God = Love

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God is love, heart, love one another, Most Sacred Heart of Jesus, sacred heart of Jesus, symbol, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

Today is the feast of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus. We all know that hearts appear everywhere when Valentine’s Day comes around. Images of real hearts, however, are more complex and sometimes not so pretty, depending on the presence of blood and the vessels that appear in the picture. We see blood as “messy” or “gory” and we forget sometimes how essential blood is to our life and how we can only live if our heart continues to beat.

On this feast we celebrate the heart as a symbol of what the heart does, of course, not how it is constructed. Presently, in some spiritual circles, there is a description of the heart as “the organ of spiritual perception,” essential to our growth in love. Although the writer of the First Letter of John did not use that denotation, he did understand deeply the significance of the definition. Here is some of the evidence from today’s lectionary:

Beloved, let us love one another, because love is of God…In this way the love of God was revealed to us: God sent his Son into the world so that we might have life through him…Beloved, if God so loved us, we must also love one another…God is love, and whoever remains in love remains in God and God in them. (1 JN 4: 7-16)

Take a moment of quiet and listen for your heartbeat. If you can’t hear or feel it, find the pressure point in your neck and just sense the love that is keeping you alive. Thank God for the life that is love, for the Love that is God. Remain in that knowledge, that grace, with each beat of your heart.

City of the Heart

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adore, Ancient Songs Sung Anew, city of God, heart, holy name, Kingdom, Peace, Psalm 122, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

Today I looked to my favorite translation of the Psalms for inspiration.* Sometimes it only takes a word and sometimes more is demanded in order to find in print or in my own mind or heart something worthwhile to say.

Psalm 122 speaks of Jerusalem as the seat of God’s kingdom. Unfortunately, this “city of peace” has been and remains a city of tension and a seat of struggle – sometimes open warfare – rather than a place that all people of faith can happily call their own. This morning, however, I found a second alternate translation that made it possible to see Jerusalem as a place for us all, as “an interior reality” where commentary names it “a reality of the heart that …has the opportunity to extend itself throughout the physical and temporal world.”

Why not try this? Consider your heart as the “City of God” and read the following with that consciousness. You are the city of God, the pulsing heart, the center of this place of peace. Read it aloud.

With joy I arose and went into your house when called to the worship of your name. I entered and now stand singing with all those gathered to worship and adore you. Your holy name becomes for us a blessed city, a place of peace that draws us deeper in where people of every tongue and race rise up before the presence of your face to know and love the God of peace as one. So in this hallowed space and ground, your judgment and your rule of love, becomes for us a kingdom. And may that kingdom come, your peace be done over all the the earth, we pray. Within the inner walls of heart and soul, and on the outer towers of human being, may peace descend, and be for everyone a fortress and a keep where nothing evil enters in. And this we pray now for the good of all, for all who are your house, your dwelling place forever. (*Ancient Songs Sung Anew, p. 318)

Monday Morning Stillness

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courage, heart, humility, John Philip Newell, Praying With the Earth, reverence, strong, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, treasure, wait

The lovely book by John Philip Newell entitled Praying with the Earth: A Prayerbook for Peace is set up in such a way that the reader not only finds – in addition to the prayers for the life of the world – prayers of awareness and blessing twice a day but also quotes from the Hebrew and Christian Scriptures and the Quran. That sounds like a lot of words but, in fact, it is not. Here are the three Scripture quotes for Monday morning that in their brevity moves one, perhaps, to a deeper, wordless place of peace.

Wait for God. Be strong and let your heart take courage. (Psalm 27: 14)

Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. (Matthew 6:21)

Remember God deep in your soul with humility and reverence. (Quran – The Heights 7 .205)

Exhortation

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heart, metanoia, peaceful world, september 11, The Hidden Ground of Love, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, Thomas Merton

As I remember the shocking attack on our country that was perpetrated on 9/11/2001, I turn to Thomas Merton for a word and find it immediately. It is not soothing but calls me to step up to responsibility. And you?

“The real job is to lay the groundwork for a deep change of heart on the part of the whole nation so that one day it can really go through the metanoia we need for a peaceful world.” (The Hidden Ground of Love, p. 92)

Total Surrender

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Good Friday, heart, Jesus, lessons, let go, love, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, Thomas Merton

Today is called “Good Friday.” The veiled goodness of this day consists of our ability to tap into the lessons that we may perceive in silence and in our willingness to widen our heart space and unite ourselves to the heart of Jesus in his total surrender. Here is how Thomas Merton expressed it long ago:

Let go of all that seems to suggest getting somewhere, being someone, having a name and a voice, following a policy and directing people in “my” ways. What matters is to love. (Learning to Love, p.15)

Good Idea?

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appearance, heart, judge, Lord, Samuel, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

Today in the first Book of Samuel, we read:
“Do not judge from appearance or lofty stature. Not as humans see does God see, because humans see the appearance while the Lord looks into the heart.”

Amen to that!

A Little Latin Lesson

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Cor meum dabo, heart, I give my heart, Latin, poor, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

I am now convinced of the truth that one can find almost anything on the internet. I woke up this morning with a chant from a wisdom school in my head. I had learned and sung it first about ten years ago and then renewed my preference for it last month in Tucson. This morning, however, I could only bring back two of the three lines! I thought that if I waited and hummed it every once in awhile it would all come back. (That is a technique that is often successful.) After two hours of wakefulness, I only had one word of the short third, so I gave up and typed the first two lines into my Google search with a prompt of “third line…?” and presto! it appeared – not only the line but the whole chant with music and (dangerously) several different third line translations! To my relief, the one I wanted was there: Cor meum dabo. (It just now took me three tries to override the corrections of my computer which really wants to speak English instead of Latin!)

Much of my love of Latin came from respect for my high school teacher, Sister Thomas Aquinas, and the happy memories of the eight of us who persevered through four years of the subject because of her as well as for the subject, the basis for my love of language in general. But I digress…

Here is what I found: Ego sum pauper. Nihil habeo. Cor meum dabo. I am poor. I have nothing. I give my heart.

I’m thinking of making that my everyday morning offering – sung, of course. In Latin definitely. The magic of music can make a simple statement so much more, even when it is enough in itself. (Go to “Ego sum pauper” on the internet to hear the tune – and don’t bother with the amazing number of different things that pop up! Just trust the man who is conducting a choir or (hopefully) the second option that is just a flute in a kind of “follow the bouncing ball” without the ball.) If you need the phonetics to be able to sing it, let me know. I’m happy to oblige.

Body Blessing for Lent

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bodies, companionship, dyads, God, heart, Joyce Rupp, Lent, mindfulness, non-judgment, prayer, Prayer Seeds, service, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

Joyce Rupp is a very gifted spiritual writer and retreat leader. When I worked for my diocese in the Office of Faith Formation she was the “go to” person for many of our prayer services because the prayers in her many books touched hearts so powerfully. This morning I picked up her book, Prayer Seeds, (p.88) and found a service meant to be prayed in dyads. I thought, however, that it might be a good idea for each of us to use it personally as a reminder that our bodies function as vehicles for God’s grace. So instead of blessing another person while touching the place named on the body, why not engage our own eyes, hands, etc. in a movement toward mindfulness each day of Lent as we speak the words – preferably aloud.

Forehead: May the Gospel teachings about non-judgment resound in my thoughts of others.

Ears: May I listen closely to how God invites me to grow spiritually during this Lenten season.

Eyes: May I slow down and look more intently order to find God’s movement in my life.

Shoulders: May I carry my cross of difficulties with courage, trusting God’s strength to uphold me.

Hands: May my service be so intertwined with God that this love overflows from my heart.

Heart: May I keep turning my heart toward God and allow this love to be reflected in the way I live my life.

Feet: May I welcome God’s companionship and guidance as I travel the path of life.

Be Your Valentine

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A Deep Breath of Life, Alan Cohen, heart, love, St. Valentine, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

Many people know that the genesis of the practice of sending valentine cards and gifts to show our love for one another began with an imprisoned Christian who was condemned to death as a heretic. Some of us know that St. Valentine is remembered for the cure of Julia, his prison guard’s seven year old daughter who was blind. Perhaps fewer of us have heard the story of the note he left for Julia on the day of his execution which said the following:

My dear Julia, although we shall never see each other again, know that I will always love you. You are very dear to me. I will stay unseen by your side and I will live in your heart. I believe in you. Your Valentine. 

Alan Cohen* reminded me of this legend today and added an unusual but deeply thought-provoking post script after urging inspiration for our loved ones. He says: If you are your own Valentine, remember that all the love you need is within you, just as you are, right where you are. (*A Deep Breath of Life)

What a good idea! Happy Valentine’s Day!

Just for Today

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believe, Celtic Treasures: Daily Scriptures and Prayer, courage, faith, fear, freedom, heart, hope, J. Philip Newell, laughter, promises, tears, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

Today, just a short prayer for the 24-hour journey in which we find ourselves. J. Philip Newell is the author.

Hope and fear, laughter and tears have been part of our journey. Joy and pain, longing and doubt meet on the pathway. Often we do not believe, O God, and sometimes we doubt that your promises can be true. Grant us and our world the freedom to laugh, the courage to cry, the heart to be open and the faith to believe. (Celtic Treasure: Daily Scriptures and Prayer)