Word for Today: Momentum On a true pilgrimage, we soon discover that the journey has its own rhythm and momentum. We realize, if our hearts are listening, that there are secret destinations that reveal themselves as our path unfolds. —Christine Valters Paintner, The Soul of a Pilgrim: Eight Practices for the Journey Within Reflective Question: As you set out upon your pilgrimage, can you leave behind your maps and guides, your desire to know beforehand which path to follow, and loosen your grip on plans and certainties? Next steps: Let the word, quote, and question inspire your creative practice (Download the list

Saturday, April 25, 2015: Challenge You have responded to the call of pilgrimage in your life and taken a journey out into the wilderness. You will face temptation. The challenge is whether you can stay awake and present enough to notice when this is happening. —Christine Valters Paintner, The Soul of a Pilgrim: Eight Practices for the Journey Within Reflective Question: What is your favorite form of self-numbing that takes your awareness away from what is happening both within and without? Can you fast from this for the season ahead to stay present to how God is moving through you?

Word for Today: Borderlands Thresholds, liminal space, being on the edge, living in the borderlands when we have a spirituality that is committed to exploring these rich places, is the opposite of comfortable, safe, secure, boundaries, rigid, and unquestioned. —Christine Valters Paintner, The Soul of a Pilgrim: Eight Practices for the Journey Within  Reflective Question: Can you acknowledge that you simply don’t know what is to come? Can you allow yourself to surrender to something bigger and more meaningful, even as it calls us away from familiar patterns that are loved? Next steps: Let the word, quote, and question inspire your

Word for Today: Possibility When we embark on an intentional journey like a pilgrimage, we are making a commitment to live in the space of threshold. Threshold is the liminal place, the place of not knowing how things will turn out. I believe it is the place of possibility. —Christine Valters Paintner, The Soul of a Pilgrim: Eight Practices for the Journey Within Reflective Question: As you continue on your inner pilgrimage, what are the thresholds of your own life? Which thresholds are calling you to cross but feel difficult to face or challenging to imagine? Next steps: Let the

Word for Today: Stillness The Desert Mothers and Fathers valued their monastic cell as a vitally important place. As with all things, they view their cells as a way to experience stillness and as a place to quiet their inner life. —Christine Valters Paintner, The Soul of a Pilgrim: Eight Practices for the Journey Within Reflective Question: Can you stay present to the storm of your emotional life, all those feelings, thoughts and voices you do daily battle with? Can you make space to feel your grief and to welcome in your feelings of helplessness, your rage at injustice? Next

Word for Today: Mystery When you explore thresholds, it’s about resting into mystery. Learn to live in the liminal space where the old is released but the new hasn’t come into being. —Christine Valters Paintner, The Soul of a Pilgrim: Eight Practices for the Journey Within Reflective Question: How do you respond when you find yourself in this mysterious space of unknowing? Do you try to analyze, order and make sense of the experience? Or do you surrender into the mystery, living in God’s time, rather than your own? Next steps: Let the word, quote, and question inspire your creative practice (Download