Good day good people,
Today we sit in the midst of Ascensiontide, the period between the Feast of the Ascension and the Feast of Pentecost. A time in the Christian tradition when Yeshua has Ascended and has encouraged his students to wait in patience to receive the Holy Spirit. It is from this nine-day period of waiting that the Church gets the tradition of the “novena”—prayer for a specific intention for nine days. We too may choose to use the rest of these days of quiet waiting as a final push of the 50 days of Easter to continue in patient trust and prayer with the intention of deepening what it means to "acknowledge, explore, and live out of our" second body within our sacred creaturely body. This second body is already always at home in the kingdom of heaven or the imaginal realm which suffuses this earthly realm now. As it continues to take shape in our incarnate being, we can sense and feel it animating our whole self with a life that is beyond even either body alone. Our bodies or selves together become greater than the sum of our parts, thus we needn't be afraid of or attempting to rid ourselves of our creaturely self or aspects. It all belongs and is in fact necessary for the full manifestation of our being!
With Love,
Heather
Readings from last week's Daily Contemplative Pauses
Monday, May 6th with Catherine
Reading: Eagle Poem by Joy Harjo
To pray you open your whole self
To sky, to earth, to sun, to moon
To one whole voice that is you.
And know there is more
That you can't see, can't hear
Can't know except in moments
Steadily growing, and in languages
That aren't always sound but other
Circles of motion.
Like eagle that Sunday morning
Over Salt River. Circles in blue sky
In wind, swept our hearts clean
With sacred wings.
We see you, see ourselves and know
That we must take the utmost care
And kindness in all things.
Breathe in, knowing we are made of
All this, and breathe, knowing
We are truly blessed because we
Were born, and die soon, within a
True circle of motion,
Like eagle rounding out the morning
Inside us.
We pray that it will be done
In beauty.
In beauty.
Tuesday, May 7th with Tom
Reading:
A fish cannot drown in water.
A bird does not fall in air.
In the fire of creation,
God does not vanish:
the fire brightens.
Each creature God made
must live in its own true nature;
How can I resist my nature
that lives for oneness with God?
— Mechthild of Magdeburg
Wednesday, May 8th with Tom
Reading: Backpain by Rumi
Muhammad went to visit a sick friend.
Such kindness brings more kindness,
and there is no knowing the proliferation from there.
The man was about to die.
Muhammad put his face close and kissed him.
His friend began to revive.
Muhammad's visit re-created him.
He began to feel grateful for an illness
that brought such light.
And also for the backpain
that wakes him in the night.
No need to snore away like a buffalo
when this wonder is walking the world.
There are values in pain that are difficult
to see without the presence of a guest.
Don't complain about autumn.
Walk with grief like a good friend.
Listen to what he says.
Sometimes the cold and dark of a cave
give the opening we most want.
Thursday, May 9th with Catherine
Reading: "The encounters with Jesus during the 40 days leading up to his ascension, are recognition dramas. “At each new level of subtlety something in us must be able to see, to find our way to who he now is…” (p. 129)
“Jesus is corporally present only to the degree that people cannot yet see with the eye of the heart. As the eye of the hear opens, there is more and more freedom to release the physical traces and simply allow the naked immediacy of love to meet heart to heart.” (p.131) — Cynthia Bourgeault, The Wisdom Jesus
Friday, May 10th with Catherine
Reading: A Walk by Rilke
My eyes already touch the sunny hill,
Going far ahead of the road I have begun.
So we are grasped by what we cannot grasp;
it has its inner light, even from a distance --
and changes us, even if we do not reach it,
into something else, which, hardly sensing it, we already are;
a gesture waves us on, answering our own wave…
but what we feel is the wind on our faces.
Saturday, May 11th with Lacey
Reading: Everything That Was Broken by Mary Oliver
Everything that was broken has
forgotten its brokenness. I live
now in a sky-house, through every
window that sun. Also your presence,
Our touching, our stories. Earthy
and holy both. How can this be, but
it is. Every day has something in
it whose name is Forever.
Chant: Everywhere I turn there is the face of God
Sunday, May 12th with Lacey
Reading: "It is significant that his words here are identical with those spoken by his mother Mary at the time of the annunciation: "Here I am, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your work" (Luke 1:38). The Latin word for "let it be" is fiat, and in both cases the human fiat is an essential ingredient (if not the essential ingredient) enabling the mystery to unfold. This coincidence becomes even more interesting when. we add to our list that third cosmic fiat in the book of Genesis: God said, "Let it be!" and the created universe comes tumbling into existence.
We can begin to see that there is a tie-rod connecting "Let it be," understood as kenosis and "Let it be" understood as divine creativity. Once this point is grasped, Jesus' fiat in the Garden of Gethsemane is not merely a capitulation to divine necessity; it is his conscious participation in "speaking" into birth the New Creation. (And once we see even further that the same is true of every fiat we are able to consciously utter in our lives, then our own kenotic path comes alive with creativity and wonder.)" — Cynthia Bourgeault, Wisdom Jesus, p. 112
Chant: Let it be, let it be, fiat, let it be
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