Abbey of the Arts

Transformative Living through Contemplative & Expressive Arts

  • Welcome
    • Prayer Cycle
      • Introduction to the Earth Monastery Prayer Cycle
      • Day 1 Morning & Evening Prayer:
        Earth as the Original Cathedral
      • Day 2 Morning & Evening Prayer:
        Earth as the Original Scriptures
      • Day 3 Morning & Evening Prayer:
        Earth as the Original Saints
      • Day 4 Morning & Evening Prayer:
        Earth as the Original Spiritual Directors
      • Day 5 Morning & Evening Prayer:
        Earth as the Original Icon
      • Day 6 Morning & Evening Prayer:
        Earth as the Original Sacrament
      • Day 7 Morning & Evening Prayer:
        Earth as the Original Liturgy
      • Prayer Cycle Leader Resources
    • About the Abbey
    • About Christine Valters Paintner
    • About John Valters Paintner
    • About the Wisdom Council
    • Monk Manifesto
    • Join the Holy Disorder of Dancing Monks
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  • Books
    • Sacred Time:
      Embracing an Intentional Way of Life
    • The Wisdom of Wild Grace: Poems
    • Earth, Our Original Monastery:
      Cultivating Wonder and Gratitude through Intimacy with Nature
    • Dreaming of Stones: Poems
    • The Soul's Slow Ripening:
      12 Celtic Practices for Seeking the Sacred
    • The Wisdom of the Body:
      A Contemplative Journey to Wholeness for Women
    • Illuminating the Way:
      Embracing the Wisdom of Monks and Mystics
    • The Soul of a Pilgrim:
      Eight Practices for the Journey Within
    • Eyes of the Heart:
      Photography as a Christian Contemplative Practice
    • The Artist's Rule: Nurturing Your Creative Soul with Monastic Wisdom
    • Desert Mothers and Fathers: Early Christian Wisdom Sayings Annotated & Explained
    • Lectio Divina–The Sacred Art: Transforming Words and Images into Heart-Centered Prayer
    • Water, Wind, Earth & Fire: The Christian Practice of Praying with the Elements
    • Awakening the Creative Spirit:
      Bringing the Arts to Spiritual Direction
    • Lectio Divina: Contemplative Awakening & Awareness
  • Poetry | Art | Music
    • Music + DVD
    • Poetry by Christine Valters Paintner
    • Poetry Videos
    • Dancing Monk Icons
    • Other Art Collaborations
      • Monk in the World art series by Kristin Noelle
      • Saints & Animals art series by David Hollington
      • Sacred Time art series by Alexi Francis
      • Mary block print art series by Kreg Yingst
  • Programs
    • Walk the Ancient Paths: Pilgrimage
      • Monk in the World (Ireland)
      • Writing on the Wild Edges (Ireland)
      • Poetry and the Sacred Garden of the World (Ireland)
      • Vienna Monk in the World (Austria)
      • Hildegard of Bingen (Germany)
    • Live Programs and Spiritual Retreats
      • Awakening the Creative Spirit: Experiential Education for Spiritual Directors in the Expressive Arts (Northwest)
    • Community Online Retreats
      • Lift Every Voice: Contemplative Writers of Color
      • The Way of the Hermit:
        A Spiritual Survival Guide for Dark Times
        with Kayleen Asbo, PhD
      • The Spiral Way:
        Celtic Spirituality and the Creative Imagination
      • Journey with the Desert Mothers and Fathers (Lent 2021)
      • Sacred Time: Embracing an Intentional Way of Life (Spring 2021)
    • Self-Study Online Spiritual Retreats
      • Creative Flourishing in the Heart of the Desert:
        An Online Retreat with St. Hildegard of Bingen
      • Dreaming of the Sea:
        A women’s discernment journey through the story of the Selkie
      • Earth, Our Original Monastery
        A Companion Retreat to the Book (SELF-STUDY)
      • Exile and Coming Home:
        An Archetypal Journey through the Scriptures
      • Eyes of the Heart:
        Photography as Contemplative Practice
        (Companion retreat to the book)
      • Honoring Saints and Ancestors:
        Online Retreat for the Season of Remembrance
      • Lectio Divina:
        The Sacred Art of Reading the World
      • A Midwinter God:
        Making a Conscious Underworld Journey
      • Sacred Rhythms of Sky, Sun, Sea & Stone:
        A Creative Retreat with the Elements (SELF-STUDY)
      • Sacred Seasons:
        A Yearlong Journey through the Celtic Wheel of the Year
      • The Soul of a Pilgrim:
        Eight Practices for the Journey Within
        (a companion retreat to the book)
      • The Soul's Slow Ripening: 12 Celtic Practices for Seekers of the Sacred (a companion retreat to the book)
      • Water, Wind, Earth & Fire
      • Watershed Moments
        in the Hebrew and Christian Scriptures
      • Way of the Monk, Path of the Artist:
        A 12-Week Companion Retreat to The Artist's Rule
      • The Wisdom of the Body:
        A 10-Week Online Companion Retreat to the Book
      • The Wisdom of Mary and the Sacred Feminine
  • Calendar
  • Reflections
  • Contact

Patheos

Advent Practices: Tending to Creation (Week One)

For the season of Advent I will be offering a weekly column at Patheos on practices for Advent to nurture our intimacy with creation:

As we enter these four weeks of Advent, we cross into a holy time when the scriptures are filled with images of expectancy as we await the coming of a God who enters into the heart of this world. I invite you during these next four weeks to embrace this season as a time to tend to your relationship to creation. As we anticipate the way holiness becomes enfleshed, we are called to reflect on the ways we honor the sacred embodied in the world, what theologian Sallie McFague describes as God’s body.

In 2003, the Canadian Catholic Bishops published a pastoral letter on the Christian ecological imperative. They described three responses to which we are called:ascetic, prophetic, and contemplative. Reclaiming a healthy asceticism calls us to conversion and recognizing how we must live more simply to put less of a strain on earth’s resources. Cultivating a prophetic vision means to examine our collective impact and to name acts of injustice.

The third is nurturing a contemplative response to creation, which I will be focusing on here for the season of Advent. A contemplative response means bringing ourselves fully present to the sacred voice that speaks through trees, mountains, and creatures. It means cultivating a sense of spaciousness in our lives so we have time to nurture an intimate relationship with the natural world.

The readings for the first Sunday of Advent always convey a sense of urgency and the need to awaken and stay alert. This first week’s readings exhort: “It is the hour now for you to awake from sleep” (Rom. 13) and “Therefore, stay awake!” (Mt. 24). Where have you been asleep to creation as the very matrix in which you live and breathe? How are you being called to awaken to a deeper sense of kinship to earth and her creatures? Where have you fallen asleep to the holy presence shimmering through nature?

In the Cherokee tradition, the element associated with the time of dawn and awakening is air or wind. As we rise each morning we are reminded of our own call to awaken to the needs around us. We inhale that first deep breath of the day and remember that we are sustained moment by moment through the gift of breath. The dawn is the time of promise, when the world seems full of possibility. During Advent we are invited to awaken to hope and new beginnings.

The word inspiration comes from the Latin root spiritus, which means Spirit or breath. To be inspired is to be filled with the spirit or to be breathed into. The Spirit continues to move and breathe into each one of us, offering inspiration each moment of each day.

The ancient Celtic monks practiced peregrinatio, a form of pilgrimage where they would set out in rudderless boat without oars and let the wind carry them to the “place of their resurrection.” Perhaps part of the Advent call is to release our carefully constructed plans and awaken to the wildness of God’s creative call.

When we awaken and breathe deeply, we become alert and present to the grace of each moment, we feel ourselves inhaled and exhaled by God. The breath is ruah, the breath of God enlivening the world.  Are you living in a way that draws deeply on the gifts that enfold and sustain you? Breathe in and allow the element of air to guide your response to these questions.

Stop by Patheos to see the rest of this article>>

Follow these links to find the whole Advent series:

Week One – Tending Creation>>

Week Two — Following the Fire>>

Week Three — Water's Wisdom>>

Week Four — Considering Our Earthiness>>

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5 Comments November 25, 2010

Upcoming Programs

The Way of the Hermit:
A Spiritual Survival Guide for Dark Times

January 22-24, 2021
with Kayleen Asbo, PhD

The Spiral Way:
Celtic Spirituality and the Creative Imagination

Hosted by the Rowe Center
February 1-21, 2021
with Christine Valters Paintner, PhD

Recent Reflections

  • Hildy Tales 3: Ní heolas go haontíos ~ by John Valters Paintner
  • Humility + Join us today for live prayer! ~ A Love Note from Your Online Abbess
  • Hildy Tales 2: Tús maith leath na hoibre – by John Valters Paintner
  • New Book Club for 2021: Lift Every Voice ~ A Love Note from Your Online Abbess
  • Hildy Tales One: Dia dhuit, is mise Hildy! by John Valters Paintner, Your Online Prior

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