It seems this week I am short on my own words and am drawn to lots of poetry and images I have been taking of spring. Part of it is that I have been feeling in a very reflective and inward mood, wanting to let things bubble inside of me, not quite ready to lay them out here. Besides, do I really need to say anything when the world is this beautiful? -Christine Valters Paintner @ Abbey of the Arts
Ninth Duino Elegy (excerpt) Earth, isn’t this what you want? To arise in us, invisible? Is it not your dream, to enter us so wholly there’s nothing left outside us to see? What, if not transformation, is your deepest purpose? Earth, my love, I want that too. Believe me, no more of your springtimes are needed to win me over – even one flower is more than enough. Before I was named I belonged to you. I seek no other law but yours, and know I can trust the death you will bring. -Rainer Maria Rilke from In Praise of
Have you ever looked closely at the purple petals of an Iris in the golden afternoon sun? Have you seen how luminescent they are, glowing from a source deep within? Have you watched the way they fold themselves over gently, inviting you to pause for a moment and embrace a sense of wonder? Have you noticed the way everything lights up under your deep and loving gaze? Have you taken a breath this day and rediscovered the luminous world waiting for you to just pay attention? -Christine Valters Paintner @ Abbey of the Arts
Testimony (for my daughters) I want to tell you that the world is still beautiful. I tell you that despite children raped on city streets, shot down in school rooms, despite the slow poisons seeping from old and hidden sins into our air, soil, water, despite the thinning film that encloses our aching world. Despite my own terror and despair. I want you to know that spring is no small thing, that the tender grasses curling like a baby’s fine hairs around your fingers are a recurring miracle. I want to tell you that the river rocks shine like
This is from Barbara Cawthorne Crafton’s Geranium Farm daily email, originally discovered at Possible Water: Well, when would be the best time to commit a crime? Wouldn’t it be right after another one had been committed in another place nearby, when everyone’s attention was focussed on the first one? Such a plan makes enough terrible sense that even a person whose mind is diseased enough to do such things could follow the logic. And, as we know today, it worked — just well enough, for a shooter who doesn’t mind dying himself — at Virginia Tech’s Norris Hall. So there
Tomorrow I head off to the Spiritual Directors International Conference being held this year in Vancouver, BC. I am especially looking forward to my workshops on First Nations cosmology and one on animal companionship and spirituality. When I return Sunday I have two projects I really need to focus some time and energy on, so I am going to take a blogging break until the end of next week just to clear some space for myself. -Christine Valters Paintner @ Abbey of the Arts
A couple of years ago it occured to me that we spend a lot of time in church talking about what practices to take on for Lent, but when Easter comes, the glorious season of resurrection, we slip back into our ordinary lives. Hopefully we arrive transformed by our Lenten journey, but the season of Easter is not just that amazing day when the tomb was discovered empty. We celebrate Easter for 50 days, days that grow longer and more brilliant as blossoming continues and we head toward the summer solstice. What might it mean to practice this resurrection in our everyday lives?
I love the wide space of Holy Saturday. Lingering between the suffering and death of Jesus on Friday and the vigil Saturday night proclaiming the return of the Easter fire. For me Holy Saturday evokes much about the human condition. The ways in which we are called to let go of things or people, identities or securities and then wonder what will rise up out of the ashes of our lives. The suffering that we experience because of pain or grief or great sorrow and we don’t know if we will grasp joy again. How often do we simply wait and hope that
Please visit this abridged version of Peace Stations of the Cross written by Megan McKenna which I found especially beautiful and moving. Peace to you this day as we enter into the fullness of death.
I was praying this morning about Holy Thurday, about what it means to me that Jesus took bread and broke it, and shared it with his friends. He said this is my body. He poured the wine and said this is my blood. These words have rippled through time and woven us together in a common narrative. I thought about the ways that sharing of food across cultures and religious traditions has great significance. Meals become sacred acts. Breaking bread and pouring wine are sacraments because they immerse us in the nourishment of all that is holy and remind us that any divisions between us
