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.
The Gift of Interdependance
Welcome to the Gift of Interdependence
Talk of interdependence immediately calls up the work of saving the planet, rightly so. But what if the first step toward saving the planet is learning to speak to it? And hear it? Could our collective failure to confront the climate crisis be rooted in our lost ability to listen? What if the quickly-going-extinct creatures don’t want our sympathy, but our ear? What if the fraying of the web isn’t just about us failing to act, but also us having forgotten who we are. And what if nature itself is the only one who can help us remember?
It’s a month of tricky questions, friends. As we begin, may these words by Rev. Kaaren Anderson send us on our way.
We Are One
Perhaps if I could pull my senses back
to the scraping squeak of the window opening
that welcomes in the pasture’s chorus of peepers,
whose resonate tones glide over my bed sheet and mental haze,
I’d be able to hear my amphibian friends’ primordial call:
We are one, we are one, we are one
Perhaps if I could recall the rapid thrum
of the nine hummingbirds beating wings,
whipping in and out around the feeder,
with a thrummmm, thrummmm, thrummmm
on that cold Montana morning in May,
I’d remember that my heart beat synched with metronomic ease
to their tiny thrumming selves and rhythmic reminder:
We are one, we are one, we are one
Perhaps if I could be real still
and lay my body on the syrupy mud
along the creek behind the wood
and hear the ferns unfurling in unison
and the roots of the poplar stretching toward the spring,
I’d remember that the universe sings a song to us,
each minute, of every hour, of every day, of every year:
We are one, we are one, we are one
Perhaps if I made it a priority to listen to that siren song,
I’d ask the right questions, and make the right statements;
and return to the communion of creatures of which I am a part.
The truth is we make this planet about us, and only us
and when we do, the earth calls our separate selves back, singing:
“Ask yourself, you beautiful, thoughtful, gorgeous species,
How much of the planet are you really entitled to?
How much of the planet are you really entitled to?“
And with the peepers, and the hummingbirds and the ferns and the roots,
I would respond:
We are one, we are one, we are one.
Welcome to the Gift of Transformation
Let mystery have its place in you; do not be always turning up your whole soil with the plowshare of self-examination, but leave a little fallow corner in your heart ready for any seed the winds may bring, and reserve a nook of shadow for the passing bird; keep a place in your heart for the unexpected guests, an altar for an unknown God.
-Henri-Frederic Ariel
Make a bit of room. Leave a little space. That may not sound like anything radical or revolutionary. But it turns out that it is one of Life’s favorite ways to make us into something new.
Be cautious with those cultural messages about aggressively tilling and turning up your whole soil. Watch out for all the heroic talk about striving and perfecting, struggle and control. Much of the time, transformation is a much subtler art. It’s about stillness, listening and waiting to be led, not fighting with yourself and others to make sure you are in the lead.
In short, when it comes to transformation, the message of spirituality is “Be careful with what you’ve been taught and told about transformation because much of it takes us in exactly the wrong direction.” Our challenge as communities of transformation is to remind each other to take those different tacks. Such as:
- It’s about breathing rather than becoming better.
- It’s about patience not perfection
- It’s about depth not dominance.
- It’s about attention not improvement.
That part about attention instead of improvement is especially important. It’s so easy to get transformation mixed up with fixing. And fixing is transformation’s biggest foe. Trying to purify or perfect ourselves is the surest way to stay stuck. The pursuit of purity and perfection focuses us on our inadequacy and inferiority, causing us to overlook those unexpected guests that Henri-Frederic speaks of.
And, friends, we don’t want to miss those unexpected guests! Those seeds brought by the wind and those passing birds are the partners that make transformation possible. They help us notice new paths. They invite us to walk with a new step. They awaken in us new songs. They remind us that transformation is not something we do alone. They assure us that transformation doesn’t have to be a long and lonely struggle, but instead can be more like learning a new dance with a new friend. All we have to do is trust, take the hand of that “unknown God” and follow its lead.
So, friends, this month, leave some room on that dance floor of yours. Keep your eyes peeled. See attention and attending as your greatest assets and tools. And when that unexpected guest reaches out its hand, don’t be afraid.
The Gift of Justice & Equity
Here we go again.
Another injustice.
Even more inequity exposed.
So much pain.
So many issues.
So little equality.
And so, so many people with certainty.
I wish I had it. Don’t you?
The crystal-clear clarity
of who’s right and who’s wrong.
Every aspect of their argument
neatly lined up.
Nothing at all left to doubt.
But when I wake,
so much ambivalence shares my bed.
So weary am I of having to announce my position right away.
So worried about my limited view.
So concerned that my people
will no longer consider me one of their own
if I express my doubts.
But answer I must.
Isn’t that true?
What does justice look like in this case?
What is the next right step?
What is the correct point of view?
Just put my mind to it.
Reason will guide me
and show me the way.
But what if we’ve got the starting point all wrong?
What if my mind – and yours – is not enough?
What if the place to begin is not
“How do I answer these questions?”
But “Who do I need
to help me think them through?”
This is the plea of that lawyer
serving those on death row.
“Get proximate!” he pleads.
To change the world,
we must get close to those on the margins.
We must hear what they have to say.
We must see the world with their weary eyes.
Amen, cry those Latin American priests
who placed the word liberation
in front of their theology.
Blessed are the poor, they teach,
not just because they will inherit the earth,
but because they view our earthly woes
most clearly.
Their gift to me, to you, to us
is to remember that the answers to injustice
arise from relationship,
as much as, if not more than,
from reason.
Who, not how.
Who, not how.
What if that is the place to begin?
What if this is the way
we change the world?
