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.

Spiritual Direction in My Life

It is with a sense of awe and gratitude that in two weeks I will join a gathering of former and current members of the Spiritual Directors International (SDI) Coordinating Council.  The meeting is part of a year-long strategic planning process.

Some people are already friends, such as the current Council members in this photo from our meeting last November.  We get to know each other well by working hard, sharing our personal life and spiritual stories, and embracing periods of contemplative silence.

In preparation for the upcoming meeting, we were all asked to write an essay about what spiritual guidance we are receiving to be a person of contemplation, a person of action, and a person who builds community.  Here is what I wrote:

A few years ago my spiritual director noted I was experiencing the longest dark night of anyone she had known.  Any sense of God was fleeting and nebulous.  My work at a national association had become poisonous to my emotional and spiritual health, and I focused on surviving. I saw no alternative, while yearning to be in ministry as a spiritual companion for more than a few people.

Like many middle managers, a corporate restructuring two years ago eliminated that work, and I was handed a three month severance package.  Within weeks I followed a newly emerging curiosity about being a hospice chaplain.  Doors quickly opened to my starting Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE) as a volunteer chaplain.  Within the first two units of CPE, I moved through my grieving the loss of a career, while learning to be with those at the end of life.  My time with Kathy, my spiritual director, turned from the desert of the dark night to surprise and hope, mixed with anxiety and fear.  As Kathy wryly noted one time, God gave me what I wanted, though not the way I expected.

Weeks after losing my job I was also invited to join the SDI Coordinating Council, after being turned down just months earlier.  It was affirmation in the middle of desolation.  I began integrating two parts of my life that had been kept separate, applying over two decades of experience as an association manager to a new and very different organization, SDI, which has been central to my growth as a spiritual director.  

Taking a third unit of CPE last autumn I explored the differences and overlaps between the roles of chaplain and spiritual director.  Dan, my supervisor and I had numerous discussions about when and how my responses pointed to one or the other role.  Dan challenged me to stop asking questions because they led the other person to move into his or her head.  My image of how to be a spiritual director has been deepened and challenged.

After that third unit Dan invited me to apply for a CPE Chaplain Resident position for a 15 bed hospice facility.  My first response was “Yes!” followed by an immediate “Oh Shit!”  Taking that to my spiritual director, Kathy pointed out my resistance to the call, which I had been unwilling to admit.  I did apply and will start in August, earning money after two years using up savings.

Now I am able to be more fully available and vulnerable to those whom I companion.  I am aware of how much brokenness I experience with each person, each one seeking in her or his own way, to know how to be in service to the broken world around us.  The two years of deepening into my own vulnerability, pain, and brokenness allows me to offer a safer place for those I companion to express, name, and begin healing their own brokenness and pain.  I am full of gratitude to be God’s presence for them.

Exploring Vulnerability and Availability

In researching how I have applied the Rule of Vulnerability and Availability in my spiritual life and in providing spiritual direction, my journals revealed a mixture of applications. Here are some brief summaries:

As Examen 

There were many times when I used the questions “How have I said ‘yes’ to vulnerability? How have I said ‘yes’ to availability?” as a kind of personal examen, following the Ignation practice. The practice has provided an ongoing and deepening psychological and spiritual awareness over the years.

As Frame 

The Rule was used going into a particular situation. For example, before beginning a silent retreat, spiritual training event, or family gathering, I would bring to mind the question “What can I do to be vulnerable and available during this time?” By asking the question, I would be alerted to ways I was not being as vulnerable or available as I wanted to be. Then I could decide if I was willing to be more open and risk-taking.

In my Body 

Having a full body massage did not just loosen the locked-up muscles, but also opened up a sense of spirit and soul. The relationship between the physical and the spiritual became clear.

In my Feelings 

There were many descriptions of feelings connected to either allowing or avoiding the choices of vulnerability and availability. While deeply desiring to be vulnerable and available to God and others, there were strong feelings, such as fear of the possible risks and dangers.

God’s Encouragement 

During prayer, God invited and encouraged an ongoing exploration being vulnerable and available. One journal entry noted a sense of God saying it “will lead to pain, to fear, to loss, to unexpected joy and delight; all of it will be there – both as a gift for me and a challenge to me.”

God’s Freedom 

God provides humanity the freedom to act with vulnerability and availability by providing God’s own self as freely vulnerable and available. More than the one time offering of Jesus’ own vulnerability, it is God’s ongoing commitment to those who are willing to open themselves by becoming vulnerable and available to God.

Self-differentiation and connection

It is only possible to choose to be fully vulnerable and available through deeply knowing yourself and experiencing the separation of that self from others. The vulnerability cannot grow out of weakness or fusion or fragility, but through deliberate and prayerful personal exploration and awareness. This process will both clarify one’s own boundaries while allowing for a more true availability for and with others.

Providing direction

Spiritual directors often describe providing hospitality as a core dynamic of the conversation. When a director intentionally chooses to be vulnerable and available to those who come for conversation, the director radically welcomes all the person brings. Supervision provides a place for the director to continue working on internal barriers and blocks, deepening both a differentiated self and the availability to others.

I would appreciate any comments or suggestions for further explorations of these topics.

Availability and Vulnerability

(Here is another article from the No Chocolate in Lent? blog that I wrote in March.  I am working on a follow up on my Changed by Silence response to Sarah Coakley's article in Christian Century, but it is not yet ready from prime time)  

There are two simple words at the center of the Rule of Life for the Northumbria Community – availability and vulnerability. Since discovering that Rule several years ago, I have tried to live my own life with availability and vulnerability.

Let me backtrack. Many years ago, David found a prayer book developed by the Northumbria Community in England. The Northumbria Community is a geographically dispersed community that has its home on the Holy Island of Lindisfarne.  It is shaped by a spirituality based in the history and experience of the Celts. What holds that community together is their Rule of Life, summarized by the values of availability and vulnerability. As Richard Foster states in the introduction of Celtic Daily Prayer:

These are vows that extend both vertically and horizontally: available to God, available to others; vulnerable to God, vulnerable to others.

While I make no claim to be a member of the community, nor have I ever visited there, I have tried to adopt those values into my life, with their challenge and hope. I continually find myself returning to them over and over again, because they seem to be at the core of my struggles to live a life centered on God. This year, I will consciously bring those challenges of availability and vulnerability into this week between Palm Sunday and Easter.

Holy Week was a time when Jesus was fully available to those who needed him, while becoming totally vulnerable to the fear and cruelty of those who controlled the religious and government institutions. In his acts of availability, such as washing the disciple’s feet, Jesus turns around the expectations of his friends by caring for them. In his interactions with those in power, he refuses to return violence for violence, hatred for hatred. During this week, we recall his betrayal by one of his disciples, beatings by soldiers, abandonment by his friends, crucifixion by an oppressive state, and death.

So, in continuing on my Lenten discipline of what if it’s all true, what can I hope to learn from Jesus' tragic, and ultimately triumphant, journey? I don’t know. Maybe nothing. But if I can find a way to stay available and vulnerable to reliving his story, I hope to be able embrace those values more fully in the power of resurrection and Easter.