Tag: discernment

With This Thirst

Sitting on the bank of the cove, watching a Weeping Willow move in the wind and feeling the same breeze on my skin is worth waking up for. I’ve been looking for this solitude and this quiet. Ordination to the priesthood is this Saturday and I want to rest in the afternoon.

The current is coming to a head from opposite directions and swirling right in front of me. I’m sitting under my praying/thinking tree at the Oxford Cemetery, where family and friends are buried and over the past year I have officiated funerals. This is a place where past, present, and future dwell together.

The cove itself is home if a body of water can be home: I’ve gotten boots stuck in the mud here at low tide as a kid, canoed, come and gone by Boston Whaler, kayaks, and paddleboards. That’s part of what draws me here to pray and listen, to read and write, and skateboard to get to the spot.

“Oh, feed me this day, Holy Spirit, with
the fragrance of the fields and the
freshness of the oceans which you have
made, and help me to hear and to hold
in all dearness those exacting and wonderful
words of our Lord Jesus Christ, saying:
Follow me.”

–Mary Oliver, from “Six Recognitions of the Lord”

Mary Oliver should be read outside. I have her book “Thirst” and Frederick Buechner’s “The Alphabet of Grace” with me. “Follow me.” That’s it in a hazel nut.

I get up and skate back to and around the conservation park. It’s lightly raining, the kind of rain that wakes your skin up. I stop when I see purple, per Alice Walker’s advice, which I follow meticulously. Then I head over to the Oxford Park.

Twelve years ago this month, I sat in the park reading this same copy of Buechner’s book. I look back over what I underlined then. This was at the end of a summer (2013) where I knew in my bones that I was supposed to go to seminary. It made no sense. I reached out to Fr. John Merchant, the chaplain at St. James School when I was there, and he told me it didn’t have to make sense. I read Buechner and Barbara Brown Taylor and Thomas Merton and I was stirred and moved and then laid all that aside, taking a job to head back to Washington, DC, to work as a technical writer.

I don’t have words to describe what the 12 years in between have been, except to say heels-over-head, upside down, life-changing; from profound heartbreak to indescribable joy, confusion and clarity, discernment, wonder, awe, gratitude, and everything in between, ultimately shedding some parts of myself and growing in others to where I feel alive in ways I wasn’t. Living now with my whole and open heart.

Here’s a bit of Buechner:

“You are alive. It needn’t have been so. It wasn’t so once, and it will not be so forever. But it is so now. And what is it like: to be alive in this maybe one place of all places where life is? Live a day of it and see. Take any day and be alive in it. Nobody claims that it will be painless, but no matter. It is your birthday, and there are many presents to open. The world is to open.”

Part of that I underlined 12 years ago, but it didn’t register. Each day is new, each day is a gift that we get to live and be alive in. Be grateful.

In the park, I often sit on a bench set off to the side at the edge. It’s in the shade. As I sit there, a child belly-laughs on the swing with her father; a workboat motors down to pull into the marina nearby; a man pulls his crabpots up on his dock; people and dogs come and go; the sun breaks through the clouds infrequently but unmistakably.

Today isn’t a day for revelations. It’s a day to rest and be glad in. It’s a day to breathe, a day to smile, a day to pray. I finish Mary Oliver’s book with the title poem, “Thirst,” which I have been reading a lot lately:

“Another morning and I wake with thirst
for the goodness I do not have. I walk
out to the pond and all the way God has
given us such beautiful lessons. Oh Lord,
I was never a quick scholar but sulked
and hunched over my books past the
hour and the bell; grant me, in your
mercy, a little more time. Love for the
earth and love for you are having such a
long conversation in my heart. Who
knows what will finally happen or
where I will be sent, yet already I have
given a great many things away, expect-
ing to be told to pack nothing, except the
prayers which, with this thirst, I am
slowly learning.”

With this thirst, I am slowly learning.

Falling Forward

Fall is a time of change, a time of incredible colors, crisp air, clear skies, and fire-pit warmth. My bones know when fall hits. It’s also always been a time of renewal, energy, and new beginnings.

This year, fall is the beginning of year two of seminary through Iona Eastern Shore for seven of us aspirants and postulants. Our studies this year are focused on the history of the Christianity (what happened between the Acts of the Apostles and today) and heavily on homiletics–preaching. I’m especially appreciating lectures, essays, and books by Tom Long, who makes me think that preaching is something that can be taught, even to those of us to whom it doesn’t come naturally.

To borrow a few aspirational sentences from Long’s book “The Witness of Preaching”–

“To have our own lives, our own work, our own words, our own struggles and fears gathered up in some way into that event (preaching) is an occasion of rich and joyful grace… To be a preacher is to be a midwife of the word… we do not establish the time of its arriving; we cannot eliminate the labor pains that surround it; but we serve with gratitude at its coming and exclaim with joy at its birth.”

And:

“Faithful preaching requires such gifts as sensitivity to human need, a discerning eye for the connections between faith and life, an ear attuned to hearing the voice of Scripture, compassion, a growing personal faith, and the courage to tell the truth.”

I have such a long way to go, but I am inspired and encouraged and am becoming a student of the art and event of preaching.

I’ve also been helped along the way this fall by a discernment group who have gathered multiple times to help me discern, distill, and clarify my calling as part of the canonical process toward ordination. The way is each and every step and I am grateful beyond words for the questions, love, and encouragement from these friends.

Small Groups

At Christ Church Easton, new small groups are gathering to wrestle with Paul’s Letter to the Romans; a group of men are two weeks into discussing Richard Rohr’s “From Wild Man to Wise Man”; and we’re looking forward to our next newcomers class, where Brenda Wood and I will help orient folks to the ministries and work of our church, while looking at how baptism, Bible study, Communion, and prayer help define our faith in Rowan Williams’ book “Being Christian.”

Romans has given me a particular focus and opportunity for the fall/winter. In the same way that I wrote each week about our small group study of John O’Donohue’s book “Anam Cara,” I’ll be writing about Romans–thoughts from different scholars, snippets from our group discussions, and I am hoping to do some video segments and interviews with folks talking Romans.

I think for many church-goers, Paul’s Letter to the Romans is something experienced piecemeal, here and there, in lectionary readings. People know it’s a big deal, but they never take the time to read it and reckon with it. And that’s understandable–it’s daunting! But it’s also beautiful and potentially transformative. I love this thought by Rev. Jay Sidebotham, in “Conversations with Scripture: Romans,” when he says:

“The expression of trust in God’s grace, a theme of the Letter to the Romans, has the power to change individual lives. It also has the power to change communities, which is why it matters that we enter into this conversation. Such a conversation does not mean that we will like or understand everything in the letter… In the spirit of conversation, a word that suggests companionship on the journey, we hope that faithful attention to this ancient letter may open the door for new insights into the expansiveness of the grace of God.”

Romans has a history of changing lives and communities. Would that our studies might increase our trust in God’s grace.

To Live Prayerfully

Last weekend, Fr. Bill Ortt preached on Luke 18:1-8, the Parable of the Widow and the Unjust Judge. The text starts out by saying, “Jesus told his disciples a parable about their need to pray always and not to lose hope.” This is advice you give people who are going through tough times; people who might reach a point in their lives and their faith where they want to give up.

If we are going to be people for God, who is love, and so people for love, we need to lean in, not give up. We need to live prayerfully. Prayer is not simply asking for things–prayer is our connection to God. Prayer requires listening as much, if not more than talking.

That’s part of the reason why we use Rowan Williams’ book “Being Christian” in our newcomer class. It ends with prayer. And Williams describes three things that are essential for prayer:

  1. First, and most importantly, prayer is God’s work in us… It is the opening of our minds and hearts to the Father…
  2. Second, there is the deep connection… between praying and living justly in the world… Prayer is the life of Jesus coming alive in you, so it is hardly surprising if it is absolutely bound up with a certain way of being human which is about reconciliation, mercy, and freely extending the welcome and the love of God to others.
  3. Third, prayer from our point of view is about fidelity, faithfulness, sticking to it… Just stay there and if in doubt say, ‘O God, make speed to save me.’ Prayer is your promise and pledge to be there for the God who is there for you.

To live a prayerful life is to open our hearts, minds, and lives to God. It’s about praying and living in a way that shows reconciliation, mercy, welcome, and love. And it’s about sticking with it.

It’s a lot to take in. It’s a lot to try. We won’t always get it right. We will stumble and fall. And none of us can do it alone. But with God’s help, and with each other, we can get back up, try again, and keep forward on the way.

I come back to the Thomas Merton Prayer regularly. We prayed it together at the first meeting of our discernment group. And it feels like a good time to offer it here: