Dearest monks, artists, and pilgrims, Next Saturday, February 19th we are delighted to welcome Wisdom Council member, musician, and psalmist Richard Bruxvoort Colligan to lead a Midrash Lab on Psalm 23. Richard’s music is featured on our CDs and in many of our retreats. Midrash is the practice of bringing sacred imagination to a scriptural text to engage it on a deep and personal level. Read on for Richard’s introduction to midrash practice celebrating God as Midwife. As a student of the psalms, one thing that keeps me enthralled is the wildly diverse models and metaphors for the Holy One. Shepherd, Holy City, Gardener, Warrior, Night Song… 

“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

Dearest monks, artists, and pilgrims, I first met Lindsay Sudeikis at a Spiritual Directors International conference in Seattle in 2019. She was co-leading a workshop on ancestral lineage healing. It was a beautiful program and at the end I went up to introduce myself and thank her for the experience.  We discovered we had much in common. She was immersed in Catholic mystical practices and traditions (and had been a nun in a contemplative order for a period of her life). Her ancestors were from Lithuania (Baltic like my Latvian ones) and from Ireland where she travels regularly to spend