To Hear Our Calling Through Creation*
Holy One,
bless us with the wisdom
to live fully as the people you created us to be,
with no doubt or hesitation.
Help us to become people who know our sacred purpose like
an oak tree possesses majesty,
an owl owns the night,
a stream quietly sings,
and marigolds lift their faces with joy.
May the fireflies light our way in the darkness,
may the morning glory spark gratitude for a new day,
may the witness of feather and hoof,
leaf and light, reveal to us what it means to be
truly, wholly, fully ourselves.
Break open the sacred seed of your Spirit planted deep within us.
May we cherish the badger who ambles across the earth,
the raven painting the sky,
the horse galloping over the meadow,
and note how they spark our own longing
to run or fly into your arms,
you who know our name,
the One who has always been etched in our hearts
from the very first moment.
Dearest dancing monks, artists, and pilgrims,
Lent begins on Wednesday and we will be journeying through the Earth, Our Original Monastery companion retreat in community. Earth offers us symbols and reminders of who we are most deeply called to be. We will listen together for how raven, oak, and marigold all call to us and reveal a holy direction.
Here is an adapted excerpt from the book:
The pale flowers of the dogwood outside this window are saints . . . the bass and trout hiding in the deep pools of the river are canonized by their beauty and their strength. The lakes hidden among the hills are saints, and the sea too is a saint who praises God without interruption in her majestic dance.
—Thomas Merton, New Seeds of Contemplation
The poet David Whyte has a beautiful line in his poem “What to Remember When Waking” where he asks, “Why are we the one terrible part of creation privileged to refuse our own flowering?” He is calling us to awareness. Imagine that everything created was formed with this natural impulse or instinct toward its own flowering into fullness. Why do we, as human beings, work so hard to resist our calling?
After the quote that begins this chapter, Thomas Merton goes on to write: “For me to be a saint means to be myself. Therefore the problem of sanctity and salvation is in fact the problem of finding out who I am and of discovering my true self. Trees and animals have no problem. God makes them what they are without consulting them, and they are perfectly satisfied. With us it is different. God leaves us free to be whatever we like. We can be ourselves or not, as we please. We are at liberty to be real, or to be unreal. We may be true or false, the choice is ours.” The animals don’t spend time in discernment; the trees don’t go off on retreat to listen to their calling. They simply are exactly as they were created to be, and in that simple witness, they reveal a path of yielding, of not resisting, and of simply allowing themselves to unfold as intended.
We need time in silence, away from the distractions of daily life. We need guides who can help us to identify and celebrate our gifts. We need wise ones who can help us identify our shadow material—those places of resistance and refusal to be who we are most called to be.
The animals and the elements live their fullness without holding back, and in them, we can discover what it truly means to become a saint, to be fully ourselves, as Merton writes. The trees and flowers do not try to be other than they were created to be. They teach us how to live out our own sainthood by no longer refusing our true nature. To become a saint means to embrace our essential nature and calling in the world, the vessels through which we carry out our callings. Mechtild of Magdeburg, a thirteenth-century German mystic and member of the Beguine movement, wrote, “The truly wise person kneels at the feet of all creatures and is not afraid to endure the mockery of others.”
Merton says that to be a saint means to be myself. This sounds so simple. And yet, we know how challenging it is, how many obstacles we set before ourselves, how many layers of fear and resistance have built up over the years, how much our egos are attached to being viewed in a certain way, and how tight we hold on to certain images and identities.
As you sit with these words from Merton, I invite you to listen for this call to be fully yourself and to listen for how best to get out of your own way. Let your heart soften into suppleness, readying yourself to receive a new insight, a new vision. Listen for the wisdom that arises in the stillness, and then share it with your community.
This feels so challenging—in fact, it’s a lifelong journey. Here is the wisdom Merton offers to us: To be fully human means to live in connection to nature and receive her wisdom and guidance. To live among the trees and the rhythm of sun and moon, to see the rise and fall of the tides and the strength of mountain presence, is to slowly feel these things within us. To recognize them as teachers and mentors provides inspiration for how to follow this path of authenticity for ourselves. Creation is the original sainthood, the witness to what it means to be fully oneself without forcing or holding back.
To become a saint doesn’t mean to be some contrived image of holiness, practicing your faith in ways that imitate others. It means finding your own unique expression in the world, the seed that was planted within you when you were born. You are a revelation of the Sacred, and there is only one revelation just like you. Nature can help you to claim and live into this truth.
Please join us for our Lent retreat. We begin the journey on Wednesday with a live opening session. This retreat is rich with new additional practices from Polly Paton-Brown and Cassidhe Hart. We will have a lovingly facilitated forum for sharing and questions as well.
With great and growing love,
Christine
Christine Valters Paintner, OblSB, PhD, REACE
*Blessing is from Christine’s book A Book of Everyday Blessings: 100 Prayers for Dancing Monks, Artists, and Pilgrims (Ave Maria Press) and is featured in our Earth Monastery prayer cycle
