The Practice of Presence
Welcome to the Practice of Presence
The moment one gives close attention to anything, even a blade of grass, it becomes a mysterious, awesome, indescribably magnificent world in itself. Henry Miller
Spiritually, presence can mean two quite different things. On the one hand, contemplatives talk of “being present.” Presence from this perspective is all about awareness and remembering to “live in the moment.” On the other hand, theologians tend to come at presence from the perspective of a hidden and divine “otherness.” Their concern is not just that we pay attention to the present moment, but that we notice a transcendent Presence woven through all moments.
This month, we refuse to take sides. Attentiveness or otherness? Who says we have to choose? After all, isn’t it true that, more often than not, they dance together more than they compete? Haven’t we all felt that when we are fully present, the most powerful presences emerge? Pay attention to your child and slowly (and mysteriously) a confidence and unique self reveals itself. Pay attention to the flow of your breathing or the flow of the ocean and something bigger than yourself enters the scene. Look for a long time at a single tree or flower and eventually it presents itself to you as a world in and unto itself.
The underlying message here is that the world is shot through with unnoticed gifts and grace. It’s a message perfectly fit for this holiday month that so often celebrates presents over presence. In the face of commercials and billboards that tell us our lives will finally be complete if we stuff them with a few more shiny objects or plastic gadgets, our spiritual traditions come along and remind us that our lives are already whole, and home. Their message: The greatest gift of the holidays is noticing the many gifts that have been sitting there all along.
So, friends, how will you engage this dance? What powerful and meaningful presence is waiting for you to be present to it? What gift is waiting and wanting to emerge? What will your awareness bring into being this month?
The Practice of Repair
When the cracks come, who doesn’t desire – even demand – to restore what once was?
Nothing is more human. We all long to reverse the damage. We all hold tight to the humpty dumpty hope that everything can be put back together again.
But, as our faith teaches us, transition and change dictate the flow of life. The current of time is just too strong for us to swim back.
And so the repair offered us is not that of returning our lives to their original state but working with what remains to make something new. The shards are not pieces of a puzzle waiting to be put perfectly back together, but building blocks waiting to be molded into a yet to be imagined form.
All of which means that there is freedom in the breaking. The cracks, if we can widen our view, become conduits for creativity. That’s not to minimize the pain involved. And it’s certainly not a way of justifying tragedy as “part of God’s plan.” Rather, it’s a call for us to perceive the broken pieces of our lives as more than just a pile of ruined rubble. “Look closer!” whispers the wisdom within. “That ash, if worked with, can give birth to a Phoenix.”
So, what piles of rubble in your life need revisited? What longings for what was do you need to let go of, so a new story can begin?
And how might you break open even further? Because that’s part of this too, isn’t it? “Your broken pieces are more than rubble” is not the only counterintuitive thing that life wants us to learn about the practice of repair. It also says to us (even though we can barely stand to hear it): “Crack wider!”
As difficult as it is to absorb, it seems we were made to be broken, broken open to be exact. Remember what the Canadian sage said, “Cracks are how the light gets in.”
Broken hearts hurt but they also let in and allow us to connect with the pain of others. Protected hearts may seem safe, but our armor only ends up being a straitjacket. It’s one of the most important but paradoxical spiritual truths there is: Broken people end up bigger people. Because of the cracks in our heart, it becomes capable of expanding. Because we’ve been torn, who we are no longer ends at the barrier of our own skin
It seems this is what it really means to be repaired and made whole.
The Practice of Deep Listening
Welcome to the Practice of Deep Listening
Do not try to save the whole world
or do anything grandiose.
Instead, create a clearing
in the dense forest of your life
and wait there patiently,
until the song that is your life falls
into your own cupped hands
and you recognize and greet it.
Only then will you know
how to give yourself to this world
so worthy of rescue.
-Clearing by Martha Postlewaite
There is so much saving needed in this world of ours. Especially in this moment. Which is why this call for clearings and cupped hands seems so odd and out of place. Doesn’t this dear poet understand the urgency of the moment? Doesn’t she understand that we need to be lifting up our voices as loudly as we can, not carving out space for quiet? Doesn’t she understand that we need engaged hands not cupped hands, with all of us pushing as hard as we can against the tide and madly mending a world that is about to be torn in two?
Well, yes, she certainly could be clueless. But it’s also clear that she thinks we are the wrong-headed ones. Hers is an invitation to see that our urgent, muscular mode of saving is just not what the world needs.
And of course she is correct. In our better and clearer moments, we know the world needs us to be grounded and centered before rushing into battle. We need those cupped hands to catch our breath before we cover them with boxing gloves and engage the fight.
We also know that creating clearings is never a waste of time. The dense forest homes we so carefully cultivate keep us safe and comfortable, but they also make it hard to see the horizon and the newly rising sun. Clearings let that new light in and in turn help us notice when we are applying old ways of being and thinking to a world that isn’t here anymore.
Ah, that seems right. A good place to leave it. With us thanking the poet for her invitation to better understand what the world needs.
But there’s that pesky piece about the world handing our song back to us. That complicates things. It means this isn’t just an invitation to see what the world needs, but also an invitation to notice that the world sees us in need and is trying to give us a gift; an invitation to notice that the world is also an actor in this precious play, not just an object we are acting upon; an invitation to notice that while we are focused on saving the world, the world is also focused on saving us.
Or to put it another way, maybe the world is trying to love us. And we are being invited to let it. Maybe that is what this talk of cupped hands is all about.
And if so, what a way to begin this new church year! And maybe even what a way to travel through our lives all the time! With cupped hands, remembering and open to receiving the love of the world.
The Practice of Invitation
Welcome to the Practice of Invitation
Do not try to save the whole world
or do anything grandiose.
Instead, create a clearing
in the dense forest of your life
and wait there patiently,
until the song that is your life falls
into your own cupped hands
and you recognize and greet it.
Only then will you know
how to give yourself to this world
so worthy of rescue.
–Clearing by Martha Postlewaite
There is so much saving needed in this world of ours. Especially in this moment. Which is why this call for clearings and cupped hands seems so odd and out of place. Doesn’t this dear poet understand the urgency of the moment? Doesn’t she understand that we need to be lifting up our voices as loudly as we can, not carving out space for quiet? Doesn’t she understand that we need engaged hands not cupped hands, with all of us pushing as hard as we can against the tide and madly mending a world that is about to be torn in two?
Well, yes, she certainly could be clueless. But it’s also clear that she thinks we are the wrong-headed ones. Hers is an invitation to see that our urgent, muscular mode of saving is just not what the world needs.
We also know that creating clearings is never a waste of time. The dense forest homes we so carefully cultivate keep us safe and comfortable, but they also make it hard to see the horizon and the newly rising sun. Clearings let that new light in and in turn help us notice when we are applying old ways of being and thinking to a world that isn’t here anymore.
Ah, that seems right. A good place to leave it. With us thanking the poet for her invitation to better understand what the world needs.
But there’s that pesky piece about the world handing our song back to us. That complicates things. It means this isn’t just an invitation to see what the world needs, but also an invitation to notice that the world sees us in need and is trying to give us a gift; an invitation to notice that the world is also an actor in this precious play, not just an object we are acting upon; an invitation to notice that while we are focused on saving the world, the world is also focused on saving us.
Or to put it another way, maybe the world is trying to love us. And we are being invited to let it.
Maybe that is what this talk of cupped hands is all about. And if so, what a way to begin this new church year!
And maybe even what a way to travel through our lives all the time! With cupped hands, remembering and open to receiving the love of the world.
The Gift of Renewal
Welcome to the Gift of Renewal
We are renewed by so many things: nature, each other, memory, music, play, solitude, silence, and – of course – our faith. Through small groups, calls to justice work, worship, caring for one another, covenant and accountability, our faith breathes new life into us.
But it also renews us in a way that often goes unnoticed: through questions! Or to be more precise, our faith has a sneaky way of changing our lives by changing the questions we ask.
Questions around renewal are a great example of this.
For instance, the “renewal questions” lifted up by our secular culture revolve mainly around health (Are you drinking enough water? Are you getting enough sleep?) and work/life balance (Are you making enough time for family, play and rest?). Those are fine questions, but they only go so deep and push us so far.
Here’s where our faith comes in. It enters the scene and in effect says, “Hey, look over here. There’s a box with an entirely different set of renewal questions that nobody’s opened yet.”
Questions like:
Are you sure it’s your body that’s tired, or could it be your soul?
What if “time away” isn’t about restoring yourself in order to return to work, but rather
making space to decide if it’s time to re-imagine what your “true work” really is?
Is it time to renew your responsibility to those who will come after you?
Is it time to renew your commitment to carry on the work of those who came before?
What if you saw your daily living and loving as an opportunity (even a calling) to renew
others’ faith in humanity?
Could it be that continual self-improvement is not the path to renewal, but instead
compassionate acceptance of who you already are?
And those are just the questions sitting on top of the pile!
So friends, this month, let’s renew and refresh the questions we ask. Let’s remind ourselves that, indeed, we change our lives by changing our questions. And, maybe most importantly, let’s each ask ourselves, “What renewing question do I want to take with me into the summer?”
The Gift of Pluralism
Welcome to the Gift of Plurism
I wonder how the moonflower feels
about its sweet sister, the morning glory.
What it must be to know that world longingly awaits another
while you must seek solace hidden under a night sky.
When the world has told you to hide,
it is only the shadows that welcome you in.
And while blooming in the dark has its beauty,
it’s also a lonely way to live.
And who can blame this moon-drenched cousin for wanting to hide.
After all, we too know what happens out there in the light of day.
We are parsed and picked over,
told who and what we need to be,
so that we will finally be loved,
finally let in.
And so we shape shift
until our own original curvature is no longer remembered,
until our masks become indistinguishable from our face,
until the pieces of us allowed out in the sun
forget the parts buried deep in the cold earthen layers of time.
Maybe that is what the moonflower
is doing out there in the dark.
Maybe it’s not hiding after all
but instead trying to remember
who it once was.
Or maybe it knows who it is
and its blooming is a way of saying
“Come find me. I’m still here.”
Which, of course, means that maybe this month
is not just about making it safe for others to come out of the shadows
but also a reminder that we all have pieces and parts buried in the dark.
So friends, what do you say?
Let’s go find them.
Let’s put ourselves back together again.
