Gathered Together--Community Contemplative Practice

 

Jesus would also die so that God’s children scattered everywhere would be gathered together as one.                                                                                       John 11:52

Reading through the gospel of John for Lent, this verse came in today’s reading. As I read it, what came to mind was the centering prayer time that Pastor Wil is leading each week during Lent. I could see our small circle, practicing centering prayer in community.

There is something special to me about gathering together in person to practice centering prayer or lectio divina or to walk a labyrinth. These are all contemplative practices that can be done alone, but there is something powerful and compelling about being contemplative with others. It’s a completely different experience!

It makes me wonder if John, the mystical gospel writer, was looking to a day when our action in the world would flow from our gathering together as one in contemplation. Practicing silence in community invites the Spirit to speak in ways we may not hear otherwise. Collective silence can draw together scattered minds.

I know I am grateful that my church is offering opportunities this Lent to do contemplative practices in community. It is shaping my Lenten journey in meaningful ways. Gathering together with others to reflect on scripture in silence or to do a twenty-minute sit is countercultural, pushing back at our society’s demand that we must always be doing something. The good news of Jesus tells us that our worth is not tied to our ability to produce. Contemplative practices invite us to live as if we believe that to be true!

A Collect for Beloved Children of God

God of tears,
who is troubled by the death
of every sparrow,
how you must be grieving now.

One hundred fifty girls dead,
your children,
our children,
killed by others who are also beloved by you,
also your children,
with mothers and fathers and families of their own.

I say I want to love as you love, but my heart is
breaking.
Yes, I do want to love as you love;
help me.

Help me.

Keep me from the callousness
that cannot grieve, and yet show me
how to bear up in a world that seems to
hunger and thirst
for hate and blood and death.

Help me
to remember that there is no one
not made in your image, no one
who does not bear
your divine light within.

Give me eyes to see,
even when I don’t want
to look.

Merciful God, abide
in this desert with us.

Small, Happy Moments

As we daily see more and more cruelty in the world around us, and especially within our own country, and add to that the stress of a major winter storm, I found myself earlier this week genuinely afraid. I’m not one who is prone to fear, but it all was feeling overwhelming.

Ironically, I got to spend time with some sixth graders yesterday, sharing ways to use breath and movements to reduce anxiety! It was just what I needed, both the experience of teaching (which I love) and the practice of things I know, but had failed to employ for my own benefit.

I could tell the effect of the practices on myself, because by the time I left the school, my whole outlook had changed. I was lighter, calmer, and more energetic than I’d been in several days.

The icing on the cake came when I received the package of things I’d ordered to help me get through the coming winter storm. Batteries, thermometers for the fridge and freezer, and a phone charger block, were good to have, but there was one thing that made me laugh out loud with delight. It was the blue enameled cast iron pot I bought so I could cook on my propane grill!

When I opened the box and saw it, I was filled with happiness! The color, the size, the weight—all of it was just right. The world hadn’t changed. Fresh cruelty came across my news feed and the winter storm is still on the way, but the combination of breathing practices to reduce stress and a cheery blue one-quart pot was just the recipe for changing my ability to cope with it all.

Mary Oliver, one of my favorite poets, shares wise words in her prose-poem “Don’t Hesitate”:

If you suddenly and unexpectedly feel joy, don’t hesitate. Give in to it. There are plenty of lives and whole towns destroyed or about to be. We are not wise, and not very often kind. And much can never be redeemed. Still, life has some possibility left. Perhaps this is its way of fighting back, that sometimes something happens better than all the riches or power in the world. It could be anything. . . whatever it is, don’t be afraid of its plenty. Joy is not made to be a crumb.

In the midst of much that is terrible, I hope you’ll be alert for small, happy moments. Every time we give in to joy, we fight back some of the darkness.