Water and Spirit

 

Keuka 1

Water is an ordinary and essential part of living.  We use it in everyday routines and rituals; our morning shower, boiling over tea leaves, and swallowing a glassful with a pill.  My favorite spots usually include a view of water, whether the pond behind my childhood home, the Chesapeake Bay through my office window, and Keuka Lake from a friend’s cottage.  Yet I have usually looked at water in a habitual way, knowing what to expect and not paying close attention.

 

Then several years ago visiting my friend at Keuka, one of the New York Finger Lakes, something changed. I was watching the sunlight across the rippling water in the morning sun.  There were brilliant flashes of light like spilled diamonds. While it was pretty, I was seeing the water as I expected to see it, how I had always seen it.  But something shifted.  I had been practicing mediation and Centering Prayer, learning to let go of my internal chatter, my expectations. I began seeing the water as shifting patterns of color and light, dynamic and fluid.

 

I was no longer bringing my past experiences to how I was seeing the water.  I was using “soft eyes” to relax my gaze, to relax what I “know” so I could see it differently.  Other parts of me, undefinable parts of my being were engaged.  Was I connecting with something spiritual, engaging with my soul?  In truth I really don’t know.

Keuka 2

I think back to visiting the Musée de l'Orangerie in Paris, standing in front of the Monet Waterlily panels over 30 feet wide.  Standing in the center of the room one can see the flowers and floating leaves of the waterlilies, the reflections of clouds and hanging branches of the weeping willows on the surface of the water.  My eyes and my mind putting together all of the pieces to make a whole, definable image.  My mind putting words to what I was seeing, “water lily,” and “cloud,” and “tree.”  

Then I stepped up so my face was just a few feet from the painted surface.  There I saw abstract patches of aquamarine and turquoise, lavender and white, cerulean and teal, olive and emerald.  Each distinct shade wrapping around, under and over the others.  A swirling of color that did not mean anything in particular. Then across the top edge of the thick paint there was a single brush stroke of red, glancing across the colors underneath.  Stepping back, my eyes and mind again brought back the experience of standing beside the pool of water with dappled sunlight through the trees.  Stepping forward I would see the texture and mixture of color; stepping back I see recognizable objects.

As I write, I look out at the water of Keuka and alternate between the two ways of seeing: waves pushed by the South wind or as strokes of color.  I have had to practice how to see beyond my expectations to this alternative view.  Most of the time I just see what I expect to see.  But when I slow down, relax and quiet my busy mind and pay close attention, I understand anew.

A very similar process occurs when I am meeting with my spiritual director or when providing spiritual direction to other people.  We often start with telling the stories about what is going on, looking at it from our usual, habitual ways of looking.  We bring in different ways to understand what is happening, to make sense out of the nonsense of living.  Together we sort through what the story means using psychological theories, theological insights or aphorisms.  While all those may be useful in providing more insight into the story, they only go so far. 

At some point we take a deep breath, relax and step forward into the swirling abstract shapes, to open up a different vision.  We pay attention to a different perspective to our lives, one which we call spiritual.  One that is easy to forget in everyday life, or when we are too busy to take the time.  Yet we need to take the time, to step forward, if we want to grow more whole.

Keuka Summer Storm

 

Ways of Knowing

Fourteen years ago when I started this blog, I chose the name “Know That I Am” because it describes the paradox of my faith.  I have always known a deep yearning for God but struggled with having a solid sense of relationship with God. I want to “know” the God with no name who simply says “I am.” Bur, how can anyone know God?

Mark 12:30 states “You shall love your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.”  This passage is a daily part of my life through the Morning Prayer Service from the Northumbria Community.

 Call:             Who is it that you seek?

Response:    We seek the Lord our God.

Call:              Do you seek Him with all your heart?

Response:    Amen. Lord, have mercy.

Call:              Do you seek Him with all your soul?

Response:    Amen. Lord, have mercy.

Call:              Do you seek Him with all your mind?

Response:    Amen. Lord, have mercy.

Call:              Do you seek Him with all your strength?

Response:    Amen. Christ, have mercy.

Answering these four questions each day with the affirmation of “Amen” has reminded me to engage in all four ways of loving God through my heart, my soul, my mind and my strength.  However, when I was younger, I thought only one way of knowing God was necessary. 

My years pursuing a Master of Divinity at Wesley Theological Seminary are a good example.  Taking classes in Christian theology, scripture, and history, I sought to know God with my mind.  The seminary seemed to teach that an intellectual knowledge of God that would settle all my doubts and questions. I thought that if I mastered knowing God with my mind, I would find peace from my doubts.  However, the answers I developed fell short of resolving my doubts, and just raised new questions.  Completing the degree did not mean that I had settled anything.

Yet, during my time in seminary there were many seeds planted about the other ways to know and love God. Those seeds waited for years before I noticed them and nurtured them.  So while singing in the Chapel Choir was important to my faith, it was decades later that I understood how music emerges from my soul.

It surprises me when specific memories of my years in seminary come to mind in my ordinary daily life.  Yet when I take the time to pause and notice that memory, I see one of the seeds planted during that time.  Curiously they are not the intellectual issues and topics I studied or wrote papers about.  They are the other aspects of knowing the “I Am” I know to be God, with my heart, my soul and my strength.

 

 

Statio

In the September 2020 issue of Mundi Medicina, an email newsletter from Holy Cross Monastery, Rev. Matthew Wright writes:

"In monastic terminology, statio can refer to both a place and a practice.  The Latin word literally means "station" or "position"; over time, it came to signify a monastic community's gathering briefly before worship, or the space through which one transitions into worship. . . . It is, essentially, a transition point, a holy pause."

While the word "statio" is new for me, I have been practicing this holy pause for over a decade. At the beginning of each spiritual direction conversation I invite the two of us to have a few minutes of silence together.  If the person has traveled to meet with me, this provides a time to fully arrive and for us to become more present to each other.  Even in this time of virtual conversations, being together in silence allows me to refocus myself to our being together.

The members of the Benedictine monastery who lived in Whitby Abbey in England probably included times of statio as a regular part of their life together.  When I took this photograph of the ruins a few years ago, I was unaware of our common practice.  Yet, wandering through those stones on a foggy day, I frequently paused to look and feel something of the holiness of that place.

Rev. Wright quotes from Wisdom Distilled from the Daily by Joan Chittister:

"The practice of statio is meant to center us and make us conscious of what we're about to do and make us present to the God who is present to us.  Statio is the desire to do consciously what I might otherwise do mechanically.  Statio is the virtue of presence."

The "virtue of presence" is especially important for these days and times.  It is very tempting to escape from the chaos, insecurity, fear and anxiety around and within me.  It is hard to stay present to what is going on within rather than to push it away or deny its power over me.  Yet by putting up that barrier within, I also put up a barrier to be aware of the presence of the Holy One.  I close out the One who I need more than anything else.

As I continue to follow the Rule of Life of the Northumbria Community, remembering to pause and practice statio opens up my ability to be Available and Vulnerable for others as well as myself.

Expressions of Faith

 

During these anxious times, when current events are crashing around me, I think of this picture.  In front are the remaining walls from an old mill on the Turnback Creek in Dade County, Missouri. Those walls hold a calm, still pool of water, while the river water cascades wildly and noisily behind.  I want to be like that quiet pool, separated from external clamor.  Sometimes, for a short time, I can find that place of internal peacefulness.  But I cannot hold onto it for long.

The chaotic voices often become strongest when I am afraid to go to bed because I know they will keep me awake or wake up in the middle of the night.  That is when I turn to the Evening Prayer Office written by the Northumbria Community.  There is a section of the liturgy called Expressions of Faith.  It is a paradoxical contrast of feelings such as weakness, anxiousness, and being unsafe challenged by the promises of choosing to believe that God provides strength, peace, and safety.  Read through them for yourself.

Lord, You have always given
bread for the coming day;
and though I am poor,
today I believe.

Lord, You have always given
strength for the coming day;
and though I am weak,
today I believe.

Lord, You have always given
peace for the coming day;
and though of anxious heart,
today I believe.

Lord, You have always kept
me safe in trials;
and now, tried as I am,
today I believe.

Lord, You have always marked
the road for the coming day;
and though it may be hidden,
today I believe.

Lord, You have always lightened
this darkness of mine;
and though the night is here,
today I believe.

Lord, You have always spoken
when time was ripe;
and though you be silent now,
today I believe.

I know that remembering those promises doesn't make the bad feelings go away;  claiming that "today I believe" is often done with a shaky and uncertain voice.  But committing to believe gives me strength while acknowledging my pain and uncertainty.