(Watercolor painting by Dave Baab – used with permission)
I’ve been thinking about the notion of “home” a lot recently. Maybe that’s because my husband and I are en route from Seattle, our home for most of our adult life, to Dunedin, New Zealand, where we have lived for the past eight years and where we will continue to live for a few more years. In 2011, I came to a place of peace about having two homes – Seattle and Dunedin – rather than having to try to figure out which one was really home.
My 2011 shift in thinking about home (which I wrote about in a blog post on this blog) came from reading Thomas Tweed’s book, Dwelling and Crossing. Tweed argues that we find and create homes in four arenas:
– our body
– our dwelling place (our house or apartment)
– our homeland
– the cosmos or heaven
I suspect that for most of us, one or two of these kinds of homes is quite comfortable or comforting. And I suspect that most of us feel a bit uneasy or uncomfortable about one or two of these kinds of homes.
For me, the most comfortable arena for my experience of home is the house where I live. I enjoy furnishing and decorating spaces, and I enjoy spending time in the spaces I create. I don’t have illusions of being a great interior decorator, and I’m not terribly picky about my personal space. I simply enjoy feeling and being at home. After seeing so many homeless people during our recent time in Seattle, I am deeply aware of the huge privilege of having a house to live in.
Second most comfortable for me would be my home in heaven. I love the notion that Jesus has prepared a place for us (John 14:2-4). I love knowing that one day this mortal body will be swallowed up by the immortal (I Corinthians 15:51-57).
My least comfortable home is my physical body. When I turned 13, I started turning to food for comfort, which began a pattern of overeating that has lasted for decades. It’s better, no doubt about it, but I still need to grow and change. I love knowing that God never stops helping us grow toward shalom – wellness and wholeness – in every area of life.
As we finish the first month in the new year, and as we prepare to enter into Lent, a season of reflection, on February 10, I want to invite you to consider the four arenas of home identified by Thomas Tweed: your body, your house or apartment, your homeland, and heaven. Here are some questions to reflect on:
- Which of the four kinds of home feels most comfortable or comforting to you? Spend some time thanking God for the gift of that home. In 2016, is there some way God is calling you to change your thinking about that home? Is there some way God is calling you to share that home with others in a new way?
- Which of the four kinds of home feels least comfortable to you? In what ways has God shaped you or worked in that area of your life in recent years? In what ways would you like God to change your thinking or actions related to that aspect of home this year? Write out a prayer describing the ways this kind of home feels uncomfortable to you and asking God for help. Write out your desires and dreams as a part of the prayer.
Today is Brigit’s feast Day. Brigit, (451-525 AD) is one of my favourite Celtic saints, She exemplified the wonderful gift of hospitality that Celtic Christians believed was not only meant to be a custom in their homes, it was a key into the Kingdom of God. To offer hospitality was seen as receiving Christ into their midst and fulfilling the law of love.
Brigit, who presided over the monastery at Kildare, was particularly known for her generous hospitality. As a child she often gave away her parents possessions. At Kildare, Brigid often made butter for visitors. Tradition has it that when churning the butter she would make thirteen portions – twelve in honour of the apostles and an extra one in honour of Christ which was reserved for guests and the poor.
The hospitality of Saint Brigit is reflected in the beautiful prayer above, which I often use as a grace before lunch at retreats that I conduct.
What is Your Response?
Brigit reminds us that the hospitality of God is a welcoming of Christ into our midst. Reflect on the times that you have offered hospitality to friends and strangers. Where have you been aware of Christ in your midst at those times?
Celtic Christians, like Brigit, often saw themselves as guests of the world, living lightly on this earth and not becoming attached to possessions or place. Every encounter of life revealed to them the God who they believed was both host and guest. Life was seen as a pilgrimage of revelation, each step drawing us closer to God.
What is your response?
Take a moment to pause and look around you. What do you notice that speaks of the generosity and hospitality of God? At home your attention may be caught by the dining room table, around which family and guests gather to eat and celebrate. Or photos and the gifts of friends and strangers to whom you have offered hospitality. Of maybe you are in the garden where even the wild brambles, and thistles – all the weeds you so diligently work to get rid of – are gifts from God and can produce the most delicious and nutritious food we can eat.
Sit in silent prayer to remind ourselves of the incredible hospitality of God who invites us, together with all creation, into the divine presence and into the eternal family.
Now watch the video below. What else is God saying to you about your need to be hospitable to those around you?
01 Welcome to the Feast mp3 image
Each morning I read one of the psalms from the daily lectionary. I love to read them in a variety of translations. Yesterday it was Psalm 50:1 from The Voice that held my attention. As you know I love to take photographs of sunrise and sunset and so it is not surprising that the words of this verse resonated in my soul throughout the day conjuring up images of the many glorious sunrises and sunsets I have witnessed.
What verse resonates in your soul today? What images of God’s world does it bring to mind? Take a photo, write a prayer or poem, draw a picture or use some other creative arts to express your response.
Each year I post prayers from some of my favourite saints ancient and modern throughout the season of Lent. I will continue to do that but thought that some would like to have access to these prayers in one easy step so that you can plan your own use of them during the season.
- Lenten Prayers by St Augustine of Hippo
- Do It Anyway – A Lenten Prayer by Mother Teresa
- Prayers for Creation by John Birch
- Prayers from Teresa of Avila for Lent
- A Lenten Prayer by Thomas A Kempis
- Christ Has Walked this Path – Lenten Video by Jeff Johnson
- Morning and Evening Prayers for Lent
- Fall In Love – A Prayer for Lent by Father Pedro Arrupe
- The Lord’s Prayer – An Adaptation
- Prayers for Lent by Desmond Tutu
- I Cannot Do This Alone – A Lenten Prayer by Dietrich Bonhoeffer
- Thomas Merton’s Most Famous Prayer – A Good Prayer for Lent
- I Choose To Breathe in the Breath of Christ – A Prayer by Joseph Tetlow
- A Prayer fo Lent by Cesar Chavez
- A Lenten Prayer for Creation
- Columba’s Prayer – Helping Me Through Lent
- The Prayer of St Brendan
- Brigit’s Feast – My Favourite Celtic Prayer
- A Prayer for the First Sunday of Lent
Please check out our complete list of Godspace resources for Lent through Holy Week
Circle prayer doodle – Joyce Withrow
Last week, you may remember, I posted this Celtic prayer. It is one of many that I have posted over the years, my favourites being God Circle Me and Circle Us Lord. I love these prayers and write them regularly as a part of my own spiritual observances.
What interested me was the response to my latest prayer. Joyce Withrow drew the beautiful doodle above and Susan Gibson sent me this photo of her inspiring meditation.
Susan Gibson – circle prayer art
Circles were significant to the Celts and it is not surprising that circling prayers or CAIM became an important part of their prayer life.
It was felt that a circle with no break was a complete whole affording no access to the devil. Monasteries were often built with a circle of crosses surrounding them declaring that the space with in was sacred and different – dedicated to God and claimed as a place where God met people who were offered sanctuary and hospitality.
The Celtic cross with its circle at the heart of the cross drew on significance of the sun as the source of heat and light, reminding people of the nimbus or halo that artists used to signify the white heat of pure holiness. (from The Celtic Resource Book – Martin Wallace)
Sometimes prayers would be said with the drawing of an imaginary circle around the people or place being prayed for. At other times an actual circle path was created around a room, a building or community and the circling prayer recited as people walked a mini pilgrimage around the area. This is a highly effective form of prayer to use for a house blessing, or as a prayer for protection, or as a prayer for spiritual strength.
Watch the delightful video below of how a child uses a simple circling prayer to cast out fear on his first day at school. Then consider ways to use your own circling prayers. What are you afraid of, our anxious about? Where are places that you feel need a special circle of God’s love? I encourage you to create your own circling prayers or to use the prayers linked in this post as a framework for meditation and contemplation. I think that you too will find this an inspiring spiritual exercise too – and I would love to hear where your inspiration leads you.
‘They’ say bad habits can be changed in 21 days. I don’t think that is true for me. There are times I barely make it through the first day. I think maybe science needed to listen more to God.
Approaching Lent this year, I think of the 40 day periods mentioned so often in the Bible. Is it maybe that a mere three weeks seems so short in today’s busy world that we think, “f it doesn’t work, it is easy to stop and just start over?” I don’t know.
I do know that when I consider giving anything up for 40 days dedicated to God, I take it more seriously.
Those who have studied this number say God used it to impress upon us our times of trouble and hardship. I could make that sound religious, as if God sent me the trials of my life, but notice that in the Bible, just as with my own times of trouble and hardship, more often than not, these were notably bought on, by those suffering, themselves. Rather cuts down on the moaning and groaning of “poor pity me” when I consider that.
During the mighty flood, 40 days and nights of rain destroyed much of the world, God created and loved, with flooding because of the evil and disobedience in the world at that time. That it only took 40 days to obliterate all I see is rather intimidating. But then comes the promise I remember every time I see a rainbow. It makes me believe that though his power can wipe out the entire planet, his desire is always to make it beautiful for us.
Since the time of that promise 40 days (and at times years!), it seems to me, is used as a teaching tool to give us time to improve our lives: to show us it takes time. Father teach me I must use the time, you allow me, to learn patiently. May I seek not the achievement of the goal as much as the lessons learned on the journey.
Moses fled to the desert for nearly 40 years after killing the Egyptian in response to seeing his true countrymen abused. Seems to me that being Egyptian royalty he might have assumed he could expect to avoid punishment. However, ‘something’ moved him to tend sheep in Midian for all those years in preparation for what was to come.
When Moses climbed Mount Sinai, after entering the midst of the holy cloud, he remained there for 40 days and nights listening to and learning from God. Oh Lord, would I would be lost in that learning for my life’s good, so intensely that time no longer mattered.
After descending the mount with the tablets, again the people had lost patience and decided an idol of their own making would be more useful. Moses, in his distress, falls to his knees and for 40 days and nights fasted from all food and water, praying the people would not be destroyed for their foolish ways again, as with the flood. Even though he had smashed the tablets, that held the Commandments/life lessons sent by God for the people, when his days of praying and fasting were ended: God returned to the lesson. Interesting that both the time with God and the time spent praying for his mercy and grace were equal.
That these two periods of 40 days and nights were held within the 40 years of roaming the desert seems significant to me, at this time. In fact, to them we must add the 40 days the spies spent scoping out the Promised Land and then refused to enter. We humans are not prone to learning or trusting our lessons of the past easily, it would seem.
Goliath was allowed to belittle Saul’s army for 40 days before David arrived to end the standoff. After Jonah ran from God’s request, he, like Moses, eventually had to return to the original message—the lesson. The people of Nineveh were given 40 days to learn and practice the lessons and it seems they did. Yet their success angered Jonah.
Lord let me not forget my own inadequacies when viewing the success of others, but let me search only to excel in the lessons you have for me.
Jesus’ temptation by the devil in the desert was allowed to last for 40 days and nights. God’s own son had to endure such! Why should I, the adopted child, expect a life without challenges? I think of all the times I have refused the lessons, even been angry with God for daring to allow me to hurt after giving in to the temptations in my life. Who do I imagine myself to be, Lord?
The disciples were given an extra 40 days between resurrection and ascension to reflect upon their time with Jesus, to learn new lessons and establish his church. Even then, the Spirit was given to us all so that we would always have ready guidance. If only we would turn from the temptations to trust ourselves alone and to ask for Divine help.
What is the meaning of these 40 days of Lent? Am I meant to simply choose on my own to give up chocolate and then pat myself on the back as I pick it back up on the 41st day?
Father, please allow me to use this period of 40 days to surrender those parts of my life that still misuse the free will you so graciously have given me to choose. Prompt me to ask you what those are that most greatly offend you. May I choose carefully my commitments to you, not just during Lent but always, willing to make the lessons, I learn from surrendering these things, the work of a lifetime. May I be wise enough to use this time to serve others, to better serve you.
Teach me to consider these 40 days of Lent, like the 40 years in the desert, not to be some temporary period of ‘suffering’ but as a time of great learning. May I consider them as more an admonition to be better than the counting of days, just as Jesus spoke to Peter about forgiveness. He told him to forgive not seven times but 70 times seven. Didn’t that message mean we shouldn’t be counting in the first place?
Forgiveness seems a good place to start. May I forgive those for whom I hold any animosity and may I not pick it up again. May I place a greater importance on what you hold important and use these 40 days to begin the conscious process of real change in my life. I can’t do it alone. Use those, you have put in my life, with similar longings, as mutual support and mentors for the journey. May I begin each of these 40 days with you as my hope and strength for the future.
Beloved, hold me close each day that I may show your light to the world through Lent and beyond. Amen.
My morning prayer takes place in our garden room which looks out over our garden through a wall of glass held by large oak beams. During Advent my usual chair had been moved to face the glass/garden to accommodate a large Christmas tree. On the first morning of Advent I sat down as usual with a cup of tea, my daily missal and a new Richard Rohr book for Advent. I looked out into the pitch black early morning and saw hanging in the sky above the Annexe at the bottom of our garden a huge star. No ordinary star but one of seven points that looked exactly like those in a children’s story book. I was dazzled. As I looked in awe, I saw with my own eye the star explode and scatter in every direction what appeared like silver dust and then reform to it’s magnificent original shape. No telescope or binoculars needed to witness this extraordinary event which repeated several times, one after another. I reached for my phone to try and record this moment of fabulousness in a photo. The picture was abysmal and I quickly realised that this beautiful piece of stellar activity could only be stored in my own memory. My heart repeated over and over ‘awesome God, praise you God’ and my prayer that morning focused almost entirely on the wonder and mystery of the God I worship. A particular line of scripture resounded in my mind
‘…and then He made the stars.’ An almost throw away line in the Creation account of Genesis which captures my imagination to envision a God who filled the night sky with these heavenly lanterns. I can only think WOW.
Each new morning of Advent saw the star waiting for me in an inky pre-dawn sky and I was totally fascinated by it and curious as to God’s purpose in allowing me this momentous experience. I read in Richard Rohr about a Cosmic Christ and I felt a special communion between God, myself and another servant of Christ all knitted together by the heavens and in particular, a star. I also found myself looking at the three kings with new understanding and how absolutely compelling their star must have been. Not unlike the one I shared my prayer time with right now, it rendered me silent without need of words to commune with God, simply eyes raised up and a heart swelling at the sight of it.
I woke later on Christmas morning with my family and of course daylight had hidden the star from view. I opened a gift from a girlfriend and inside the wrapping a star shaped box with the words ‘The Star’ printed in gold. It contained a small bottle of oil with the words ‘inner strength’ written across the label. Once again I felt God at work – moving people, things and experiences into my path with a divine purpose that I neither understood nor needed to understand. The mystery of it all was enough. Threads, connections, union across countryside, continents and cosmos.
On 12th January my son was preparing to leave for a posting to Bahrain with the Navy as a diver. He would be away for 6 months and had to leave in the early hours to be at Brize Norton by 4am. He assured me I didn’t need to get up to see him off. I, on the other hand, felt it to be essential to put my arms around him and plant a kiss on his cheek before he left for distant shores. As I marched down the garden in pyjamas and slippers to the Annexe to hug my boy, I happened to look up and found myself standing beneath a velvet sky so heavy and glittering with stars, it took my breath away. They hung so low above me I felt I could reach out and touch them. I felt once again God’s full presence in that instant. We made our good-byes under that sky and afterwards I stood alone, appreciating personally Mrs Morel’s experience in Sons and Lovers, a paragraph I have always adored for it’s passionate lyrical description. More connections asserting themselves, between past and present, literary genius and physical experience, memory and real life, mother and son, me, God and the universe. All intertwined, interconnected but completely separate. It felt as though I was present in the whole of eternity from beginning to end. God offered a moment in a ‘thin place’ where the whole of everything existed in a single flicker of time.
Our priest has spoken of the guiding star on the celebration of the Epiphany at Mass and I listened intently to his words about the 3 kings representing the whole of God’s gentile children – Jesus for all mankind, just as the shepherds symbolised His chosen people, Israel. I have learned that a hectogram, a seven pointed star has been used in Christianity to represent the 7 days of Creation and is the symbol of perfection for God in many Christian religions. Recently the media has been filled with the news of David Bowie’s death, the lyrics of Starman have played themselves out to me: ‘There’s a star man waiting in the sky, he’d like to come and meet us but he thinks he’d blow our minds…….’ Stars, stars and more stars……
Are we ready to meet with the creator of the stars, of the universe? Am I ready? This part of my journey in faith is not over, we are only half way through January and right at the start of the church year, but already I feel completely overwhelmed by the breadth and intensity of a God imprinting Himself upon me as I am soft wax to His creative hand. Lift up your eyes to the night sky and breath in the heavens of a holy God. Look, wait, listen for your own connections and don’t be surprised if they are written in the stars. If there is any God purpose in all of this at all then I believe it is that we are all connected intrinsically and intimately through all eternity. We are part of His story.
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