spiritual practice

Snowball Discernment

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I glanced out the window of the snug and saw a struggle: boy vs snow. I noticed a path that must have started at the boy’s house a few doors away from us, and now the snowball had grown to heavy and unwieldy proportions. I have no idea what the boy’s goal or intention was, but now he faced a problem-how to roll the ball to wherever it was he wanted it to be.

He patted the snow around the big ball. He paused and looked around, hoping, I imagine, to find some of his buddies who might help. He rested, sometimes on the ball itself, but then he was right at it again, determined, it seemed, to accomplish his goal, whatever that was.

Soon he had some success and got the ball rolling, but then he was done, just plain done. At least for the moment.

Had he met his goal? Was the snowball where he wanted it to be? Did he decide to take a time-out and perhaps return the next day when he felt fresher and had a different perspective on the project? Had he changed his mind and decided whatever he had accomplished was enough? How did he feel about his efforts? Had he learned anything in the process?

Will he someday in the future remember the Sunday afternoon in February when he had a plan to roll a snowball from one end of the block to the other or to build a snowman in his friend’s front yard. Or maybe he didn’t have a plan at all. He just started rolling the ball one inch at a time. What story will he tell himself about that effort?

This simple drama outside our house seems like a window into discernment. Sometimes we start something with only a vague plan or maybe we know the outcomes we want, but we have no idea how hard getting to the finish line will be. Or maybe the goal changes as we go along, or maybe we discover we have gained valuable lessons or awareness along the way and it is time to move onto something else. Maybe the situation has changed, and it is time to evaluate the initial goal.

My thoughts return to the boy.

Maybe the boy’s inner voice whispered, “Enough, boy. I have other plans for you.”

Maybe the boy’s energy needs to be directed in other ways.

Currently, I have a big, heavy snowball in my front yard, a major project, and I don’t know what steps to take next. This is discernment time, and I am doing my best to find the balance between pushing and resting. Between looking at options and stepping away to gain perspective. Between consulting with others and listening deeply to myself and the voice of Spirit.

Tomorrow, March 2, is Ash Wednesday. The 40 days of Lent are a time to open to the yearnings God has for me, as well as the ways I yearn for God. I may or may not discern an answer to my current question by the time we sing “Alleluia!” on Easter Sunday, but I know the willingness, the attentiveness I give to the movement of God in my life will somehow grow me closer to the person I was created to be.

An Invitation: Is there something in your life now that calls you into discernment? I would love to know.

NOTE: Decision Making and Spiritual Discernment, The Sacred Art of Finding Your Way by Nancy L. Bieber (2010) is an excellent resource for the discernment process.

Book Report: Morning Meditation Basket

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As promised in my recent post (Tuesday, February 21, 2022, “Morning Meditation”), today’s Book Report shares my current morning meditation and devotion materials.

My collection of materials change as I finish reading a specific book, but also as the seasons in the church year change and as my personal needs change. However, two books always remain: the Bible and a journal. I only have a few pages left in my current journal and need to choose a replacement soon. That is on this week’s list.

Here are the other books in the basket:

  • Celtic Treasure, Daily Scriptures and Prayer by J. Philip Newell. (2005). This may be the third time I have returned to daily use of this book. Right now I am focusing on chapter five, “Songs of the Soul,” but other chapters include “Stories of Creation,” “Power and Justice,” and “Letters of Love.” Each day in the seven week cycle, begins with the same words, “We light a light in the name of the God who creates life, in the name of the Saviour who loves life, and in the name of the Spirit who is the fire of life.” After encouragement to “Be still and aware of God’s presence within and all around,” Newell retells a piece of scripture and offers a prayer. The brief and simple, but oh, so lovely daily meditation always ends in the same way.

The blessings of heaven,

the blessings of earth,

the blessings of sea and of sky.

On those we love this day

and on every human family

the gifts of heaven,

the gifts of earth,

the gifts of sea and of sky.

The illustrations from the Book of Kells plus children’s drawings are lovely, too.

This book provides a framework for my meditation practice right now. I begin with the opening prayer and readings and end with the closing words.

  • The Wild Land Within, Cultivating Wholeness through Spiritual Practice by Lisa Colon Delay (2021). I first learned about this book on Christine Valters Paintner’s website, Abbey of the Arts. https://abbeyofthearts.com The author describes the book as

an invitation to explore your own flyover country. This book serves as a companion to search the inner and unseen but very real territory of yourself. As we attend to this land within, our journey will involve some issues you may know little or nothing about. There are places of rough and even terrifying terrain. We will learn what makes spiritual growth unnecessarily difficult or extra confusing. To explore this land within means encountering climate and storms, negotiating treacherous topography, and finding creatures both wounded and wild. p. 2

Delay, who is a writer, teacher, and spiritual director and originally from Puerto Rico, broadens my white cultural context with references to Native American, Black, Latinx, and others and asks me to define what have been my main influences and how those influences have affected my spiritual growth.

In an early section Delay spends time reflecting on the four soils parable recorded in Matthew 13:1-23, Mark 4:1-20, and Luke 8:4-15. I have been re-reading those pieces of scripture now myself, and using the practice of lectio divina, I ask what meaning they have for me after walking on the earth for almost 74 years. Ongoing exploration.

I am moving slowly, deliberately through this book. My plan is to read a chapter every day, but I keep returning to what I read previous days, finding more openings for learning and reflection. Chapter Five, by the way, is called “Weather Fronts,” and that seems perfect for the winter storm watch we experienced as I wrote this.

One more thing: Delay has a podcast, Spark My Muse. I have not yet listened to it, but I will.

  • The Divine Dance, The Trinity and Your Transformation by Richard Rohr with Mike Morrell (2016) It seems I always have a Richard Rohr book in my meditation basket. If I think I am reading Delay’s book slowly, I am reading this one at an slower pace. I dip into this book, reading two or three pages, when I am willing to set aside the next task.

I was first attracted to this particular book because of the cover art, the famous icon of The Trinity created by Russian iconographer Andrei Rublev in the fifteenth century. I love that icon and the mystery it draws me towards. I was also attracted to the title of the book itself.

Whatever is going on in God is a flow, a radical relatedness, a perfect communion between Three–a circle dance of love.

And God is not just a dancer; God is the dance itself. p. 27

This book will be in my basket for a long time. Oh, I also have a publication from Richard Rohr’s Center for Action and Contemplation: Oneing, An Alternative Orthodoxy. Volume 9, No. 2 focuses on The Cosmic Egg.

  • Soul Therapy, The Art and Craft of Caring Conversations by Thomas Moore (2021) This is another book I dip into when the spirit moves me. Moore’s books, especially Care of the Soul, have been important landmarks in my spiritual growth. Directed towards “helpers,” including psychologists, social workers, ministers, spiritual directors and others, the book reminds me to continue my own soul work as I sit with others doing their own soul work.
  • The Making of an Old Soul, Aging as the Fulfillment of Life’s Promise by Carol Orsborn, Ph. D (2021) I have not yet cracked open the cover of this book, but I enjoy Orsborn’s blog https://carolorsborn.com and I really liked her earlier book The Spirituality of Age. More than likely, I will report on this book later.

My basket runneth over!!

An Invitation: What books or other materials do you turn to for reflection and soul work? I would love to know.

Morning Meditation

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Dear Lord, So far today, God, I’ve done all right. I haven’t gossiped, haven’t lost my temper, haven’t been greedy, grumpy, nasty, selfish or over-indulgent. But in a few minutes, God, I’m going to get out of bed. And from then on I’m probably going to need a lot more help. Amen

Author Unknown

When I found a copy of this little prayer in a book a friend gave me, I laughed out loud. True, so true, and it reminded me why I spend part of my morning in meditation and devotion time. I need all the help I can get.

First thing in the morning, before I get dressed, but after making the bed, I walk up the stairs to the garret. I turn on the twinkle lights around the window and my desk lamp, but I don’t turn on the laptop. I confess I have already checked my phone, just to make sure I’ve not missed any vital messages, but then I leave it on my desk, out of easy reach, and turn to my meditation corner.

Unlike a Buddhist sitting on the floor, legs crossed, back straight, I rest easy in an overstuffed, slightly shabby chair I call my Girlfriend Chair. In our home prior to this one, this chair, slipcovered with vintage tablecloths, lived in one of our guest rooms, quite feminine in decor, called The Girlfriend Room.

I begin my meditation time with my eyes closed, lightly, not tightly, and I take a couple deep cleansing breaths, finding my own rhythm. In fact, finding the rhythm is the reason for this time, although I have not always named it in that way.

What is today’s rhythm?

In what ways am I out of rhythm?

To what rhythm does God call me? Today? Beyond?

What follows in my meditation time differs from day-to-day, but most often it includes a brief reading and prayer for the day, using a specific book, such as Joyce Rupp’s Fragments of Your Holy Name, followed by writing in my journal and studying a book on spirituality. The study time often leads me to reading a passage in the Bible, which may take me back to additional journal writing time. Interspersed throughout the hour or more, is intentional prayer time, lifting up names and concerns on my heart. If I have an appointment that day with a spiritual direction client, I imagine being with that person and pray that we will know the Presence in each other’s company.

Before I end this sacred time, I once again close my eyes, lightly, not tightly. I take a couple deep cleansing breaths to find my own rhythm and I rest in the silence.

When I notice a thought, often a worry, but sometimes a writing idea or an approach to a task on my To Do list, I gently breathe it away, for I know If it is important, it will be there when I need it. Sometimes I feel total openness, but the second I am aware of that feeling, it is gone. Sometimes the silence, the stillness, brings tears to me eyes. Sometimes I feel my heart lift. Sometimes I feel a surge of energy, a freshness.

I may hear the bells from the chapel on the campus of St Thomas University chime, as they do every quarter hour, or I may hear our backyard windchimes, sharing their own rhythm, or a cardinal singing a winter song, or the children next door heading to school. Or I may hear a whisper of my own inner voice, “Nancy, it is time to move forward into the day.”

Often my morning meditation time may be reinforced later in the day by a something I read online, such as Richard Rohr’s daily meditation, or by walking in the neighborhood, or by an interaction with a loved one, but my morning time provides me with the pulse I need. If I miss more than a couple of morning meditation times, my rhythm becomes raggedy and unbalanced. This precious time, this holy time, is what I need to be aware of the movement of God in my life and how I can be present to the way God desires me to move and be in the world.

Before leaving the Girlfriend Chair where I always feel held and known, I lift up one more prayer, “Thank you.”

An Invitation: How do you find your rhythm in the day? I would love to know.

NOTE: In my Thursday, February 24 “Book Report” post I will share what books currently are in my morning meditation basket.

Book Report: Crisis Contemplation, Healing the Wounded Village by Barbara A. Holmes (2021)

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We can identify three common elements in every crisis: The event is usually unexpected, the person or community is unprepared, and there is nothing anyone could do to stop it from happening…Bereft of words, all of us hold the same question: How could this be happening? Crisis Contemplation, p. 21

We don’t need to think very hard or very deep to identify crises in the last couple years. You may have experienced a personal crisis, alongside the communal ones our society has been enduring.

I don’t imagine many of us respond by moving into contemplation when a crisis strikes. Our more immediate response is action. This book does not negate that response, but at the same time Holmes encourages us to “allow for the possibility of contemplative refuge, respite, and renewal. To slow down and be still is to allow both the source of our troubles and options for recovery to emerge.” (42)

This is hard work and as Holmes points out this work does not mean retreating to our meditation pillows. She points out that “Contemplative porch practices are no longer required of me; they are part of me.” (42). Yes! I often urge my spiritual direction clients and my readers to develop spiritual practices now, before the unexpected, which will come, for sure. Ground yourself in your contemplative practice and they will be with you.

As I read this book, I felt as if I was sitting in the back of a room where Holmes was exploring and reflecting with BIPOC peoples. I had the privilege and pain of listening, opening my heart (I hope) to the trauma, the wounds across the generations and so present now. I attempted to read this book as a contemplative practice.

Rev. Dr. Barbara Holmes, author and scholar of African-American spirituality and mysticism, is on the faculty of Center for Action and Contemplation (CAC) under the leadership of Fr. Richard Rohr, https://cac.org and it was in one of CAC’s daily meditations where I was introduced to her wisdom. I know I will eventually read one of her earlier books, Joy Unspeakable: Contemplative Practices of the Black Church (2017). And I am drawn back to books by Richard Rohr.

The Universal Christ, How a Forgotten Reality Can Change Everything We See, Hope For, and Believe (2019) has become a touchstone book for me.

As I was writing this post, I remembered another book on my shelf, one I have recommended when personal crisis hits, The Ten Things to Do When Your Life Falls Apart, An Emotional and Spiritual Handbook by Daphne Rose Kingma (2010). This book focuses more on individual issues, but still, there is much to contemplate here. The ten things, by the way are:

  • Cry your heart out
  • Face your defaults
  • Do something different
  • Let go
  • Remember who you’ve always been
  • Persist
  • integrate your loss
  • Live simply
  • Go where the love is
  • Live in the light of the Spirit.

As always, one book leads to another and another.

An Invitation: When you have been in the midst of a crisis, has there been a book that has been helpful or meaningful? I would love to know.

Winter Gifts

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Ice formations on top of an artesian aquifer near Maiden Rock, WI. https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/nelsons-on-rush-river

At a retreat I helped facilitate for women with breast cancer the opening activity was to declare our favorite season. The floor had been divided into four quadrants–winter, spring, summer, fall–and the women gathered in the segments. The winter space was almost as bare as tree branches in January with only 3 of the 50 participants asserting love of winter.

I was one of those three, and we three actually held hands and huddled together–and vowed to meet for hot chocolate on the coldest of winter days. Each person shared what they loved about their favorite season, and we winter people had similar feelings–the love of burrowing in, of being cozy and having more time to read and write, feeling there are fewer distractions. We expressed love for the quiet that darkness brings.

None of us talked abut loving outdoor sports, although I have such wonderful childhood memories about ice skating Friday nights and Sunday afternoons at the neighborhood rink. As as an adult I enjoyed cross-country skiing with our children and later, at Sweetwater Farm, snowshoeing on our land, noting where deer had bedded down for the night. But those activities are not the core of my love of winter.

The season allows and encourages me to access not only the deepest parts of myself, but also the barest, like those skeleton bare branches.

Winter is a time of clarification for me. I see across the landscape of my soul, unhindered by intense and varied colors and textures. Instead, there is the sweep of white, the unhidden contours of the land, the places where the earth meets the sky. I note the eagles soaring above the few places of open water, and my heart soars, too, and feels the bigness of possibility, of hope. I seek that open water, not because I yearn for the flow of water in spring and summer, but because of its uniqueness during this frozen time. It illuminates the edges, the hard places, and invites me into the deep.

I wonder sometimes if the winter season was not positioned at the end and the beginning of the year, would I feel differently about winter? How much of this intentional time to go deeper, to challenge myself is related to the reflection and evaluation as we end one year and move into another? How much is about turning the page of a new calendar, clearing the space, starting again? Hard to know, but I think I am glad the season and the new year are related.

Recently, my husband and I headed out of St Paul and drove down the Wisconsin side of the Mississippi; a drive we love no matter the time of day or year; no matter the weather. We followed the easy directions to see the ice formations we had heard about and were stunned by their magnificence and their fairy tale beauty. As we continued along our favorite route, able to see Lake Pepin’s shoreline through the bare trees and also homes on top of the bluffs normally hidden by thick foliage, but now revealed against the grey sky, we counted hawks and eagles. Six hawks and at least two dozen eagles, including four in the same tree. And swans, too, holding a convention in open water. Who would not love this, I thought.

Returning home, I felt renewed, restored, and ready for the ongoing work of this winter age of my life.

An Invitation: Sit with winter, the season, the stage of life, and allow it to speak to you. What does it say to you? I would love to know.

Book Report: The Story of Ruth by Joan Chittister

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I’m always happy to spend time with Benedictine nun and theologian, Joan Chittister. I have heard her speak many times, often at the Chuautauqua Institution in New York, but other places as well, and, of course, I own and have read many of her books. I return to her The Gift of Years, Growing Older Gracefully (2008) frequently, but value many of her other titles, also, including Following the Path, The Search for a Life of Passion, Purpose, and Joy (2012); The Time is Now, A Call to Uncommon Courage (2019); The Art of Life, Monastic Wisdom for Every Day (2012); and Between the Dark and the Daylight, Embracing the Contradictions of Life (2015). Many years ago when I was preparing lectures for a weeklong retreat on spiritual friendship her book The Friendship of Women, A Spiritual Tradition (2000) was a guiding star.

The Story of Ruth, Twelve Moments in Every Woman’s Life is a gentle and wise, but compelling reflection of the Biblical story of Ruth and Naomi. Who isn’t familiar with the verses:

Where you go, I will go; where you lodge, I will lodge; your people will be my people, and your God my God. Where you die, I will die–there will I be buried. (Ruth 1: 16-17)

I’m not sure what drew me to this book at this stage of my life. I probably read some reference to it in someone’s blog, but what a welcome companion it has been recently. How good it is to be in the company of women as they meet the challenges, or as Chittister calls them, “moments” of their lives and how God calls us to become who we were created to be.

The book leads us through the Biblical story, highlighting the ways Naomi and Ruth, mother-in-law and daughter-in-law, meet the challenges following the deaths of their husbands. Chittister relates those challenges to the challenges all women face, especially as women continue to struggle with inequality and stereotypical limitations. Each chapter examines one of those challenges, including respect, recognition, invisibility, and empowerment.

I suspect if I had read this book earlier in my life I would have been drawn to different chapters, but as a woman in her 70’s, I was most drawn to the chapters on loss, aging, and the last chapter, fulfillment. In the chapter on aging, Chittister writes:

There are lessons that come with age that come no other way. Age is a mirror of the knowledge of God. Age teaches that time is precious, that companionship is better than wealth, that sitting can be as much a spiritual discipline as running marathons, that thinking is superior doing, that learning is eternal, the things go to dust, that adult toys wear thin with time, that only what is within us–good music, fine reading, great art, thoughtful conversation, faith, and God–remains. When our mountain climbing days are over, the elderly know, these are the things that will chart the setting of our suns and walk us to our graves. All the doings will wash away; all the being will emerge. (p. 33)

And in the chapter on fulfillment:

What we do as women to bring ourselves to fullness makes the world around us a fuller place as well. (p. 87)

A wonderful bonus in the book is the art by John August Swanson.

An Invitation: What Biblical stories have new meaning for you as you age? I would love to know.

Books Added This Week to My TBR (To Be Read) List

  • The Heartbeat of Wounded Knee by David Treuer (2019). This actually is already on my list, but needs to move higher. Nonfiction
  • The Love Songs of W.E.B. DuBois by Honoree Fannone Jeffers (2021) Fiction
  • Cabin by the Lake Mystery Series by Linda Norlander: Death of an Editor; Death of a Starling; and Death of a Snow Ghost (May, 2022)

The Rhythm of Rest

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I could not do one more thing. Well, of course, I could, but I would have done the next thing without focus or interest, inspiration, or energy.

The week had been full . Full of good interactions and scattered with productive writing time, but I was done, even cranky. Perhaps it was the unrelenting cold or the unrelenting pandemic, but I sagged and slumped.

Enter my Word of the Year: Rhythm.

Most of my weeks have a defined, steady rhythm. We begin the week attending church and adult forum, followed by going out for lunch where we read the New York Times. Early in the week I write both Tuesday and Thursday posts for this blog, and I prepare for the writing group I facilitate Thursday mornings at church. I tend to do the week’s grocery shopping that morning, too. Usually, on Friday or Saturday, my husband and I plan an outing–get in the car and roam.

The weeks vary depending on appointments with my spiritual direction clients and if one of the writing groups in which I am a participant is scheduled, and, now and then, there is time with friends or family. And, of course, there are the usual tasks–the laundry, the emails, the bills, the meal preparation, the home-tending. Oh, and writing time. This past week I worked on a piece to submit to a publication that has published my work in the past.

I begin my day meditating, praying, and writing in my journal, and later, I try to leave my desk by 4:00, giving myself some space to read before fixing dinner. In the evening we binge watch something on Netflix or Amazon Prime (Right now we are watching season 11 of “Vera” on BrittBox.) and read before going to bed.

By and large, these are good rhythms, but my word of the year invites me to pay attention. What rhythm calls me right now? What is the rhythm my body needs? My soul needs? Rhythm summons me to listen to my own heartbeat.

Instead of pressing on determined to check more off a list that seems to grow when my head is turned, I took a deep breath and asked, “What rhythm wants to be heard right now?”

REST. REST.

I turned off my computer, left my desk and the garret, even though it was hours before my normal 4:00 leave the office time, and I nestled in the snug with book, blanket, and a mug of hot cider. I read and I dozed. I listened to the rhythm pulsing gently around and through me, and I restored. And I gave thanks for being at a stage of life when it is possible to respond to rhythm’s invitation.

I know, appreciate, and allow my own rhythm. Each day I take some time to be in my personal rhythm.

Sue Patton Thoele

An Invitation: Do you have a word of the year? If so, how is it present in your life? I would love to know.

Book Report: January Round-Up

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January has been a cold month here in Minnesota, but I have been content to stay inside and read.

Such good books. My intention was to select one or two favorite fiction titles and one or two nonfiction titles, but I could not decide which books not to mention.

Fiction

  • The Sentence by Louise Erdrich. I love books set in a bookstore, and any book written by Erdrich calls to me, so this was a winning combination. Erdrich’s actual bookstore in Minneapolis, Birchbark Books, is one of my favorites and the fictional representation of the store is just as appealing. The basic plot is that one of the employees is haunted by a customer who has died, but that is far too simplistic a description. The book is set during the pandemic and also refers to the murder of George Floyd and the days following that. I am so grateful for Erdrich’s ongoing elucidation of indigenous history, culture, and current realities.
  • Celine by Peter Heller. I read his more recent book The River and liked it, but didn’t love it. However, a favorite bookseller recommended this book to me, and the main character, a 68 year-old woman who is a private investigator, is intriguing. At first I was confused by lots of names and places and wasn’t sure where the focus was going to be, but Celine, who comes from an “old” family, wears Armani scarves when she tracks her prey, uses guns comfortably, and is married to Peter, a “Mainer” who doesn’t drive, kept me turning the pages. I hope Heller writes another book about these two. The story itself–searching for a young woman’s father who supposedly was killed by a bear in Yellowstone–is well done, too.
  • Songbirds by Christy Lefteri. Set in current times in Cyprus, where a maid, originally from Sri Lanka disappears. She has fallen in love with a man who poaches song birds and sells them to restaurants as forbidden and exotic treats. That’s disturbing enough, as it is, but even more so is the indentured servant conditions of the maids and that the main character, Nisha, is not the only one.
  • Oh William! by Elizabeth Strout. I loved this book. William and Lucy Barton were once married and had two daughters, now grown. Lucy’s second husband has died and William’s current wife leaves him. William asks Lucy to help him confront a missing piece of his life story. Lucy, by the way, is a successful writer, but feels invisible and inadequate. Ah, the mysteries of marriage and relationships and as Strout (Lucy) says, “how we lived our lives on top of this.” After reading this book, I re-read the earlier one My Name is Lucy Barton and discovered I liked it much more the second time around.
  • The School for Good Mothers by Jessamine Chan. Think The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood. Not as chilling, perhaps, at least not on the surface, but…. Frida, a divorced mom with a young child, has a “bad day” and makes a mistake for which she is sentenced to a training school for mothers. There is a right way and a wrong way. One way. In the school she is assigned to a robotic doll to practice the right way. Ripe for a movie, I am guessing.
  • The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman. Set in a retirement community in the UK, a “gang” of residents meet to solve unsolved murders and, of course, get involved in a real murder (or more than one). Interesting characters with interesting backgrounds (Elizabeth was former secret service), and I am eager to read the next book in the series. I assume there will be more after #2.
  • The Phone Booth at the Edge of the World by Laura Imai Messina. This is my “wild card” of the month–a book I just happened upon. I knew nothing about it, but the summary sounded intriguing, and it was one of those books that just felt right. The plot is based on the true story of a tsunami in Japan in 2011. People who have lost loved ones come to talk to them in a disconnected phone booth at the site of the tsunami. Two of those are Yui, whose daughter and mother died, and Takeshi whose wife died. Such a beautiful story of the rhythms of grief and re-entry into life and love.
  • Mrs March by Virginian Feito. This is the least favorite novel I read this month, but I finished it. (I discarded a few others along the way.) Mrs March is married to a successful novelist, and she has many emotional problems. I got tired of the grinding perspective of her paranoia, but still there was some nice writing.

Nonfiction

  • The Inner Work of Age, Shifting from Role to Soul by Connie Zweig. I read this book slowly during my morning meditation time. Zweig’s main message is to become an Elder, which means doing the necessary inner soul work, becoming who we were created to be and embracing the hidden spiritual gifts of age. She doesn’t ignore the challenges; for example, life-changing illness, but instead urges each of us to become aware of our own shadow–the obstacle(s) that prevent our own authenticity. So much here. I added many quotes in my journal and used many of the reflection questions at the end of each chapter. This is a book to move us beyond being elderly and instead, to live our elderhood with awareness.
  • Wife/Daughter/Self, A Memoir in Essays by Beth Kephart. I have loved Kephart’s books on writing and this book gave me insight into who she is as writer and teacher, but much more beyond that. Each section was divided into snatches, short pieces, but the book didn’t feel disconnected. I did think, however, that the section on “wife” was the strongest. The book made me think about how roles change or even end, but the self remains.
  • In the Country of Women by Susan Straight. Straight is a white woman who was married to a black man from the neighborhood where she grew up. They had three daughters and even after they divorced they remained connected in healthy ways. Plus, she was very connected to his large and complicated family. I couldn’t always keep every one straight and how they were related to one another, but the weaving of the stories, the texture of the connections, like the braiding of hair, which she mentioned often, were memorable. This was an unexpected gift.
  • 16 Ways to Create Devotional Writing to Renew the Spirit and Refresh the Soul by David J. Sluka. A book to keep on my shelf for the day, if that comes, when I decide to write devotions for women elders.

It is already February 3, and I have read….sorry, you have to wait till my February Round-Up.

An Invitation: What were your favorite January reads? I would love to know.

Morning Gratitude, Morning Presence

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As I make the bed first thing every morning, I pause and look out the window towards the backyard and the garage. This time of the year I know what I will see: mounds of unmelted snow, tracks from the squirrel gang that frequents the base of the bird feeder, and the bare branch remnants of my husband’s glorious garden. Maybe there will be a cardinal at the feeder, but probably not till a bit later.

I don’t stand at the window hoping to see something different. No, I stand at the window to welcome a new day, to give thanks for the light of a new day, and to remind myself to be present to this day, the new and holy day.

Soon after making the bed, but still in my robe and pajamas, I climb the stairs to the garret and settle in for meditation time. Lately, my quiet time has included listening to Cat Stevens sing one of my favorite hymns, “Morning Has Broken.” You can listen here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e0TInLOJuUM

Morning has broken like the first morning;

black-bird has spoken like the first bird.

Praise for the singing!

Praise for the morning!

Praise for them, springing fresh from the Word!

Text: Eleanor Farjeon and Music: Gaelic Tune

What more could I ask for than to remember that each morning is like the first morning. Oh, if I could only live present to that gift, that morning gift, the whole day, every day.

That prayer would be enough. That prayer holds all those I love and all those unknown to me, but in need of a new day.

The words in verse three lift me even higher.

Mine is the sunlight!

Mine is the morning,

born of the one light Eden saw play!

Praise with elation, praise every morning,

God’s re-creation of the new day!

Each day is a chance to re-create the sun in my own heart, my own being. This is enough. More than enough.

I invite you to sing with me. I will stand at the window and listen for your voice.

An Invitation: What is your first view of the day? How does it help you move into the day?I would love to know.

Book Report: Browsing A Bookshelf

/ nagneberg48 / 3 Comments

Join me in my garret, where I keep my books on spirituality and theology. Pick a shelf, any shelf. How about the one that begins with books by Elizabeth A. Johnson and ends with a little book about contemplation by Martin Laird, Into the Silent Land?

And in-between are treasures of learning and wisdom and journeys into spiritual practice and reflection.

The Prettiest Cover: Ask the Beasts, Darwin and the God of Love by Elizabeth A. Johnson. (2014) Inside are several pages of notes I wrote when this book was the focus of a class I took at Wisdom Ways in 2014. https://www.wisdomwayscenter.org Johnson asks the question “What is the theological meaning of the natural world of life?” and “Why hasn’t theology taken the natural world seriously?” This is a dense book and as a non theologian, I was grateful to be studying this book with a group of wise and educated women. Johnson, by the way, was being “investigated” by the Catholic Church as she was writing this book.

Right next to this book is another Elizabeth Johnson book, Friends of Gods and Prophets, A Feminist Theological Reading of the Communion of Saints (1998); a book I have yet to read. Some day.

Moving Along: A commentary on the Gospel of Mark by Donald Juel, who was a professor at Luther Seminary when I was associate director of public relations there, and I always enjoyed the brief conversations with him when he stopped in my office or during lunch. Next to Juel’s book is Julian of Norwich’s Showings. I wonder what Mark and Julian of Norwich would have to say to each other.

Other Saints–Among My Personal Saints: Thomas Keating and Sue Monk Kidd. Father Keating was the founder of the Centering Prayer Movement and two of his books have been important in my spiritual development–Open Mind, Open Heart, The Contemplative Dimension of the Gospel (1986) and The Better Part, Stages of Contemplative Living (2000). Centering prayer is a practice of turning within and resting in God’s presence. Not far away from the Fr. Keating books are two books by Sue Monk Kidd, When the Heart Waits, Spiritual Direction for LIfe’s Sacred Questions (1990) and The Dance of the Dissident Daughter (1996). You may recognize this author for her more recent fiction, including The Secret Life of Bees (2002) and The Book of Longings (2020), but it is “Dissident Daughter” that holds the most meaning for me. Kidd unfolds her awakening to feminine spirituality, and I went on that journey with her. I read this book more than once and underlined more each time and added my own questions and reflections and commentaries.

Next to Kidd on the shelf is Ursula King’s The Search for Spirituality, Our Global Quest for a Spiritual Life, (2008) and I see I have marked Chapter Five, ‘Spirituality Within Life’s Dance” as my favorite in the book and within that chapter, the section on “Spirituality and Aging.” I need to reread that section.

Buddhist Wisdom: Two books by Jack Kornfield. First, perhaps his most famous work A Path With Heart, A Guide Through the Perils and Promises of Spiritual Life (1993) and a collection of sayings, The Art of Forgiveness, Lovingkindness, and Peace (2002), which was given to me by a dear friend who died many years ago. She lives in my heart and on my bookshelf. In A Path With Heart Kornfield includes a number of meditations, such as “Who am I?” and “Transforming Sorrow into Compassion.” The techniques may be different. The definitions may be different, but I think these mindfulness meditations are compatible with the practice of centering prayer, and I think Jon Kabat Zinn, whose book Wherever You Go There You Are, Mindulness Meditation in Everyday Life (1994) is also on this shelf, would agree.

Jewish Wisdom–Books by Three Rabbis: Yearnings, Embracing the Sacred Messiness of Life (2006) by Rabbi Irwin Kula, The Lord Is My Shepherd, Healing Wisdom of the Twenty-Third Psalm (2003) by Rabbi Harold S Kushner of When Bad Things Happen to Good People fame, and Jewish Spirituality, A Brief Introduction for Christians (2001) by Rabbi Lawrence Kushner. A post-it note dangling from the edge of Yearnings directed me to this sentence, “The more we allow ourselves to unfold, the less likely we are to unravel.” p. 37

Interfaith Wisdom: The Jews, Christians and Buddhists all meet in Beside Still Waters, Jews, Christians and the Way of the Buddha (2003) edited by Harold Kasimow, John P. Keenan, and Linda Klepinger Keenan. Another book unread. So far.

Life’s Journey: 1. A Woman’s Guide to Spiritual Renewal (1994) by Nelly Kaufer and Carol Osmer Newhouse. 2. The Ten Things To Do When Your Life Falls Apart, An Emotional and Spiritual Handbook (2010) by Daphne Rose King. (#1 on the To Do list is to “cry your heart out.) 3. Grieving Mindfully, A Compassionate and Spiritual Guide to Coping with Loss (2005) by Sameet M. Kumar. At one time or another I have consulted all of these books, both for myself and for my spiritual directees.

And More: a book on the sacred art of pilgrimages, one on dreams, a classic of spiritual literature (The Imitation of Christ) and still more. I close with a book that is a feast for the eyes, as well as the mind and the heart, Journey of the Soul (2000) by Doris Klein, CSA. It has been a long time since I sat with the words and the images in this book–perhaps now is the time to return to this book.

The soul journey is the process of spiraling into the Heart of the Holy where in reality we always are. We simply learn to see more clearly. p.3

I know I’ve just flung a lot of titles your way, but what strikes me is how one single bookshelf can open the door to new reflection and at the same time rewind a path of memory. By the way, I removed four titles from this shelf and added them to the Little Free Library pile. May they be exactly what someone else needs.

Thanks for shopping my Johnson to Laird bookshelf with me.