Yielding

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centering prayer, Finding the On-Ramp to You Spiritual Life, Jan Phillips, journey, opportunities, resistance, spiritual path, spiritual practices, surrender, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, yield

In looking ahead to possibilities for the autumn “semester” at the Sophia Center, I began re-reading Finding the On-Ramp to Your Spiritual Life, a little book by Jan Phillips. The impetus came from two different conversations – one with Jan and another with a member of my Spiritual Practices Circle who is considering reading the book with a group in her Church. It’s a catchy title and the idea of using traffic signs as chapter titles was, it seems to me, quite an inspired idea. It’s part of Jan’s genius, I think, to see deep meaning in the connections that exist everywhere and use everyday experiences to mine deep truth. Think about all you could say about “STOP” or “DIVIDED HIGHWAY” or even “FALLING ROCKS AHEAD.” (Actually, that’s not a bad idea. What would you say about each of those things vis-à-vis your life?)

Last night I read the chapter entitled YIELD, which is a familiar concept to someone who learns the daily letting go in the practice of centering prayer. Here’s how Jan began that reflection.

The word yield has a variety of meanings. On the road, it means to surrender, to give way. In nature, it means to engender, to bear fruit. On the spiritual path, one leads to the other. Once we give up our notion of how life “should be,” we free ourselves to experience the lives that we do have.

Simple, right? But not easy, of course. Give it some time today as you drive or shop or interact with others…See how yielding is a better choice than resistance and bow to the opportunities that so often just show up to help us along on our journey.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Our Life Is Love

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Christian, Cynthia Bourgeault, forgiving, helping, hospitality, Isaac Penington, life, love, Marcelle Martin, Our Life Is Love, Paulette Meier, Peace, Pendle Hill, prayer, Quakers, retreat, shining through you, spiritual path, tenderness, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

Late yesterday I arrived home from my 5-day retreat at Pendle Hill, near Philadelphia, a gloriously peaceful place saturated with the beauty of nature and the prayer of Quakers since 1930. The theme developed over the days for the 60 participants – many Quakers and those others of us from several different Christian traditions – was Our Life Is Love. I went to the retreat because it was being led by Cynthia Bourgeault who has for over a decade been a bright light on my spiritual path. Cynthia was being assisted (I thought) by two women: a composer of chant-songs, Paulette Meier, and a teacher of the Quaker tradition, Marcelle Martin. Contrary to my impression from the retreat flyer, these three women presented a seamless experience of the beauty and depth of Quakerism that can also be found at the heart of mainstream Christianity. It was a priceless gift of camaraderie, shared prayer and hospitality that I will treasure going forward.

I woke up singing Paulette’s musical rendition of the quote from Isaac Penington, one of the founders of Quakerism, that begins Marcelle’s book, Our Life Is Love, a chronicle of ten elements of the Quaker spiritual journey. Here is what he said and what we sang.

Our life is love, and peace, and tenderness; and bearing with one another, and forgiving one another, and not laying accusations against one another; but praying for one another, and helping one another up with a tender hand…So mind Truth…[and] be a good savor in places where ye live, the meek, innocent, tender, righteous life reigning in you, governing over you, and shining through you, in the eyes of all with whom you converse. (Isaac Penington, 1667)

A More Perfect Union

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brain, engines of change, female, Finding the On-Ramp to Your Spiritual Path, imagination, Jan Phillips, joining, male, negative, positive, speaking, spiritual path, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, them, thought, thought pattern, union, universe, us, we

Quotes from Pendle Hill: Today’s quote comes from Jan Phillips in her book Finding the On-Ramp on Your Spiritual Path.

Just as a battery is charged by the union of positive and negative forces, just as a child is conceived by the union of a male sperm and a female ovum, just as a thought issues forth from the union of right and left brain, so does our authentic spirituality emerge from the practice of joining “us” and “them” into a “we.” Our imaginations are the most potent engines of change in the universe, and when we change our thought pattern and become conscious of our speaking, we will make a quantum leap forward on our spiritual path.

Disciples on the path

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arduous, commitment, disciple, discipline, effort, Finding the On-Ramp to Your Spiritual Path, hard work, Jan Phillips, love, spiritual path, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

Quotes from Pendle Hill: Today’s quote comes from Jan Phillips in her book, Finding the On-Ramp to Your Spiritual Path:

“Many people think that the spiritual path is an arduous one that requires a lot of effort and hard work. Actually, the opposite is true. A certain discipline is required, but think of that discipline as coming from the word disciple. It has to do with love and commitment, not punishment.”

Cooperation

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bad, division, Ezekiel, good, heart, new heart, new spirit, passivity, prophet, reconciliation, responsibility, sins, spiritual path, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, unity, violence

I’ve always been partial to Ezekiel’s verse in chapter 36 that has God saying, “I will take from you your stony hearts and give you natural hearts…” It’s something I hold onto when I’m feeling ungenerous or grumpy – or worse. This morning however, in the earlier text from Ezekiel, chapter 18: 21-28, I read a serious message about bad and good behavior and the consequences of turning in one direction or the other. In case we miss it in the first reading, the verse before the gospel says this: Cast away from you all the crimes you have committed, says the Lord, and make for yourselves a new heart and a new spirit. (18:31) The lesson for today, then, is that we have a responsibility to work toward restoring ourselves to God’s image rather than letting God do all the work.

There is more to this story, however, that resolves the apparent contradiction in the above comments. Why did Ezekiel change his mind from chapter 18 to chapter 36? The story goes that Ezekiel became a prophet in Babylon during the exile, and “his first task was to prepare his fellow countrymen in Babylon for the final destruction of Jerusalem, which they believed to be inviolable. Accordingly, the first part of his book consists of reproaches for Israel’s past and present sins and the confident prediction of yet a further devastation of the land of promise and a more general exile. In 587 BCE, when Nebuchadnezzar destroyed Jerusalem, Ezekiel was vindicated before his unbelieving compatriots.” (New American Bible commentary, p. 972)

The good news of Ezekiel’s prophecy which I quoted at the beginning of this reflection is that God never does abandon the human race, but there are questions that arise, I think, from a comparison of the Israelites’ situation to the state of our fractured nation today. Have we been shaken enough by the division and violence that continues to occur in our country and the world to wake up? Will we take the responsibility to change our own hearts and cooperate with God in moving toward unity and care for one another before we devolve into a people who will lose any semblance of humanity? I know those questions sound alarmist and dire but the story of the Israelites this morning calls me to look deeply into my own spirit and ask myself about my behavior. Am I so sure that I am “above the fray” by saying my life is on a spiritual path? Do I avoid difficult conversations because I think I have the right answers and don’t trust people on “the other side” to be rational about differences? Is praying for movement toward peace and reconciliation enough to do if I am unwilling to leave my prayer space to reach out to anyone I see as unsafe or uncomfortable? The blindness of the Israelites and the severity of Ezekiel’s message this morning have touched me as never before and shaken my passivity as one who believes that God will always save us. I still know that truth but now ask myself how long I am willing to watch what we are doing to each other before I give God some active help in the effort of our reconciliation. A sobering question for this first Friday of Lent…

 

 

 

 

 

 

A Vision

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hope, inner peace, potential, prayer, seeker, spiritual path, taize, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, wisdom work

For those of you reading this message who have no other connection to the Sophia Center for Spirituality than the blog, whether because of distance or focused interest, I would like to take this opportunity to invite you to join us in our end-of-year fundraising campaign. Please take time to read the letter below and consider a donation. It is my privilege to write nearly every day and I am grateful to know that people far and wide are sharing in this on-going project. We hope to continue all the work of the Sophia Center into the future. Your gift will help to make this a reality. Thank you!

Dear Friends near and far,

As we approach the end of our third full year of existence here at The Sophia Center for Spirituality, I continue to give thanks for all the blessings that have come to us as we endeavor to serve people who are seeking ways to deepen their spiritual lives. To those who have come along on this journey we have offered quiet retreats, bi-monthly centering prayer sessions, Taizé chanting once a month, exploration of the tenets of other faith traditions and tapping into the deeper side of Christianity at a Wisdom School. All of these and more have become part of our programming for the people of our region of Central New York and beyond.

Helen Daly had a vision for the spread of “Wisdom Work” in its many forms in wider and wider circles. A generous grant from her estate has enabled us to continue the mission of the Sophia Center. As is always true, however, organizations such as ours cannot continue to function indefinitely from of one source of funding. It is time for us now to give others the privilege of joining in the effort to raise the consciousness of all people to unity in diversity. This goal of ours is becoming more urgent as it is seen in stark contrast to world events and personal tragedies that seem to escalate with the passing of each day. A spiritual path can open the door to wisdom leading the seeker to hope, to trust in potential, and to inner peace. This we believe. This we strive to achieve together. Won’t you join us?

With sincere gratitude,
Sister Lois A. Barton, CSJ
Program Director, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

(We are grateful for your donation which is tax deductible. Go to our website’s donation link via Paypal (click HERE), or send your check payable to The Sophia Center for Spirituality at 30 Main St, Binghamton, NY 13905.)

Transfiguration

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commitment, conversion, Elijah, James, John, Luke, metanoia, Moses, Peter, profess vows, Sisters of St. Joseph, spiritual path, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, transfiguration, transformation

Today’s gospel (LK 9:28-36) tells of an experience that was truly “mind-blowing ” for Peter, James and John, the three apostles that Jesus took with him when he “went up the mountain to pray.” Usually Jesus took those treks alone but on this day he allowed the three to see more deeply what could happen when he was in deep communion with God. He was, the story goes, “transfigured before them…his face changed in appearance and his clothing became dazzling white.” If that was not enough of a shock, they also saw Moses and Elijah conversing with him.

One wonders why Jesus chose to expose his friends to this experience. Perhaps they were ready for the next step in their own transformation. It was a scene that they didn’t understand and they didn’t tell anyone about it but they certainly were changed by that day.

Sometimes on a spiritual path we can also have experiences of divine presence that we don’t understand. They may not be as dramatic as that day on the mountain was. It may just be as simple as a felt sense of peace, or an insight that we recognize as not coming from ourselves…yet we are changed. We know something that we did not know before and it gives us motivation to seek a deeper knowing. Sometimes it is strong enough to call the experience a “conversion” or “metanoia” and it leads to serious commitment on our part.

This day is very special to the Sisters of St. Joseph in my community. It is the day on which we professed our vows as religious. Although a peak experience, I would guess that for most of us our “transfiguration” was not instantaneous or sustained. But it was a step. What had begun in different ways for each of us: an organic growing desire from childhood, a comment from a parish priest, a dream or a vision – the notion of religious life came to us (sometimes not so welcome!) and remained. And it is a commitment, just like that of any other vocation in life, that must be nurtured by the ways in which we are called to grow and become the person we were born to be. So today I celebrate my own vocation and the support of all the women who have been example to me of what religious life has been and continues to be for the world. And I pray for a future that will see a flowering of new ways for the transformation of the world.

Oneness

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disciples, diversity, divisions, Jesus, John, oneness, shared humanity, spiritual path, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, unity

Today the gospel reaches the point in the farewell discourse of Jesus where he prays for the unity of all people. This familiar text has Jesus pleading that they (all the disciples and “those who will believe in me through their word” – us) may all be one, as you, Father, are in me and I in you, that they also may be in us…that they may be brought to perfection as one…I have made known to them your name and I will make it known, that the love with which you loved me may be in them and I in them. (JN 17:20-26)

Our pleading should rival that of Jesus, I think, when we consider the divisions that exist in our world. No matter the diversity in our prayer and spiritual paths or religious practice, the desire for unity must be backed up with intention toward that goal. If each of us spent some moments every day asking God to wake us up to the unity that already exists by virtue of our shared humanity and to give us the will to foster that unity with all we meet, I believe it could change the world. I’m willing to try. You?

Walking the Walk

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center, dream, God, labyrinth, Luke, reflection, spiritual life, spiritual path, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, trust in God, walk the walk, walk together, walking

This morning as Luke (Ch. 12) continues to continues to talk about servants and their readiness to serve, I want to offer a footnote to my reflection of yesterday about walking through life aware of how the walk is going (See “Stay Awake” from yesterday’s blog post). During the day yesterday my mind kept coming back to the theme of the blog and to the experience I had the evening before of walking a labyrinth. We (the Sophia Center for Spirituality) began on Monday to offer a series called “Spiritual Sampler” on Monday nights and the first of these offerings was a labyrinth walk. A labyrinth, as some of you know, is not a maze where you can get hopelessly lost but rather a unicursal or one-branch path that leads to the center. For centuries, labyrinths have been symbolic of walking a spiritual path where, in the center, God may be found.

Until I was quite sure that the description of “unicursal” was true, I was hesitant to walk a labyrinth. Over the last several years, however, I have come to relish the opportunity for this quiet, slow, reflective time that is always meaningful and sometimes surprising. As I made my intention at the entrance to the labyrinth, all I asked was to be in God’s presence, walking consciously toward God. During the next half hour of silence I was conscious of putting one foot in front of the other on the path that twisted and turned, sometimes coming close to the center and sometimes moving farther away, but always with the hope of achieving that goal. I thought how clearly like life that was. On occasion I was aware of the four others walking with me and pushed away the occasional sense of disappointment that there weren’t more companions. That brought to mind the wondering of whether or not the whole project of establishing a spirituality center -just a year old this month – would be “successful” in the long run. As I continued to walk and attempted to let go of such useless thoughts for one who purports to trust God, I heard from inside, “This is your dream; now you need to walk the walk.” Soon after that I reached the center where the sense of relief and strength was palpable.

The walk back out was long and winding again, but I felt a new confidence in remembering what I have known for much of my ministerial life: that numbers have little to do with meaning in the spiritual life and that God is with me at every step of the path. Our short conversation at the completion of the exercise convinced me that our time had been truly blessed and that each day, each moment is precious as we walk together in God’s sight.