caused by the caste system. 

Wilkerson's previous book, The Warmth of Other Suns, is brilliant as well, and I hope you will read that, too, but this one does more than enlarge your knowledge of history. Caste opens your heart.

An Invitation
What have you learned or experienced recently that has cracked open your awareness? I would love to know. 

 

 

Being Present Via Zoom

One afternoon this past week my writing group met. On Zoom, of course. Before the pandemic we gathered in my living room. We each had our self-assigned seats and after years of meeting, I know their beverage preferences. I provided some sort of treat, usually homemade, but sometimes bowls of popcorn or nuts. Before receiving each others' writing, we checked in about other our lives and our concerns about current events in the world. 

Later in the week I participated in another kind of Zoom meeting. This was a group of women from church who had agreed to share insights about the challenges and gifts of these pandemic months and how the Third Chapter, Spirituality As We Age committee could address our needs as elders during the pandemic. 

Oh, how I wished we could have gathered in my living room, instead of on a screen, greeting and hugging one another. I would have added chairs to enlarge the circle and offered something to eat and drink before we settled in to share our wisdom, our insights, our concerns, our losses, but also our joys. 

In addition, I met with clients this week on Zoom, and Bruce and I had a fun screen time conversation with good friends. 

In each of these cases, I missed welcoming them to our home, to being together in the same space, but I was also aware of our ability to adapt to what is required. I was grateful for the willingness to connect even when it doesn't feel quite the same. 

Being on ZOOM or FaceTime takes a different kind of energy than being together in person, and so I think carefully about when and how often I will use that energy. However, would I have preferred not being in communion with these loved ones because we couldn't meet in person? Absolutely not.

We were able to be present to each other, even though we were not physically in the same place. We felt the presence of God in each other's presence. 

                  any thing, any person, any situation 
                  is a word addressed to me by God.
                                 Brother David Steindl-Rast

Any situation. Even Zoom.

An Invitation
Where have you experienced the presence of God in a new way? I would love to know. 

Lenten Practice #1: Letting Go of Books

  For the second year in a row one of my Lenten practices is to let go of books. Last year I eliminated over 100 books from my garret bookshelves, which is where I keep my spirituality, theology, and writing books, and this year I have decided to accept the same challenge. 

Books are my comfort, which I wear like a shawl. They are my terra firma. When I am puzzled about something or facing a new challenge, or need a guide as I reflect and process, I turn to a book. Books are the threshold I cross and the return that welcomes me. 

Saying goodbye is no small task. 

Eliminating books from my library is my version of giving up sugar or caffeine during Lent--something that takes willpower and focus and persistence and self-control. But this practice is also a kind of love and a way to honor my growth as a spiritual being. 

Each day during Lent I browse one of my shelves for at least one title  I can take to a Little Free Library, where, I hope, just the right reader, spiritual seeker or writer will find it. I pull out possibilities and browse the pages. How likely is it that I will want to read this book again? Or if I have not read it, has its time passed? 

For example, I have many books on feminist theology, and I remember the days when I saturated myself in that content, hungry to fill that gap in my education and awareness. I read many of them, and I  am so grateful for writers, researchers, theologians who opened themselves --and then me--to that material. Will I read ones I have not yet read in the next years of my reading life? Probably not. Will I re-read any of them? Probably not. Ok, add them to the pile. 

Before adding a book to the pile, I notice what I have underlined or where I have made a note. For example, in Seeking God, The Way of St Benedict by Esther de Waal, my eyes land on text highlighted in pink with a star next to the passage:    

        Only after we give up the desire to be different and
        admit that we deserve no special attention is there space
        to encounter God, and to discover that although we are
        unique and that God calls us each by name, that is 
        completely compatible with the unspectacular, possibly
        the monotony, of life in the pace in which we find ourselves.
                                                                   p. 61

(An aside: I am an enneagram 4, and this passage really fits my 4 personality.)

I spend a bit more time with the book and even copy a couple passages into my journal, but still decide to add it to the "pass it on" pile. 

Sometimes when I have loved a certain book by an author, I have then collected and read everything written by that person. For example, Natalie Goldberg's Writing Down the Bones will remain in my library forever, even though I may never read it again, but while I enjoyed and benefited from other titles, such as The True Secret of Writing and The Great Spring, I am comfortable passing them on. 

I will keep Twyla Tharp's The Creative Habit, but will move on her more recent book, Keep It Moving, not because it wasn't worth reading, but it didn't speak to me in the same way. Plus, I found this book in a Little Free Library and it seems fitting to return it for someone else to find. I admit I wonder about the person who received this as a gift. The inscription in the front reads, "Christmas, 2019. For Kate, As you move forward, a book about moving forward. Much love, Bill and Julie." Did the book resonate with Kate?

I thank each book for its wisdom, for the insights and new learning it brought to me, and I thank the author for the effort it took to bring that book to fruition. I think about the reason I added that book to my library in the first place and what I learned; how it added to my spiritual and my writing life. 

This process becomes a kind of meditation. 

I notice books that seem especially meaningful for my life today, such as the rows of books on aging. I hold those who have been companions along the way. I give thanks. I rejoice. I note books that hold promise for me now. I marvel at the new books on my shelves written by young theologians, young people exploring their faith and their lives as spiritual beings, and I welcome their presence. I reflect on lessons learned and those still a work in process. 

My intention in this Lenten practice is not to empty my shelves. In fact, I have added new titles to my shelves, but not nearly as many as I have eliminated. Each of these titles will have their own time and then perhaps be passed on. Or not.

    1. Three Steps on the Ladder of Writing by Helene Cixous
    2.  16 Ways to Create Devotional Writing by David Sluka
    3.  Ron Carlson Writes a Story by Ron Carlson
    4.  An Interrupted Life by Etty Hillesum
    5.  A Rhythm of Prayer, edited by Sarah Bessey
    6.  Sacred Time, Embracing an Intentional Way of Life by Christine
        Valters Paintner.

Sorry, family, but you will more than likely have to pack and carry heavy boxes of books down the stairs, just as you lugged them upstairs for me when we moved here. I promise to continue this practice of deciding what to keep and what to release, not just during Lent, but as on ongoing process. However, books nurture and expand me, and in a paradoxical way they are part of my inner process, a bigger process of creating space in which I encounter God. 

An Invitation
Do you have a Lenten practice? I would love to know. 

   

A second part of the challenge both this year and last was to limit the number of books added to the shelves

Vote Your Conscience

 "Vote your conscience." That statement was made many times during the impeachment trial last week, and each time I heard it I hoped that would happen.

In my view, voting one's conscience in this case meant voting to convict the former president. To vote otherwise, I felt, would be to deny the truth. 

How can they sleep at night? How can they look themselves in the mirror? How can they face their children, grandchildren? 

What is the future they are creating?

The outcome of the vote on Saturday was not surprising, but even so the reality of it was and remains upsetting. For many of us the words repeated over and over leading up to January 6 and the ugly and frightening videos of that day will not disappear. How does one go on with business as usual now?

Don't they have a conscience? 

I am re-reading all of Louise Penny's wonderful mysteries, and I love them even more this second time around. Not only does the murder case in each book still intrigue me, but the characters offer so much wisdom about living compassionate and loving lives; lives, not always easy, but ones reaching towards integrity and authenticity. 

How amazed I was when I read this section in Glass Houses after checking my phone for the results of the vote. In a discussion about the archangels Michael and Lucifer, Ruth, one of the ongoing characters in the series, a poet and often viewed as crazy says,

    "Well, I start off praying that anyone who's pissed me off meets
    a horrible end, Then I pray for world peace, and then I pray for
    Lucifer."
    "Did you say Lucifer?" asked Myrna.
    "Who needs it more?"

And then Ruth talks about conscience.

     "Stupid, stupid angel...It's generally thought that a conscience
      is a good thing, but let me ask you this. How many terrible
      things are done in the name of conscience? It's a great excuse
      for appalling acts?... A conscience is not necessarily a good
      thing. How many gays are beaten, how many abortion clinics
      bombed, how many blacks lynched, how many Jews 
      murdered, by people just following their conscience?

Myrna, a black woman, and former psychotherapist who owns a book store in the small community, says,

      "A conscience guides us...To do the right thing. To be brave. 
      To be selfless and courageous. To stand up to tyrants whatever
      the cost."

I suppose all who cast their votes on Saturday feel they voted their conscience, and I suspect many who stormed the capital felt they were doing what needed to be done. I wonder, however, what the deep, small, quiet voice inside is whispering to them--if they could only listen. If they could only sit in stillness, in silence.

Here's the deal: What happened Saturday in the Senate is not just about "they" and their consciences. (And, oh how aware I am of the "they" language, the reference to "other" I am using. Ouch!) I need to stay in close contact with my own conscience, my own still, small voice inside. I need to nurture it and clear it of mean and judgmental thoughts. I need to wash it in love and compassion and hope. I need to strengthen its ability to guide me to do the right thing. I need to awaken and stay awake to the presence of God in my life and I need to be that presence. 

And that is no small task. May we know the presence of God in one another. 

Thanks to Interfaith Action of St Paul for offering prayers by local clergy for a country in need. Here's one:

                              Our God, and God of our ancestors

                              And God of our descendants, in these incessant 

                              days of challenge, I need you.

                              Steady my breaths.

                              Quell my worries.

                              Calm my anger.

                              Alleviate my sadness.

                              Allow my mind and heart to trust

                              That decency, law, and reason will abide.

                              Help me find the strength to

                              Protect myself and all people against racism, 

                              antisemitism, islamophobia, and all hatred of

                              the other.

                              Open my eyes to see the good in our

                              time and give me the ability to nurture that

                              good in others.

                              And, please God, may I experience

                              living in an America where all feel safe, our

                              democracy is sanctified and streets peaceful, and

                              all shall sit under their own vine and fig tree, and

                              no one shall make them afraid.

                              Amen. 

                                           --Adam Stock Spilker, Rabbi,

                                           Mt Zion Temple

You can read the rest of the prayers here.

Back to reading. I only have three more Louise Penny books left, and then I wait till August when #17 is published.

An Invitation

Where do you see and know the presence of God? I would love to know.