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Monk in the World Guest Post Series

Monk in the World Guest Post: Julie Cicora

I am delighted to share another beautiful submission to the Monk in the World guest post series from the community. Read on for Julie Cicora’s reflection on Contemplative Knitting Practice After I was ordained to the priesthood, a good friend gave me the book Beginning to Pray by Anthony Bloom. She knew I was relatively new to prayer and that I was struggling to maintain a regular prayer practice.  I was delighted to find a story in the book about a woman who complains to the author that she feels an absence in the silence every time she tries to

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Abbess love notes

Exploring the Wild Land Within – A Love Note from Your Online Abbess

Dearest monks, artists, and pilgrims, We are delighted to be returning to our monthly Lift Every Voice book club exploring contemplative voices of color and enriching our perspective on the mystical tradition. Our featured book for February is The Wild Land Within: Cultivating Wholeness through Spiritual Practice by Lisa Colón Delay and she joined Claudia Love Mair and myself for a video conversation. (You can also now listen to these episodes as audio podcasts and view the weekly reflection questions on the book page and in the Facebook group.)  As always it was very meaningful to discuss the book with the author and help break

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Monk in the World Guest Post Series

Monk in the World Guest Post: Jan Spragge

I am delighted to share another beautiful submission to the Monk in the World guest post series. Read on for Jan Spragge’s reflection on “Desert-ing.” It’s 3am and I’m standing on my back porch looking out at thick fog edging the water. Somewhere out there is a lone goose. I hear her. I hear honking her plaintiff call. Does she hear mine? Does she feel my increased bodily restlessness in these nights, and the way I rise to meet myself with conscious intention to create the space to stay in this moment and let go of the old sticky ‘need

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Lift Every Voice Book Club

Lift Every Voice: Contemplative Writers of Color – February Video Discussion and Book Group Materials Now Available

Join Abbey of the Arts for a monthly conversation on how increasing our diversity of perspectives on contemplative practice can enrich our understanding and experience of the Christian mystical tradition.  Christine Valters Paintner is joined by author Claudia Love Mair for a series of video conversations. Each month they take up a new book by or about a voice of color. The community is invited to purchase and read the books in advance and participate actively in this journey of deepening, discovery, and transformation.  Click here to view this month’s video discussion along with questions for reflection.  In The Wild Land Within, spiritual companion

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Abbess love notes

Join Us for a Virtual Celtic Pilgrimage ~ A Love Note from Your Online Abbess

Dearest monks, artists, and pilgrims, Tomorrow is the eve of St. Brigid’s feast day, a threshold time in the Celtic imagination where the doors to the Otherworld open wider and we are invited to rest into this liminal space and listen for our heart’s true calling.  As the pandemic continues on, many of you have asked us if we would consider creating a virtual pilgrimage. We are delighted to invite you into this sacred space with us. Nine days of giving yourself the gift of dwelling in time outside of time and letting your imagination bring you on a journey of

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Abbess love notes

The sky poured down beauty this morning

“The breezes at dawn have secrets to tell you, don’t go back to sleep.” – Rumi Photos at Silver Strand Beach, Barna, County Galway, Ireland © Christine Valters Paintner

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Blessed Feast Day of St. Muirgen(The Mermaid Saint)

Dearest monks, artists, and pilgrims, I come to the sea to listen to ancient rhythms and the primordial voice. I come because it is exquisite medicine. I come because in another life I was a mermaid or a Selkie, diving beneath the dark surface of the cold water to find new worlds waiting. I come because this adopted home of mine is an island and the edge where sand and shore meet is always a portal. I come because when I sit and watch the waves roll and roil life makes sense, chatter quiets, I can drink from the well

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Contemplative Living

Christine’s Reflection on Honoring the Body

Christine has a new reflection published at Bearings journal online on Honoring the Body: “My story is not a one-way hero’s journey. I have not overcome or done battle; I don’t want to be anybody’s inspiration. Stories that give the impression that one can achieve victory over the body’s vulnerabilities do a great disservice to the collective imagination by pushing away the discomfort of grief. I want my story to reveal that tenderness and surrender instead of fortitude and domination are signs of strength. I want my story to say that yielding to my body’s needs rather than forcing myself

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Monk in the World Guest Post Series

Monk in the World Guest Post: Noelle Boughton

I am delighted to share another beautiful submission to the Monk in the World guest post series from the community. Read on for Noelle Boughton’s reflection, “My COVID Transformation.” In early 2021, we’d been hearing for a year that COVID was a global time of transformation. That was certainly my sense going into it the previous March, and I was so excited to see how it would transform my life and that around me. In fact, my spirit was dancing with the possibility of what could be!  Then I smacked into reality. I was working in a congregation that had never

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Introduction to Birthing the Holy: Exploring the Sacred Feminine and Archetypes

Seminary of the Wild recently welcomed Abbey of the Arts online abbess, artist, contemplative, and prolific author, Christine Valters Paintner as a guest Wild Luminary speaker. Christine shares from her new book exploring the archetypes of Mary and the sacred feminine. “The sacred feminine is not at the expense of the masculine. We need both in healthy balance to one another. The feminine values qualities of intuition, dreaming, receiving, and resting among others. We all hold the feminine and masculine within ourselves. Mary offers us many faces of this sacred feminine presence and can help us to cultivate a slower,

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