Publishing these in the middle of the next week gives me time to reflect on the week that’s passed, reevaluate my journey and see what changes need to be made in my spiritual life. It’s a when, not an if. There are usually a few. I think I’ve put writing in the center of the labyrinth since even my spirituality involves an excess of writing, but I feel that there must be more that I’m looking for when I get to the center. I may take a walk later this week (or more probably next) at one of our local labyrinths.
I’m also a little stuck on the exercises in Felicia Day’s book Embrace Your Weird. She suggests filming yourself. (Not going to happen.) But I still need to step back and watch myself with new eyes and then answer her questions. This guide is for fostering creativity, but I find that the parts of my life are so interconnected that I can’t help but reflect on my faith and spirit. I’ll pick it back up this afternoon when I get home from my errands. I think I’ll do my daily readings then as well.
I still haven’t been able to answer what it is I’m being called to, although I feel the tugging.
If you look back at last week’s labyrinth and compare it to this week’s, you’ll see what I saw: this week’s is a lot less active than last week’s.
And that’s okay.
Every week, every day is different, and while sometimes we are overwhelmed with activity, other times we are Baby Bear levels of just right (thanks Felicia Day for that description), and often we won’t know how we feel about each until the week is over. That was one reason that I chose to share the previous week’s labyrinth, after the week was over, and I had a couple of days to reflect and process how things went. This is titled Week 3, but I am living in the middle of Week 4.
This has given me a chance to look back and reassess. Am I reading enough? What am I praying for and should I pray more? Should I add people to my prayer list? I began grouping on Monday and this will continue indefinitely twice a month. I was confronted with taking action, and realized that I really do need a little intentional time; time to intentionally spend with G-d, in prayer, in meditation, contemplation, and discernment. That sounds like a lot of work! It can be, but it can also be a time to rest in the spirit, and see things from different angles and perspectives. Rest in the Word and in words.
How is your third and half-fourth weeks of Lent progressing? Are you feeling your way through the desert?
I’ve added another downloadable sheet to the home page. This is the coloring sheet I designed for Gish‘s Book Bash in reference to Florida’s discriminatory law not allowing schools – children and faculty – to say gay. I don’t understand a society that is afraid of a little word. Anyway, it IS okay to say gay, and more importantly, it IS OKAY to BE GAY (or any of the other LGBTQIA orientations and genders).
Last week was kind of extraordinary. I am making great effort to attend Mass on Sundays on Facebook regularly, religiously if you will. There is a routine of the mass structure at our parish, and I’m sure it parallels many parishes: Music, Announcements, Prayer for the Deceased, Stand, Processional, Mass begins.
When there is a change to this, I can tell simply by who is milling about near the altar during the first musical portion. On this second Sunday of Lent, I saw our parish trustees. I felt tense. I felt anxiety creeping in and when they approached the ambo and stated that they’d be reading a letter from the Bishop, it did not help my tension and anxiety.
As I’ve mentioned previously (probably too many for some), my parish priest died suddenly in October and we’ve been waiting to hear about a new priestly appointment. This was that announcement. I held my breath, not that I have any control over the choice or know many of the priests very well, but still, I waited with literal bated breath.
It turns out that I do know this priest who will soon become my new priest. I actually cried. I was happy (and am) that he will be joining our parish. I’m feeling excited as I write this, nervous but not apprehensive and I think the announcement was the catalyst that set my week on the right path, although it was a very busy week planned (as is this one).
You will see from the labyrinth photos that I ran out of room and needed TWO more extensions. Unbelievable. The one negative was the my writing retreat scheduled for next week was cancelled, but again, I can muddle through and self-direct my own writing retreat while simultaneously doing a writing/reading scavenger hunt.
I had several close moments where I felt G-d’s presence palpably, I listened and learned, I wrote and I drew and I kept up with my readings. The week was overflowing with grace and spirit.
Looking back on last week, I am also looking forward to this busy week. Celebrated my son’s twenty-fifth birthday last night and today I am Zooming all day.
I feel good.
Lenten Labyrinth, Week 2. Part 1. (c)2022
Lenten Labyrinth, Week 2. Part 2. (Plus book list) (c)2022
In honor of our common Irish heritage (today anyway), I thought I’d post some original art as well as photos from our very short visit to Dublin, Ireland a few years ago. The photo of the Celtic cross is from the historic landmark at Cranfield Church in Randalstown in Northern Ireland. I would note that we could not get into St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Dublin because you needed tickets which we did not have. That did not stop us from strolling the adjacent park and enjoying the blue sky and sunshine.
Yesterday as I began to look at the new week’s labyrinth I realized how important mass has been to me in more than a spiritual way. You’ll see the picture next Wednesday, but this is what I wrote yesterday morning:
“I do notice that the days I go to mass are filled with other things. Whether it’s errands or prayer or publishing/scheduling here. I am invigorated to do more. I also haven’t felt that for some time.” And in parentheses I added, “This is a busy week though.”
I know I’ve had to push myself to do some things since the fall, and it hasn’t been easy. Of courses, the pandemic hasn’t helped. Like, at all. October has always been an unsettling time for me. What should have been a fully joyous time led in a few short weeks to a devastating time and unconsciously I’ve held that uneasiness yearly. I only recognized it when it was brought up to me and I try to lessen the difficulties by being aware and looking inward. When my priest died this past October, let’s just say that did not help my spirit.
As I write this, I’ve only just realized that his death and my mother’s are exactly two months apart (seventeen years apart though). That’s some coincidence. Or something.
My parish church announced this weekend about the forthcoming appointment of our new pastor, and I didn’t realize the stress and anxiety that I’d held inside myself. The ease I feel now that the appointment is certain is palpable. I’m sure it helps that I am familiar with this new pastor, and I’m looking forward to my continued journey in the faith and the church. I do think that this news has had a positive effect on my spirit and may have given me the punch in the arm I needed to return to my previous level of interaction (in several parts of my life).
Just as it takes one thing to stop us in our tracks or put us off the path, sometimes all we need is that one little (or major) catalyst to jump start us. This was one of them.
I also have two workshops/lectures, one day of reflection, another class, an interfaith meeting, and preparing for a retreat at the end of the month, plus my oldest son’s twenty-fifth birthday. And I’ll be cooking three meals this week, which is a lot for me lately. (Real meals, not hot dogs or pasta. Possibly more on that Friday.)
Here, in the middle of this second week of Lent, I feel an optimism, a hope that my Lenten journey will continue to be meaningful and will set the path for the rest of the year after we mourn the Crucifixion and celebrate the Resurrection in the days and weeks to come.
Have a peaceful and blessed Lent. May the week land gently.
Books are the quietest and most constant of friends; they are the most accesible and wisest of counselors, and the most patient of teachers.
Charles W. Eliot
One week ago was World Book Day, although everyday is a good day to read a book. This is proved by the fact that this is one week late. Things happened, one of which was laziness, but not entirely. Last week was a particularly not great one, but nothing that can’t be overcome.
This is the list of books I read since last Monday. The ones with the asterisk are the ones that I completed before tonight (although most were not read entirely in seven days.)
Daily Reflections for Lent: Not By Bread Alone 2022 by Amy Ekeh and Thomas D. Stegman, SJ
Thirsty and You Gave Me Drink from Clear Faith Publishing, various authors
Quantum by Patricia Cornwell *
Learning to Pray: A Guide for Everyone by Rev. James Martin, SJ
Spin by Patricia Cornwell *
The 1619 Project by Nikole Hannah-Jones, The NY Times Magazine *
The Book of Gutsy Women: Favorite Stories of Courage and Resilience by Hillary Rodham Clinton and Chelsea Clinton
Never Tell by Selena Montgomery (Stacey Abrams) *
Search Me: A Way of the Cross in Solidarity with the LGBTQ Community by John T. Kyler *
Where the Deer and the Antelope Play: The Pastoral Observations of One Ignorant American Who Loves to Walk Outside by Nick Offerman
It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop. –
Confucius
Sunflower. (c)2022
My thought daily are with Ukraine, each morning and throughout the day checking on updates. My thoughts have also been with my parish (and selfishly myself if I’m being completely honest) as the search continues for a new pastor. I wrote a short reflection on Facebook a day or so ago, and I do feel a slight weight lifted as the parish trustees announced on Sunday our new incoming pastor (who will start at the end of April).
A friend described her feelings as “being at ease with the decision” and I would agree with that sentiment. I’m not anxious although it helps that I’m acquainted with the new (to us) pastor and looking forward to his ministry, but of course, my feelings are bittersweet. Fr. Jerry, my only priest so far in my journey would talk during his homilies at funerals as the bittersweetness of the Christian journey: we who are left behind are sad, but the one whose gone home is with Jesus and so how can we resent that.
I’ve written before about my struggle to move forward in my faith and my practices and I’m reminded of something else that Father Jerry so wisely said during funerals.
He has also talked about a life that’s not ended but changed, and I think with this new pastor announcement, I feel that my Catholic journey isn’t ended, but it has changed, and with this resolution, I may be able to be changed and follow this new path. I also feel more reflective things to say on this subject, but my words need a bit more study and discernment.
At the moment as I look around at my messy table and my busy calendar, I hope that I can spend some prayer and meditation time to get back on track for Lent. There are other challenges ahead, and I need to organize myself for them. It may be time for a list; a very, very long list.
Lent is right around the cor – hmm…I guess it’s here.
I’m not ready. My prayer life is struggling, and the idea that I need to make a forty day plan for myself is giving me hives. It’s daunting. Between new bouts of covid isolation keeping me from in person masses and spiritual gatherings and my continuing struggles to come to terms with the sudden death of my priest this past fall, I have been having difficulties in focusing on my prayer life. I read constantly. I finally resumed listening to podcasts this morning while I was setting up my medication. My daughter has a doctor’s appointment tomorrow so my plans for 9am Mass to receive my ashes will need to be adjusted. I made three phone calls yesterday and mailed a letter. I’m not sure what this has to do with Lent or prayer or anything other than keeping the chronic depression at bay.
I’m still at ‘what do I give up‘ part of the process and I just don’t know. With mask mandates ending and war in Ukraine, the giving up decision of my Lent feels superficial and not at all relevant.
Should I stop drinking soda? Watching TV? Starbucks? Giving up the internet for a couple of hours a day? (Heaven forfend!) Cheese? Chocolate? Cigarettes? Alright, that one would be cheating; I don’t smoke. Can I give up being judgmental for forty days? I’m not sure I can manage forty minutes.
What is a worthy of sacrifice that doesn’t strike me as trite or worn out?
However, there are some things that I have worked out: a weekly Scripture series through March, a weekend retreat, reading, and art journaling with the use of a Lenten Labyrinth (pictured below).
Beginning tomorrow, I will read Learning to Pray by Father James Martin, and Life is Messy by Matthew Kelly and a daily devotional: Daily Reflections for Lent: Not by Bread Alone 2022 by Amy Ekah and Thomas Stegman. I’m sure there will be more reading as the days go by, but these three are on my goals list.
I will pray the rosary at least weekly.
I will make one pilgrimage, although I’m not sure to where yet.
I will work diligently on my Labyrinth Prayer Book.
I will attend Sunday Mass on Facebook and commit to attending one daily mass in person during the week.
I will keep up with my labyrinth in the art journal. It is similar to the spiral journals I shared a few years ago after my trip to Wales. I plan on looking at it daily and trying to draw or write something relevant. I have enough copies for a new labyrinth each week.
I also have included a downloadable clean copy on my home page for anyone interested in journaling through Lent. (Sorry about some of the crooked lines.)
(c)2022
I think the most important thing I can impart to readers and to myself is to be easy on ourselves. Focus on the three Lenten principles: prayer, fasting, almsgiving.
St. Brigid may be remembered as turning water into beer or the legend that she midwifed Mary in the birth of Jesus, but for those of us hoping for women’s advancement in the church, she preached to her flock, and founded a monastery for men and women, and became abbess there. Several of her images are shown with her holding a Bishop’s crosier. While there is some dispute if she was an actual bishop, she was the leader of both monasteries and the Abbess of Kildare is considered as the superior general of the monasteries in Ireland. Regardless of her official capacity as a pastor, Brigid’s oratory at Kildare became a centre of religion and learning, and developed into a cathedral city. [1]
Personally, I’m disappointed that when I visited Ireland a few years ago that I was so close to Downpatrick and didn’t visit. Her relics aren’t there any longer (not since 1538) but I still would have liked to have visited especially since the relics of Patrick, Brigid, and Columba (Columcille) had been there and all are said to have been buried there.
Imbolc dates back to ancient times and Celtic tradition has it beginning the night of February 1st and continuing through February 2nd. This speaks volumes, to me at least that this tradition was adopted/co-opted by the early Christians in the Celtic world. February 2nd is Candlemas, which commemorates the presentation of Jesus in the church. Imbolc is about halfway between the winter solstice and the spring equinox and foretells the coming of spring. Groundhog’s Day is February 2nd and he also foretells the coming of spring, whether after six more weeks of winter or right around the corner.
So many things in our myths, traditions, and religions are interconnected; not all of them by chance or coincidence. Some were intentionally brought forward by the church to include the “pagans” in their conversion to Christianity. This feels almost like a “gentle Crusade” rather than at the point of a sword when they encouraged Jews and Muslims.
I’ve just completed reading a Celtic spirituality book that has nine chapters describing different Celtic ways along with the intertwining of Christianity. The second chapter was focused on St. Brigid and what she brought to Celtic spirituality in this author’s opinion: the Sacred Feminine. Celts had a tremendous respect for the feminine and how it balanced the world they lived, and we live in.
The book is an easy read. I chose to read one chapter a day. That let the information gradually process. There is also prayer and an appendix that would lend itself to daily prayer and meditation in the Celtic tradition.
Sacred Earth, Sacred Soul by J. Philip Newell can be found or ordered from bookstores, national and independent. I read most of my books on my Kindle; this is the link for Amazon Kindle’s version.
[1]Herbermann, Charles. St. Brigid of Ireland, Catholic Encyclopedia, 1913. Public Domain.
[In my interpretations of St. Brigid’s religious life, I would appreciate any corrections from those expert in such things.]
Since joining the church I discovered something about Christmas that had, up until then been unknown to me. The Christmas season doesn’t end on Christmas Day, but begins. The twelve days of Christmas aren’t the twelve days preceding December the twenty-fifth, but the twelve days after. Christmas Day is a beginning, not just of the season of Christmas, but of a way of thinking, of letting us move forward in our journeys, becoming more in relationship with Jesus than we had been previously.
In my parish, and in many parishes across the world, there is a visual documentation of this journey, from the Birth of Christ through His Baptism: the travel of the three kings from one side of the altar to the other, on their way to meet the Christ child, awaiting them in the manger.
We go through a similar journey ourselves; from Christ’s Nativity to His Crucifixion and Resurrection, the journey from his life to his death, and to his life again, a never ending circle that continues through time.
We try to put ourselves in Jesus’ shoes, walking through his childhood in a quick one-two-three and then move suddenly into the Acts of the Apostles to see what his disciples did after his ministry, death, and resurrection. Were they able to put aside their fears, their doubts, the uncertainness about their own personal futures to follow his example? Are we? The Acts show us what the disciples did in those days after, and give us examples of how we can go ahead sharing the Word in our world, and being examples ourselves. They give us a path to emulate, reaching across and around the globe, introducing Jesus to the people and making him accessible. We still do this today.
Today is Epiphany, a word that by itself has several meanings, all of which are relevant. We see with new eyes. We come to the realization. We indulge in our thoughts and find our way with that one seed, that one kernal, that one thing that moves us forward in whatever we do, and hopefully in all of these journeys we carry Jesus with us, as He carries us; with concern, with care, with hope, and with love.
In one week, Jesus will be baptized, like I was – as an adult. It is something I can relate to. When the priest asks if we remember our baptisms, most in the pews will shake their heads and laugh, but I, and a few others, can raise our hands and declare, yes, I remember my baptism. It was one of the greatest days in my life. It was the one time, literally, the only time where I did something without second thoughts. When asked if I was nervous, I readily and confidently stated, Not at all. And I meant it.
In one week, we return to ordinary time for a scant amount of weeks until Lent begins another journey. From now until then, we can set out to learn more about our relationship with Jesus and try to put ourselves into his shoes. We can never fill them, but we can muddle along and do our best. That is all any of us can do.
