Station Island XI by Seamus Heaney/St John of the Cross As if the prisms of the kaleidoscope I plunged once in a butt of muddied water Surfaced like a marvelous lightship And out of its silted crystals a monk’s face That had spoken years ago from behind a grille Spoke again about the need and chance To salvage everything, to re-envisage The zenith and glimpsed jewels of any gift Mistakenly abased …. What came to nothing could always be replenished. “Read poems as prayers,” he said, “and for your penance Translate me something by Juan de la Cruz.” Returned from Spain to our chapped wilderness, His consonants aspirate, his forehead shining, He had made me feel there was nothing to confess. Now his sandaled passage stirred me on to this: How well I know that fountain, filling, running, Although it is the night. That eternal fountain, hidden away I know its haven and its secrecy Although it is the night But not its source because it does not have one, Which is all sources’ source and ori

  I learned a new word this week or should I say I let a word which I had heard before, but to which I had never paid attention, into my consciousness. The word is “precarity”! By now, you may have come to expect that I love to riff on words which have surfaced or even erupted in my life. This feels a little different.   Precarity seems to be a word to which I am called to pay attention because it is part of a surrender of false self, a process to which I am deeply committed. Precarity is defined as the state of uncertainty or precariousness. It seems to feed doubt and despair. However, it speaks to a certain fragility which we so often avoid. Precarity calls us to the vulnerability and powerlessness which comes right before conversion and redemption. Precarity is not separate from resurrection; it is essential to it. So much of my life has been spent denying any weakness and, in turn, shoving precarity down. I am realizing there is a lot of precarity residing in my dark wells of being

  As I read the beginning pages of Katherine May’s book Enchantment: Awakening Wonder in an Anxious Age, I found myself traveling in a liminal space, on the threshold of something new and revelatory and still carrying grief, anxiety, confusion, joy, love, kindness of not just recent, but also distant past. Written as we emerged from a time of pandemics when there was already divide between returning to “normal” and celebrating new potential ways of living and being, the author immediately locates a yearning and points to a consolation in the desolation. The yearning is for transcendence and meaning making; the consolation is the reception of enchantment. Similar to Rabbi Heschel’s I Asked for Wonder and the contemplative desire for deeper connection with that which astonishes, that which mystifies, that which causes wonder love and praise, there is an acknowledgment, even gratitude for, beauty and its healing properties in the mystery of creation. The issue, it would seem, is whether w

  Two days ago I found myself mesmerized by videos of whales breaching the surface of the sea. I was drawn into a space of wonder and awe which I didn’t want to leave and could not replicate. And then…this poem by Mary Oliver (below) dropped into my mailbox. I began to pay a renewed attention! Putting aside my envy at the way she puts words to wonder, I chose to just receive her gift. And there I was for another brief while, contemplating the beautiful beast rising despite itself and our assumptions in this world of “original fire”. I found hope. It is such an oxymoronic image! like a dinosaur along side a civilized society reminding us of what we do not control, reminding us to ‘sing’ nevertheless. Whoever we are, wherever we are…all creatures great and small can make a joyful noise… There is such joy in this revelation. There is such joy in simply paying attention to the unexpected and ordinary wonders. They seem to be beckoning toward the impossibly amazing. “The sky, after all, sto

  The poem below,   Rosa Parks  by Nicki Giovanni, is new to me and exquisite. It is also particularly timely, not only for Martin Luther King day but for everyday as we struggle to use our memories to feed our social justice and kindness efforts. As the commentator in SALT notes: “Rosa Parks, [is one] whose actions are a luminous example,…of ‘shouldering a cross,’ of living for ‘a higher law’, of honoring what must be honored, of doing what love demands be done.” (SALT January 9, 2024) Rarely do we couple the word ‘love’ with the word ‘demand’ and yet perhaps we should. After all, have we not covenanted to love, been commanded to do so by some higher power?  If so, then on this day and everyday the question might be asked as to what is love demanding of us? Some days it is to have the courage to take one more step, just one more, toward freedom for all. Some days it is to have the courage to climb aboard. Some days it is to have the courage to lend a hand. Some days it is to have the

  “Go like a river” is both the title and the recurring theme which runs through a magnificent novel I recently read. “Go like a river” was both puzzling and consoling for me. I was intrigued not only because I have been drawn to many quotes and metaphors of water and flow and grace but also because in the context of the story it spoke of acceptance, grace and freedom. To go like a river seemed to speak of an eternity which carries all of us, an eternity with which we might participate, but more importantly an eternity which we might become. Today in the church we celebrate and remember the baptism of Christ in the river Jordan. It has always been one of my favorites. The words which accompany my memories are belonging, believing, beloving and becoming. All “be” words. So for me baptism (and water) present or connote images of being rather than doing. The act of baptizing is less important than the transformation of spirit and soul.   And so in Go Like A River I found myself reverberat

  “Put yourself in the way of grace.” Mary Oliver remembers something which Bishop and SSJE brother Tom Shaw said. Put yourself in the way of grace… As I sit on this dreary, dark winter Monday morning I am amazed not to be consumed with the heaviness or sadness and rather to feel some shimmering of joy. I am able to somehow bask in the glow of Thanksgiving which was practically perfect in all its silly imperfections. I am aware of how precious simply being together is…all of us. I am aware of how over the course of four days each and every one of us held the newborn Caleb. It felt like passing a chalice from which we all drank and were somehow called back to love.  And that is the grace of it or in the words above that is putting ourselves in the way of grace. I believe that grace is being poured out and onto and into every single morsel of existence and I believe we might become more aware of that, more appreciative, more intentional. It takes a pause, a moment, a gesture, albeit smal

  “Whenever I groan within myself and think how hard it is to keep writing about love in these times of tension and strife which may at any moment become for us all a time of terror, I think to myself, "What else is the world interested in?" What else do we all want, each one of us, except to love and be loved, in our families, in our work, in all our relationships. God is Love. Love casts out fear. Even the most ardent revolutionist, seeking to change the world, to overturn the tables of the money changers, is trying to make a world where it is easier for people to love, to stand in that relationship with each other of love. We want with all our hearts to love, to be loved. And not just in the family but to look upon all as our mothers, sisters, brothers, children. It is when we love the most intensely and most humanly, that we can recognize how tepid is our love for others. The keenness and intensity of love brings with it suffering, of course, but joy too because it is a f

  Blessed be God who animates our lives and calls us to be authoritative and authentic blessings in the world. AMEN On the day of my ordination to the priesthood, I thought I knew what was supposed to happen; I thought I knew what this day was about; I thought I knew just how things should go. I thought I knew what I would feel.   But once again I was to learn lessons about shoulds and supposed to’s. I was to notice something about true authority, the grace filled creative kind, as opposed to dictated authority, the kind we humans impose. I was to know a new feeling, a new power, a new holy wholeness… My ordination to the priesthood was spirit filled. I was overwhelmed with tears and deep joy as my cup was running over. And if you have ever experienced an ordination you may recall that one of the supreme privileges and authority bestowed upon the newly ordained priest is to offer sacred blessing to all who come forward. First my family and then a collection of that great cloud of witne