Reflections

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Monk in the World Guest Post Series

Monk in the World Guest Post: Kreg Yingst

I am delighted to share another beautiful submission to the Monk in the World guest post series from the community. Our reflection this week comes from Kreg Yingst whose block prints of Mary are featured in Christine’s forthcoming book Birthing the Holy: Wisdom from Mary for Creativity and Renewal. Read on for Kreg’s reflection “The Creative Act as Spiritual Praxis*” “Go, sit in your cell, and your cell will teach you everything.” – Abba Moses Some of the most magnificent works in art history have been the beautifully illuminated Psalters of the Middle Ages. These prayerbooks were for kings, queens,

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March 16, 2022
Abbess love notes

Celebrate the Feast of St. Patrick with Us! ~ A Love Note From Your Online Abbess

Dearest monks, artists, and pilgrims, This Thursday is the Feast of St. Patrick. After two years without St. Patrick’s Day parades in Ireland, they are returning this year to great celebration.  We are so delighted to be welcoming Irish poet and musician Mícheál ‘Moley’ Ó Súilleabháin who will be offering a free online event for our community to celebrate the Feast of St. Patrick through poetry, storytelling, and song. He is the author of Early Music. This excerpt about St. Patrick is from my book The Soul’s Slow Ripening: 12 Celtic Practices for Seeking the Sacred.  The Call of St. Patrick  Patrick is the patron saint of

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March 13, 2022

“Breath Prayer” Honored by Spirituality & Practice

Christine’s most recent book, Breath Prayer: An Ancient Practice for the Everyday Sacred was named one of the best spiritual books of 2021 by Spirituality & Practice! Christine joins an impressive list of contemplative writers including Carl McColman, Cynthia Bourgeault, John Philip Newel, and poet Amanda Gorman. Click here to see the full list and read the review.

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March 10, 2022
Monk in the World Guest Post Series

Monk in the World Guest Post: Marianne Patrevito

I am delighted to share another beautiful submission to the Monk in the World guest post series from the community. Read on for Marianne Patrevito’s reflection “Being Present to the Process.”  In the first light of an early spring morning, I stood looking out of my kitchen window.  Resting my eyes on the creek bordering our yard, I see glimpses of geese floating in the still, cold water. Inhaling the quiet peaceful time of a few mindful moments, I pause. Reflecting, I am infused with the grace of dawn breaking as I listen for the sounds and sights coming to life in

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March 9, 2022

Update About In-Person Programs ~ A Love Note from Your Online Abbess

Dearest monks and pilgrims, Now that the pandemic seems to be (at least temporarily) subsiding many of you are looking for meaningful travel opportunities. We decided early on in 2022 to cancel all of the in-person programs we had scheduled. There were several reasons for this — it takes an enormous amount of work to plan for these pilgrimages and to keep having them delayed the last couple of years hasn’t been sustainable for us so we have chosen to focus our energy in other directions for the time being. The pandemic is still ongoing and new variants can emerge

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March 8, 2022
Abbess love notes

The Many Faces of Mary ~ A Love Note from Your Online Abbess

Dearest monks, artists, and pilgrims, Next Saturday I am leading a retreat on three of Mary’s names or titles: Untier of Knots, Our Lady of Silence, and Madonna Protectress. When we explore the many ways Mary has been experienced, we open ourselves to those gifts within ourselves as well. Mary calls us to find the place within where we can loosen our constrictions, the sanctuary of the heart where we can rest in deep silence, and the courage to create strong boundaries and utter the sacred no to all that depletes us and takes out energy away from our sacred yes.  This

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March 6, 2022

Monk in the World Guest Post: Christina Campbell

I am delighted to share another beautiful submission to the Monk in the World guest post series from the community. Read on for Christina Campbell’s reflection “Finding a Place of Belonging.” As a self-proclaimed “mountain gal,” moving to Iowa 12 years ago was more than a career move but rather one to preserve our family unit. We moved to the prairie from the mountains of Montana to focus on family as we’d been rushing here and there with two full-time, intense careers and 3 young children spending more time with other families or daycare than they did at home. My

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March 2, 2022
Lift Every Voice Book Club

Lift Every Voice: Contemplative Writers of Color – March 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.  Womanist Midrash: A Reintroduction to the

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March 1, 2022
Abbess love notes

The Saints in Walgreens ~ A Love Note from Your Online Abbess

Dearest monks, artists, and pilgrims, Ash Wednesday is this week and we will embark on our Lenten journey The Love of Thousands: Honoring Angels, Saints, and Ancestors.  Many of you feel a deep kinship with Abbey of the Arts because of our love of mystics and the saints and the ways we cultivate connections to those wise guides beyond the veil. This happens in many ways including pilgrimage, presence, and . . . relics. Relics may seem just like that – relics of another era, but these bits of clothing, hair, nails, and bones of the saint that have been revered

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February 27, 2022

Monk in the World Guest Post: Karen Luke Jackson

I am delighted to share another beautiful submission to the Monk in the World guest post series from the community. Read on for Karen Luke Jackson’s reflection “Lovers of God: Free Women.” A ten-foot wall separated the small red brick retreat house from the forty-year-old monastery, home to cloistered nuns in Greenville, South Carolina. Sister Mary waved as I pulled into the driveway. She wore a tan tunic belted at her waist with a rope. Her hair, cropped short and combed away from her face, hinted of gray. I guessed she was in her early fifties, a few years older

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February 23, 2022

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