Open Worship, a Quaker Distinctive

This was written as a first word for my Quaker community, West Hills Friends. First words are a 3-5 minute report on how god is moving in your life right now. 

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Hello, my name is Alyss and this Christmas was my fifth Christmas at West Hills. I didn't grow up a Quaker but last summer, a Friend here accused me of "being convinced by the process". I laughed but have come to think of that as the best way to describe my Quaker conversion. This process, these centuries old methods of seeking and finding, these are distinctive ways of worship and business particular to us Quakers. I've seen them work and they have convinced me. 

George Fox wrote, "Meet together, and in the measure of God's spirit wait, that with it all your minds may be guided up to God, to receive wisdom from God. That you may all come to know how you may walk up to him in his wisdom."

Here at West Hills Friends we hold our open worship to be that special and sacred place where we wait for God's spirit. And more than once, I have received some of that wisdom Fox referred to. Sounds like it would be fun, right? Hah. Being led to speak in Meeting is not, in my experience, an altogether pleasant experience. I like to talk and I like to tell people what I think and know. I mean, I'm a middle school teacher - I make a living standing up in front of big groups of people telling them what I know. But giving vocal ministry is not like that at all.
  
Silent worship is, in our Quaker understanding, a time for God to speak to us. God is speaking to us, her gathered body. God has always had to use humans' hands, mouths and wombs to do her work and through generations of lived experience we have learned that silence together is one of the best ways to prepare for hearing that voice of god. That silence is important, it is sacred, it is the path we walk on to get to the place we can hear god. And maybe be asked to share what we hear.

In 1659 early Friend, Alexander Parker wrote about giving vocal ministry: "And if any be moved to speak words, wait low in the pure fear, to know the mind of the Spirit, where and to whom they are to be spoken. If any are moved to speak, see that they speak in the power; and when the power is still, you are still."
 
Pure fear. Speak in the power and when the power is still, you are still. This is not a small task we are being called to. Silent worship has always seemed to me as akin to us all being archaeologists working on a dig. Each person is intent on the delicate work right in front of them. Giving vocal ministry is like yelling "Look - look what I found!" Everyone stops their own work with tooth brushes and dental picks to see what you found. If what you've found is good it will help everyone else with their work. But there's a chance that you are distracting them and interrupting their good work.

In my experience, being called to speak in worship is a distinctly physical experience. It starts with a thought, just like any other thought, but almost immediately there is a distinct bell that DINGS in my mind. A flag that this is important. So, my mind reacts to this notice of importance with "Oh! I should stand up and share!" But then I get a kind of sense of dread. Nope, that's just my ego talking, wanting to be seen and heard and have people think I'm witty and wise and clever. That is not what this time is for. So I sit, listening again.

Edward Burrough, an early convert under Fox wrote in 1655 "Do not be hasty, when you see things open in your minds; dwell in them, and do not run out to speak them, but treasure them up in your hearts, and take heed, and keep low in the fear of the Lord God, that pride and presumption do not get up, nor anything be exalted above what is pure."

Often, at this point, that original thought expands, contracts, continues on to something else that feels different than my own thinking and again the bell DINGS. By this time, though, the No often comes from my ego... "I am so not standing up and saying THAT". What before felt like a message that would get me applauded now feels like a message that would bare my innermost tender and gooey parts. I am not saying that out loud. At about this time my stomach starts to hurt and my knees feel weak. Denial on the edge of panic. No no, no. But the message won't go away and by now it is clear that god has tapped me on the shoulder to say this thing. She's waiting, standing behind me with my arms crossed waiting, like Yahweh listening to Moses give all the reasons he can not possibly go talk to Pharaoh, both of them knowing full well Moses is gonna go talk to Pharaoh.
 
Other people speak and I am temporarily relieved. Sweet, off the hook! But then the silence falls and I'm back on that hook. Finally I can't stand it. The pressure is too much or Mike asks if "all hearts are clear" and mine most certainly is not. I stand and start to speak. The first few words are familiar, I thought these already. But often the message moves away from my thoughts and things that had been nebulous at best come out in elegant or halting words. People often thank me for these words but I feel bashful - they weren't mine. I didn't think them, I hardly remember speaking them. When the message is done I sit down and thank goddess for whoever it was that donated those pillows 'cause I really need to hug something to me when I sit back down. The first time this happened I remember thinking, "oh! That's why we're called Quakers."

Giving vocal ministry in open worship is a Quaker distinctive. It is a thing that sets us apart from other people, other Christians, other seekers. I don't know if this is how vocal ministry works for yo, and this is not how god works for me in most other places in my life. It is a mystery and I have no explanation. I am convinced by the process, though.



Quotes from Early Friends came from Hall V Worthington's website here: http://www.hallvworthington.com/George_Fox_Selections/meetingrules.html

Magic

February First

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If you are a dreamer, come in,

If you are a dreamer, a wisher, a liar,

A hope-er, a pray-er, a magic bean buyer...

If you're a pretender, come sit by my fire

For we have some flax-golden tales to spin.

Come in!

Come in!

It is that time of year again, the subtley sparkley days in late winter when the first hints of spring start showing themselves. The days are getting longer a couple minutes at a time and some very adventurous plants are even starting to sprout or bud. There's a bit of a pinkish and greenish tinge to the world, rather than just January grey.

Aurora Borealis in Alaska by well_lucio

The holy day marking this point in the wheel of the year is is February First, also known as Brigid, or Candlemas, Imbolc or Groundhog Day. Brigid was a goddess in Ireland before she became the Christian saint and in both (or all?) of her aspects she is the patron of blacksmithing, weaving, healing, poetry and prophecy. At first, these seem like a strange jumble of things and activities to preside over, but a second look shows something in common - these are all elements of magic. Prophecy and poetry are the magic of turning words from nonsense into meaning, healing is the magic of turning illness into health and weaving and blacksmithing are the magic of turning raw materials into useful objects. In a pre industrial world, blacksmithing was just as much magic as healing and both were at least as important as prophecy.

But I don't live in a pre industrial world. In fact, I live in a post industrial, post modernist, 21st century world where even the word magic is a bit dirty, provincial or naive. Materialists insist that everything that happens has a material cause. Perhaps things look magical, but we just havent' seen the cause. Christians know that something non-material can be a cause of material things, but they dismiss magic as either occult or prideful. Dabbling in magic either puts you in league with the devil or full of pride, thinking that you can do something beyond or outside of god's will. I am not a materialist, or a Christian, though, and so I wonder... what do I think about magic?

As you know, I'm a fan of young adult fantasy and other science fiction. Last week I read the first four books in the The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel series, one of those "regular kids get sucked into a world where everything they believed to be true is wrong... and have adventures!" kind of books. In these stories, gods and 

Aurora Borealis in Norway by Tor Even Mathiesen

mythological characters are real, some people can become immortal and even more people can awaken to their true abilities and powers, becoming magical. Characters learn magic in all kinds of ways, but the end results are usually of the spectacular, laws-of-physics-do-not-apply-here kind. At one point, the children call the water out of the earth, causing a muddy pool to swallow a particularly scary monster, and in another scene someone tracks people across Paris by the trail their aura leaves behind. At other times, characters cast spells by putting certain runes or symbols in certain patterns, or by combining special potions or words.

I don't really use magic like that. I don't say I don't ever, because, well, sometimes I say a special ritual phrase or choose symbols, images or colors for specific meanings both in my daily life and in my "religious" life of my nature table, bedroom altar or other special events or objects. I certainly played around with these kinds of magical correspondences, rituals and spells as I explored earth based religion in my 20s but have really never gotten deep into working magic. As I developed a much more panentheistic sense of the divine (that god is both omnipresent in the physical universe and also exists beyond it, as opposed to the theism of Christianity of the polytheism of many Pagan theologies) I have really moved away from these kinds of symbolic gestures. A few remain - I have a charm in my car and say a special verse while rubbing it for luck and safety - but the Quaker sensibilities of both being wary 

Aurora Australis from the International Space Station

of outward symbols and of trusting god in all things, have really taken over my spiritual life. 

But I do know that I have power in this world. I do know that I can make things happen the way I want them to happen and that words and symbols have great, great power. Am I rejecting this knowledge by rejecting magik the way it is practiced by wiccans and some other Pagans? Is it the power of prayer and god's omnipotent will that makes these unexplained, magical seeming things happen? I do not believe in a purely material universe, so why not work with the web of energy that I know connects us? Sometimes I think that the answer to that question is a humble one of not being willing to take on that kind of power, and sometimes I think I am ducking a potential responsibility.

Ultimately, the query I am sitting with in regards to magic is this, an adaptation of a query my pastor asked recently; to what extent do we create magic and to what extent do we merely uncover the magic that already exists? But then again, this is the query I sit with about god in general. What is the answer to life, the universe, and everything?  :)

What does magic mean to you? Have you ever worked magic with spells or magical objects? Do you believe that we have a supernatural influence on the workings of the world through our own work or through petition to a diety? Or do you think this is all a bunch of codwollop? Have you ever experienced anything magical?

Magic

Sandra’s seen a leprechaun,

Eddie touched a troll,

Laurie danced with witches once,

Charlie found some goblins gold.

Donald heard a mermaid sing,

Susy spied an elf,

But all the magic I have known

I've had to make myself.

If you didn't know... both poems are from Shel Silverstein in Where the Sidewalk Ends. The photos are of aurora, one of the more blatently magical things I can think of. Click the links below the pictures to be taken to the photographers' Flickr pages and see more of their phenomenal work.

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February First 2009: February the First

February First 2010: Lovely Luz and Sweet Bridgit This happens to be my all time favorite post from all two plus years of blogging. Please go check it out. 

Feburary First 2011: Brigid - The Goddess of Poetry

February First 2012: Brigid's Red Soup

Grabbing the Tiger by the Tail

Full Birth Moon

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Welcome to the first full moon of 2012, the Birth Moon. Happy New Year! Did you have a wonderful holiday weekend, full of friends, parties and maybe a few more thoughtful moments? Have you been savoring the darkness of this time of year, incubating plans for the coming season of light? Or have you been trying to drown out the dark with lights and liquor, food, parties and go go go, fun fun fun? Yeah, I've been doing some of both, too.

Last year at about this time, I looked over the year before, did some gwishing and came up with a theme for 2011: Building a Better Teacher. As I look back on this last year I see how that theme really filled out the year. I really enjoyed my coursework, did a lot of processing with the deeper themes of equity, child development and how our public schools work, and actually spent some time in a public school classroom. I

Winter Sky

feel like so much of the rest of what I did this year helped me build a better teacher, too. The play and poetry I engaged in during the spring and summer, my trip to visit my family in Southern California, working through all the hard stuff and then more hard stuff and every bit of reading and writing I did this year all helped me become a stronger, clearer person and more ready to be a friend, mentor and leader to teenagers. 

The days between Christmas and Epiphany are considered the 12 Days of Christmas and there are many esoteric beliefs and traditions associated with these dark nights. Some people believe that the weather of the twelve days associates with the weather of the corresponding months in the upcoming year, and others use that correspondence to do meditation or planning for those months. Other people use the 12 nights to focus on the upcoming year in a more general way, on their own spirituality or on inner work they might want to work on in the coming year. No matter what, it is a time of sinking into the deep dark, bringing the magic of the Christmas rebirth into the new year and getting ready for the Epiphany, the lighting up and insight, that can come if you are ready for it. I spent some of the 12 days, and some before and after, pondering about this upcoming year, 2012.

As I worked through what I want 2012 to look like and listened intently to what the Universe was hinting at, I used some old techniques and some new. I read my Fairy Tale Tarot deck and looked at Sabian Symbols. I prayed in Meeting and in my car. I listened to the conversations I had with my friends and examined what stories were really speaking to me during this time. I brainstormed qualities and imagined scenes from the year. It took a lot of pondering and meditating and thinking, but finally… I am ready to unveil 2012.

Grabbing the Tiger By the Tail

• 2012 will be a year of saying yes to adventure, of facing the fearsome, of just doing it, no matter what "it" is.
• 2012 will look ballsy and awesome, effortless and amazing! Sometimes it will look as challenging as it feels, but it will always look real. 
• 2012 will feel exciting and terrifying, hard but do-able, good like a hard work out or a tricky puzzle. 
• 2012 will be bright orange and zebra striped. It will smell like cinnamon and snow. It will sound like big bells, the crack of a bat and the roar of a crowd, it will sound like the Rocky Theme song (being played by a Hawaiian marching band... which will follow me everywhere this year. Get ready).

2012 is going to be full of adventures. I am student teaching at a middle school, looking for a job in the spring and summer and good Lord willin’ start as a classroom teacher in the fall. I might have to move and will definitely be meeting new people all along the way. I have no idea what adventures this 

The Tiger's Stripes

summer holds for me, in fact, I don’t even know where June rent is coming from. I am going to need to step up to the plate this year and grab each tiger by the tail as it comes my way or I might miss an opportunity, either material or otherwise as they zoom by.

There are other kinds of tigers lurking in 2012, though, too. The story that I shared with you earlier in the month is a story about a man who runs from a tiger that is more about emotions than about the material world. Stefano is terrified of the columber and spends his whole life running, ending up a sad and lonely man. Almost immediately after my motto for the year came to me I had a situation where I realized that I was running from a columber. Something was scary to admit, hard to feel and I ran away from it through blame and anger. As hard as Grabbing the Tiger of jobs and teaching By the Tail might be, turning to Face the Columber is even harder.

Over the last year I’ve been thinking a lot about courage. Courage is not necessarily not feeling afraid of what you are facing, but it is working through that fear and doing something anyway. The last time I really examined courage, I realized that it is the root of all other virtues. To be generous, or loving, or loyal, kind or grateful all require facing fear of being laughed at, or rejected or judged and acting anyway. This year, I will need to draw on all of my courage to Grab the Tiger and Face the 

By Don Kenn

Columber. The Mission Statement I wrote a couple years ago declares that I am an ambassador of the Universal Divine and ambassadors are always under the protection of those who send them. I have the full backing of god in my work, and I have nothing to fear. 

“My life, glowing with integrity, shines a bright light out into the world. I am filled with the light of god and others around me see it and respond.”

What does 2012 have in store for you? Did you do some gwishing or dream decreeing during the 12 days of Christmas or at some other time this winter? What is your motto for the upcoming year, what is your year going to look like or smell like? Do you have a story about gathering your courage and Grabbing a Tiger by the Tail or Facing a Columber? Happy New Year!

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** This winter was tough and I got messed up in my calendar. I wrote this thinking it was the Milk Moon but it was really the Birth Moon. Since the post itself is more about the the new year of 2012, I just changed the tags and labels. For more on my thoughts about this, see this post. **

Full Birth Moon 2008: Outer Darkness and Inner Hope

Full Birth Moon 2009: New Year! and A Story for the Birth Moon 

Full Birth Moon 2010: The Dark of the Dark.

Full Birth Moon 2011: The Columber

Some Birth Moon posts are dated for a Gregorian year but are a part of a lunar year that mostly takes place in the Gregorian year before. Confusing.

This post is about new years, a topic I discussed in the posts The Quaker Year, New Year and New Milk Moon.

The New Birth Moon

New Birth Moon

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Lest that last post leave you worried that I am drowning in depressing and darkness....

The veil has lifted. The Birth Moon is risen!


I can't tell what made the change. I finished a big writing portion of my student last week and am actually teaching now. Maybe I finally was able to hang onto the positive attitude breakthrough I've been bobbing in and out of for a few weeks. Maybe it was God showing me, through a question asked at Meeting last weekend of what would heaven look like, that really cemented the change of heart. My response was that heaven looks just like this life, only I get the unshakable, undeniable knowledge that everything that happens is part of the Divine System and really will make everyone stronger, smarter, wiser and happier. It felt like as soon as I wrote those words down the scales fell from my eyes and I really did see heaven here and now.

Yes, I'm still tired. Yes, there is tons of work and stress. But I do really, honestly feel... really know in my heart... that it is all just the work that has been set up, uniquely and purposefully, for me.

Have you ever felt this realization? How have you worked through hard periods in your life? What sooths you in times of stress the way the sight of the new crescent moon soothed me this week?

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** This winter was tough and I got messed up in my calendar. The moon that this post was written about -the Birth Moon - and the moon that it actually was according to Annette Hinshaw's calendar - the Death Moon - are not the same. For more on my thoughts about this, see this post. ** 

New Birth Moon 2008: Waiting

New Birth Moon 2009: Advent, Awaiting the Birth

New Birth Moon 2010: Winter is Dark, Yet Each Tiny Spark

New Birth Moon 2011: It's Hard

I also talked about Very Hard Things in the post Very Bad Things and Our Lady of Sorrows.

It's Hard

New Birth Moon

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I'm student teaching right now and it is possibly the hardest thing I've ever done.

What's so hard is the commute. A solid hour each way with the sun rising halfway through the morning drive and setting halfway through the evening drive - if I leave right on time, which I rarely do. It's a long, stressful drive and it leaves me exhausted every day.

What's so hard is how tired I am. To get there before class starts means waking up at 5am. I rarely make it back home before 7pm and then it's essentially make-dinner-pack-lunch-pass-out time.

What's so hard is how lonely I am. I don't see my friends, or really have much contact with them. My days are filled with strangers and people I'm not terribly fond of. And those long, long drives.

What's so hard is how stressed out I am. I have so much schoolwork, both for the student teaching itself and for my other classes. I'm behind in everything, and this knot in my stomach hasn't really left in a couple weeks.

It's all hard, and sometimes I drown in the hardness. Sometimes I can't see out of my own Debbie-Downer attitude about being tired and lonely and stressed out. Sometimes I cry. OK, more than sometimes.

The new moon we are celebrating this weekend is the Birth Moon in Annette Hinshaw's calendar and the Moon of Long Nights in the calendar Jessica Prentice lays out. The Moon of Long Nights is the month of the Winter Solstice, the month of darkness.

In her book, Full Moon Feast, Jessica Prentice discusses a number of authors and researchers who have looked at how the human body responds to light and darkness, disease and health, known and unknown. She says something I've stated before on this blog - that our culture is a culture of light and growth and bigger, better, onward and upward but our physiology needs rest periods. Too often we deny the darkness and fallow periods in life to the detriment of our psychological, spiritual and physical health.

What is interesting to me is not so much the darkness of winter, but other kinds of darkness. I have spent a number of years allowing myself to sink into that rhythm of the seasons and have come to quite enjoy the rest that comes with the long nights and wet days of winter. What I am experiencing right now, though, is a different kind of darkness, a dark time of a trial or that dark night of the soul some people experience when they feel so far away from god. It's just so hard.

Some days, I drown in the darkness. I am lonely and sad and tired and freaked out. I am being pushed and stretched and molded and it hurts. I think about staying in bed or of driving to Texas instead of to my Quiet Little Mountain Town. Some days I am sure my friends don't care about me and I'll never be able to do what is asked of me and it will all end in disaster. It is dark, and hard.

Other days, or other hours, I can bob up out of the darkness and feel the pull of the Birth Moon even in the midst of the darkness. The Birth Moon is the time when new light and new hope is born, even in the middle of the hard. I can see clearly, my head is on straight and I know this is all for the good. The hard is the call, it is the point of it all. If I didn't do anything hard I'd never get any better and this particular hard only lasts a couple more weeks. I am actually coping well and learning so much. And the sunrises, and the beautiful mountain valleys, and the leaves and the kids are all amazing.

On these days I feel so clearly and strongly my pronoic foundational beliefs. The Universe really IS a conspiracy to make me smarter, wiser, happier and better. The difficult is doing the exact same thing as the delightful; making my life more fully useful to god's purposes. I am being tested and trained in the crucible, but it is all for the best. Hard is the calling, hard is the name of the game. But it's still really, really hard.

My family's Thanksgiving tradition is to go around the table during dinner and say what we are thankful for. This week I had four different Thanksgiving dinners with four different "families" and four different delicious spreads of food. And at each dinner I said what I was thankful for; I am thankful for my friends and family who do love me, even if my monsters sometimes try to convince me otherwise. I am thankful that no matter how poor or disadvantaged I may feel, I can still buy gas, socks and chocolate ice cream. I am thankful for the hard. It really is working to liberate me from suffering, shower me with blessings and make me smarter, stronger and happier.


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For the wide sky and the blessed sun,
For the salt sea and the running water,
For the everlasting hills
And the never-resting winds,
For trees and the common grass underfoot.
We thank you for our senses
By which we hear the songs of birds,
And see the splendor of the summer fields,
And taste of the autumn fruits,
And rejoice in the feel of the snow,
And smell the breath of the spring.
Grant us a heart wide open to all this beauty;
And save our souls from being so blind
That we pass unseeing
When even the common thornbush
Is aflame with your glory,
O God our creator,
Who lives and reigns for ever and ever.

A Thanksgiving prayer by Walter Rauschenbush.

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** This winter was tough and I got messed up in my calendar. The moon that this post was written about -the Birth Moon - and the moon that it actually was according to Annette Hinshaw's calendar - the Death Moon - are not the same. For more on my thoughts about this, see this post. ** 


New Birth Moon 2008: Waiting

New Birth Moon 2009: Advent, Awaiting the Birth

New Birth Moon 2010: Winter is Dark, Yet Each Tiny Spark


I also talked about Very Hard Things in the post Very Bad Things and Our Lady of Sorrows.

C.S. Lewis on Praise

New Harvest Moon

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Before the loaf, the snowy white flour
Before the flour the mill.
Before the mill the wheat and the shower,
The sun and Our Father's will.

I have been reading a collection of C.S. Lewis essays called Reflections on the Psalms. I've read a few other pieces of Lewis' non-fiction work, letters and essays, and greatly enjoy them all. He and I may differ quite significantly in some aspects but I do love reading him. I would love to have him as a neighbor or great uncle to visit with, drink tea and listen to him ramble on about God and life and such.

In his rambling on about the Psalms he comes to the issue of praise of God. He says that he never used to understand the commandment to praise God or the way some people seems to be bargaining with God through praise. He finally came to a realization that praising god is the scaled up version of the praising we do of all good things in our lives. "It is frustrating to have discovered a new author and not to be able to tell anyone how good he is; to come suddenly, at the turn of the road, upon some mountain valley of unexpected grandeur and then to have to keep silent because the people with you care for it no more than for a tin can in the ditch. " We express our delight and enjoyment because that expression makes the enjoyment full. We delight and enjoy God and so can't help but exclaim that joy in words, songs and actions of praise.

Lewis makes the point that this praise is not only natural, but it is evidence of health. "The healthy and unaffected man, even if luxuriously brought up and widely experienced in good cookery, could praise a very modest meal: the dyspeptic and the snob found fault with all." A healthy attitude towards life leads to praising earthly experiences so a healthy attitude towards the divine would equally lead to robust and genuine praise of God. The question I have, though, in light of this current Harvest Moon, is which is the seed and which is the harvest? The healthy attitude or the genuine praise?

For our daily bread we thank the Father
We thank the sun and the moon and the stars
We thank the wind and the frost and the rain
We thank the earth, we thank the grain
The thank the beasts and all farming men.

I have been thinking a lot about gratitude, complaining, cynicism and acceptance lately. I've been more and more annoyed by negativity I see in people around I have been making an effort to not take part in that talk or thinking myself. I made a New Water Year resolution to not complain about the weather, a resolution I joke will lead me to an abnormally high level of complaining about my clothes. But then I think, clothes are something I can change so it's OK to critique them, the weather is not. Many great thinkers from Gautama Buddha to Viktor Frankl to Thomas Jefferson have said that attitude is the key to a fulfilled life. There is a space between what happens to us and how we react and in that space we make a decision about how we will react and what we will believe about the action. This is a space for optimism, for gratitude and for god.

I still wonder, though, which is the seed and which is the harvest? Do we have a steady bearing in the world because we make space for gratitude and praise in between events and reactions, or does a good attitude cause the space to open up? Maybe, like so many other complex systems, it is a matter of both elements playing a part. We nudge the system from whatever part of it we happen to be standing at in the moment - giving thanks when we want to complain, or inserting praise into the space we feel at the moment in between.

The seed and root beneath the earth,
The willful growing shoot,
The hopeful bud and flow'ring blossom
Turned to glowing fruit.
We thank the earth who grew this food from little bursting seeds,
And the keepers of the earth whose gifts fulfill our needs.

What harvests are you celebrating this month? Are you seeing a harvest in attitude, thanksgiving or relationship with god or is that a future harvest you are sowing for now? How is your garden winding up? Have you found any fruit trees in the neighborhood or great deals at the green grocer? How do you give thanks when you really just want to complain?

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New Harvest Moon 2009: The Harvest Moon is New

Apparently I didn't post a New Harvest Moon post in 2010, but I did post Harvest Moon during that month.

Michaelmas Season

Autumn Equinox

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The season is swirling around and I am feeling very caught up in it. I love the ride, the golden light, the crisp mornings and hot afternoons, the change in birdsong and the ripening fruit, but I am also feeling pushed and pulled all over the place. I haven't found my new grip yet. Must be the turning of the wheel into autumn.

Autumn is my favorite time of year. I love the cooler days, the yellowing plants, and the harvest. I especially love the comforting feel of the constricting energy that fall brings. In the summer, the Earth is in the height of its long outbreath. It's soul is expelled fully out to outer reaches of it's atmosphere, touching the cosmos. This gives those of us on the surface energy and freedom. We want to be outside, live outside, be up early, stay up late, run and play and swim and be in the world. I tend to feel a little frayed by the end of it all, like last season's prayer flags, faded and rough around the edges. As the earth turns towards the Winter, it begins to breathe its soul back in. This constricting energy makes me feel like I'm being given some more boundaries. A bed time seems like a reasonable idea. Sitting down to dinner instead of just grabbing some food on the run makes sense. Rebuilding the rhythms of a life that includes work as well as play, rest as well as activity. It's the back-to-school season in more ways than one.

Fall, Leaves, Fall

Fall, leaves, fall; die, flowers, away;
Lengthen night and shorten day;
Every leaf speaks bliss to me
Fluttering from the autumn tree.

I shall smile when wreaths of snow
Blossom where the rose should grow;
I shall sing when night's decay
Ushers in a drearier day.

-Emily Bronte

In my evolving wheel of the year, I call this time the Michaelmas Season. The story of Michael is one of a hero who harnesses heavenly and earthly powers to subdue and over come a primeval force of chaos and fear. There are many stories told about dragons and heroes this time of year and all of them help align us with this powerful movement of the seasons, both inner and outer.

My Quaker pastor, who's sermons are always a mix of hilarious and thoughtful storytelling, told a story this morning about a world plagued by a terrifying serpent. It lept out of the ground in a village, ripping up cobblestones, showering the area with rubble and dust, knocking people over and devouring the tinker's faithful mule. The villagers filled the hole in with rocks and logs, paved over the square and put up a statue to the mule. After a number of years the tinker was able to purchase a new-to-her mule and travel further afield selling her wares. She came upon a large city with towers and guards all around it. A friendly guard allowed her in and took her up on one of the towers to show her what the fortifications were all about. There were large cannons on each tower but instead of facing outwards, towards an enemy's army, the cannons faced inward, toward the town square. Specifically, facing the gaping hole in the middle of the square. The guard told her about the serpent and how the city had responded to the threat by building all these battlements. Everyone was expected to do their part in helping guard against the serpent threat, including a tax levied on traveling merchants and tinkers. The tinker owed, as it happened, exactly one mule.

In this time of year when we prepare ourselves for the coming darkness of winter we are also asked to prepare ourselves for the coming challenges of earthly life. There will be illness, poverty, pain, loneliness and eventually an end of this life. The story of the tinker and her mules mules reminds us that we can prepare for these inevitable burdens in any number of ways, some of which are actually more detrimental than beneficial. Michael provides us with heavenly iron to arm ourselves this time of year, but the real defense against debilitating fear is internal strength and courage. These things come from the dynamic interplay between God's love and providence, and our own willful building of our lives.

We wait in hope for the LORD;
he is our help and our shield.
In him our hearts rejoice,
for we trust in his holy name.
May your unfailing love be with us, LORD,
even as we put our hope in you.

Psalm 33:20-22, New International Version

I marked the Michaelmas with some of my favorite September activities. I put up my St. Michael and the Dragon mobile, watched the swifts at Chapman School and woke up for the sunrise on Equinox morning. I went again to my favorite fall fruit picking field and walked around as the sun creeped up behind Mt. Hood. I made dragon bread the night before, a new Michaelmas activity for me. Bread dragons are easy to vanquish and nourishing as well. At the field, I found a lovely pear tree in full fruit and happily accepted the gift. In prayer, I have been given the image of a pear tree, laden with full and heavy fruit hanging within easy reach, as an image of God's provisions available to me. Pears seem a perfect image for God's gifts. The fruit is earthy, woman shaped and sweet but bruises easily so must be conscientously picked and preserved. It is not a windfall treat.

As the sun came up, all pink and orange, over the misty autumn field I laid out my feast and said my thank yous. Thank you sun, thank you mountain. Thank you pear tree and grain field. Thank you morning and thank you evening. Most of all, thank you autumn!

How are you marking the turning of the wheel into Autumn? What dragons are you facing these days and how are you preparing to meet with them? Are your preparations costing you more mules than they need to? What's your favorite kind of autumn fruit?

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Autumn Equinox 2009: The Autumnal Equinox and The Earth is Breathing its Soul Back In

Autumn Equinox 2010: Here Be Dragons and A Dragon Tale for Michaelmas

Blessed Ramadan

The New Father's Moon
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Once again, the holy month of Ramadan is upon us. Ramadan Mubarak!
Last year I posted about my growing concern about how Islam and Muslims are viewed in America and the West in general. I spent a thoughtful and fruitful month collecting information about Islam and Ramadan and sharing it with my close and distant circle of friends in person and electronically. It is Ramadan again, and again I feel the call to spend the month learning and sharing what I find.

Fire

O Marvel! a garden amidst the flames.
My heart has become capable of every form:
it is a pasture for gazelles and a convent for Christian monks,
and a temple for idols and a pilgrim's Ka'bah,
and the tables of the Torah and the book of the Qur'an.
I follow the relition of Love: whatever way Love's camels take,
that is my religion and my faith.

Ibn Arabi
It has been an exciting year for the Islamic world and a hard one. Revolutions in Egypt and Tunisia are changing the way people in North Africa and the Middle East view their governments and their societies. People continue to struggle for political reform in Yemen, Syria, Palestine and many other places. The struggle has turned to outright war in Libya, and Sudan is probably just in a lull in its long standing civil war. Famine grips Somalia and Ethiopia and the ancient battles in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and northern India continue on in their modern forms. Muslims in Europe and North America continue their struggle for economic freedom and acceptance in antagonistic cultures. I can only imagine it must be a difficult time for many Muslims around the world. I know that I can make a difference by helping other people learn about the religion of Islam, get some perspective on the current events in the Muslim world and understand more of Muslim world history.

This year my Ramadan call feels strongly about the people and cultures of the Muslim world. About 1.5 billion people, 20% of the world's population are Muslim. The Muslim world stretches from Morocco to Pakistan to China, Indonesia, the US and northern Europe. Muslims have black skin, blond hair, brown skin, Asian faces and every other kind of face imaginable. People are Muslim in sandy deserts, lush tropical rain forests, temperate mountains and high, windy plateaus. Like with all religions, people continue to practice their local traditions in addition to Islam leading to various versions even of the same basic activities. So many different cultures, so many different kinds of people.

Allah

I tried to find Him on the Christian cross, but He
was not there; I went to the Temple of the
Hindus and to the old pagodas, but I could not
find a trace of Him anywhere.

I searched on the mountains and in the valleys
but neither in the heights nor in the depths was I
able to find Him. I went to the Ka'bah in Mecca,
but He was not there either.

I questioned the scholars and philosophers but
He was beyond their understanding.

I then looked into my heart and it was there
where He dwelled that I saw Him; He was
nowhere else to be found.

Jalaluddin Rumi

As a billion and a half Muslims around the world spend this month of Ramadan fasting and praying in order to be closer to God, I will spend it getting closer to God-In-People. I will spend time studying the cultures of the world and and also the cultures in my own neighborhood. I will cherish and cultivate my relationships with people I already know and love, and cultivate and open heart towards the people I do not already know. Again this year I will sit with queries from the North Pacific Yearly Meeting's Faith and Practices: Do I speak to and answer “that of God” in everyone? Am I charitable with others? Do I practice the art of listening to others, even beyond words? What will you be thinking about during this bright yellow August month when so many others are fasting, praying, feasting and playing?

Blessed Ramadan!

Images by Zolashine, JakeBrewer, Mizrak and NewMediaNormaRae. Click on their names or the photos for more of their amazing work. Thank you!

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New Father's Moon 2009: New Father's Moon
New Father's Moon 2010: Fourth of July

This post is about Ramadan, as are my posts from last August, Ramadan and The End of Ramadan.

Very Bad Things and Our Lady of Sorrows

Full Seed Moon

Full Seed Moon 2009: Seeds! Seeds!!

Full Seed Moon 2010: Planting Seeds in My Mind, Heart and Garden

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The full moon that happened on March 19th was the full moon in the Seed Moon. This moon asks us questions about the things we begin at every scale from small project to lifetimes and beyond. This is the time of year when so much in nature is beginning anew - plants are growing new leaves or sprouting completely new from the soil, animals are mating and giving birth - it is natural to think about how we begin and nurture new things in our lives. It is a time for tiny, sweet things.

Tiny, sweet things are scary, though, because we tend to imagine all the terrible things that might happen to them in the future. A seed is taking a risk in sprouting and we take a risk every time we start something new. I usually like to focus on the benefits of taking a risk, the positive potential outcomes and the biggifying good in the world. But you know what? Sometimes we take a risk and fail. Sometimes our seeds don't even sprout, or they are killed by frost or torrential rain or jays or slugs. Sometimes bad things happen that aren't our fault, like a hailstorm or earthquakes. Sometimes these things are crushing, awful, Really Bad Things.

I have been struggling mightily in the past few weeks with this realization; bad things happen and there is nothing we can do about it. It may seem trite or obvious, but my life has been really blessed and there has been thankfully little in my past that qualifies as a really bad thing. I've been witness to some Really Bad Things recently, though, ranging from earthquakes, tsunamis and war to more personal disappointments and disasters. It's not much fun and has turned me to that possibly most ancient of ancient questions - how can a good God allow such bad things to happen?

There is no way I can really do justice to the question, but I can share an insight I had as I was struggling in that mire. My insight was not novel (what is in theology?) but it was brilliant to me. As I prayed into my hurt and disappointment I had the realization that God is there, too. She is in the blossoms and sprouts, but she is in the frost bitten, dead and dying bits. Upon realizing, or remembering, this Truth I was comforted. It was like a balm had been applied to my ache.

I have always been a little baffled by the Catholic preoccupation with the sorrow of Christ and his Mother. One of the popular rosary devotions is called the Seven Sorrows, churches and schools are named Our Lady of Sorrows and the Lamentation of the Virgin - the image of Mary holding the crucified Jesus - has been depicted in sculpture and painting through the ages. These images of god just never resonated with me before (and yes, I fully realize just how lucky and blessed I am to be able to say those words). In this month of thinking about the seeds that sprout and the seeds that don't, these images have started to be meaningful to me.

For years my motto has been "Everything will be OK in the end; if it's not OK, it's not the end." I still believe that but I am starting to see the real truth that the not-OK stuff is OK, too. It hurts and sucks and is scary. But it's OK to be there in the hurting, sucky, scary stuff because God is there with you. I've felt her there, holding me, rocking me, crying with me - just like the Virgin in the Pieta. She feels the suck and hurt, and it sucks for her and hurts her. But we are here, together, in this mess and knowing that gives me the strength to put one foot in front of the other and start walking towards the not bad stuff that is still going on all around me.

Prayer in Sickness

Holy Mary, Mother of God,
and my Mother,
I come before you
in the knowledge that you will help me.

My faith tells me so
and my heart makes sure of this.

In my sickness,
and in the midst of my suffering,
I often call out to you: "Mother!"

Just saying this word
makes me feel better.

When I feel misunderstood and all alone,
I know that you are with me
and that you love me.

Help me, Mary,
and when I am well let me love God more.
Amen.

Mercurial

mer·cu·ri·al
/mer kyoŏ rē ul/
• adj.
1. (of a person) subject to sudden or unpredictable changes of mood or mind: his mercurial temperament. Or (of a person) sprightly; lively.
2. of or containing the element mercury.
3. (Mercurial) of the planet Mercury.

Mercurial is a word that came to me in prayer early this morning and it seemed to fit perfectly how things have been going for me this month, the Mating Moon. The weather is mercurial, my interests and moods are mercurial and even the planets are feeling mercurial with the second Mercury retrograde of 2010 (see this old post from Riana at These Days in French Life to read about Mercury retrograde). Just the other day someone quoted me the old phrase attributed to the Chinese: "May you live in interesting times."

Part of the mercurial unpredictable changes are changes for the good. Two weeks ago I was gearing up to write a cheery blog post about how lovely spring is. We were enjoying some fantastic weather, the flowers were blooming and I was feeling on top of the world. For a couple days in a row we had sunsets like I haven't seen since college. Ashland, the town I went to school in, is in a Northwest-Southeast running valley with beautiful summer weather. In the summer the sun sets at one end of the valley turning the sky fantastic shades of sherbet orange and pink, possibly with gold and silver clouds. Actually, my favorite thing to do was to hike up into the hills on the south side of town and watch the eastern sky as the sunset. I’ve never seen that color purple anywhere else on heaven or earth.

At the very beginning of this month I was watching for the new crescent moon and was treated to a special alignment of the moon and Venus. I have a scene quite similar to that tattooed on my arm – a sight I saw watching one of those lovely Ashland sunsets. My tattoo is of Venus right above the new crescent moon but this month Venus was below. It was still a special (I feel like every conjunction of the new moon and Venus is a special gift for me), and combined with the orange sunsets and apple blossom scented warm air made me so happy.

Photo by fdecomite

I was also feeling really great and grounded in my spiritual practice. After Easter I had focused on calling more pagan forms of divinity in my evening prayers. A sweet mother goddess is one of my favorites to ask for help from, but a young flower goddess and a fiery warrior goddess are others that have pressed themselves into my thoughts this month as well. I’ve also had visions of god as rain and waves and sand. I was feeling surrounded by love and like my feet were on the right path.

But mercurial means that everything isn't always rosy and sweet. Sometimes the clouds roll back in, it storms and hails and the temperatures drop back down to 45 degrees and you feel like you want to crawl under a rock. I have been feeling led to explore my personal boundaries in terms of emotional openness and connection with other people lately, which can be a very scary thing for Virgos like me. I was exploring old fears and adult coping mechanisms (a term that gets a lot of bad rap - but we have to cope!) and it all seemed to be going fine until the lessons became practical and not just theoretical. I had a couple bad days at work where I felt like I couldn't help but be sucked into or react to other people's emotional states. It sucked.

Yesterday I spent some time writing in my journal about all of this emotional stuff I've been experiencing this week. Just the other day I came across the website of Sybil MacBeth's book Praying in Color. She uses doodling as a contemplative prayer to spend time in the presence of god when words are inadequate or hard to come by. Words are relatively easy for me so journaling can be a similar process and in that session I had some insight.

The hard stuff this month seems to be the death before the re-birth kind of hard stuff. It feels like the razing of an old building so a new home can be built, or tilling soil so new crops can be planted. I'm still on the right path - this is why that warrior goddess with her double edged axe, the labrys, came to visit me. She came to guide me through this time, or maybe just to do some hacking at my "stuff".

Photo of the labyrinth at Grace Cathedral in San Francisco

This is the first step in hearing the lesson of the Mating Moon. In order for new stuff to be born the old stuff has to break open and let the universe in to fertilize it. A bee can't get into a flower to pollinate it until it breaks out of its bud. A baby can't be started in a mother without the intrusion of the penis and sperm. I don't yet know what the new stuff is, or how far into the process we are, but I know G!(d)dess is with me, and she has good things in store for me. Life really is a conspiracy to make me wiser, happier and a better person.

So this weekend I focus again on spring. Trees and flowers, bugs and beautiful sunsets. Full moons and crickets. What are you excited about this spring? What is hard right now? How has mercury retrograde messed with your life and your comfort zone?

Easter

Easter Sunday is the most holy day in the Christian religion. It is the commemoration of the day Jesus rose from the dead three days after his sacrificial crucifixion and is celebrated on the first Sunday after the first Monday after the first full moon after the Vernal Equinox (Rudolph Steiner spoke about how this festival falls when the calendars of the earth, the moon and the man-made week have all realigned themselves). This year that fell on April 4th. Some Christian groups celebrate a whole slew of holidays leading up to and following Easter including Mardi Gras, Lent, Palm Sunday, Good Friday, Ascension and others. It is a busy time in the Christian church.

I wrote some last year about the various spring celebrations from all over the world that cluster around the Spring Equinox. Much of what we see in modern Easter celebrations - Easter bunnies leaving candy, hunting for dyed eggs, wearing new dresses and hats, eating lamb or ham, even the name Easter - come from pre-Christian European spring celebrations. Much like with Christmas, the expanding church in ancient and medieval Europe co-opted the local traditions and reassigned them meaning in the new religious narrative to get the cooperation of the masses. There certainly isn't any mention of Easter eggs or Christmas trees in the Bible.

This doesn't mean, however, that Easter is just a pagan celebration with some details changed. Unlike Christmas, in which I see more similarities between pagan and Christian celebration than I do differences, there is a truly different meaning behind Easter Sunday than behind pagan spring celebrations. Yes, both celebrate the re-birth of life through the divine, but Christ's re-birth means something different than Nature's re-birth does. It means salvation, and this is where things start getting sticky for me.

I chose to really immerse myself in Easter celebrations this year (well, maybe it was less conscious than all that - but I certainly was immersed in Easter). After rejecting the austerity of Lent for 39 days I participated in an interactive stations of the cross devotional on Good Friday, watched part of the Maundy Thursday Mass given by the Pope and both The Greatest Story Ever Told and The Last Temptation of Christ as well as played an angel in my Quaker Meeting's Easter Drama. All of this had the effect of allowing me time to really spend some time working with the meaning of Easter in my own life.

The story of Holy Week has been fascinating to me since I first learned about it in a college art history class. The story goes that Jesus entered Jerusalem on the Sunday before Passover and was welcomed by the citizens. They draped their robes on the ground so his donkey wouldn't walk in the mud and waved palm fronds to honor him. This is commemorated in the church calendar as Palm Sunday. Thursday of that week was Passover and Jesus met with his disciples for a Passover meal commonly called the Last Supper. This is when he told his followers to eat of his body and drink of his blood in remembrance of him and the practice of communion with bread or wafers and wine or juice was born. That night, as he prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane, Judas Iscariot betrayed him and he was arrested. The following day, Good Friday, he was beaten and crucified fulfilling the scripture and paying the price of fallen man's sin. After three days in the tomb he rose from the dead on Easter Sunday. Ritual celebrations that replay and symbolically show the meaning of a holy story are so attractive to me that I am almost willing to overlook my theological issues with the Passion story.

After a very brief mention of Palm Sunday at Meeting on Sunday the 28th I kicked off my Holy Week "celebration" by watching part of the Holy Thursday mass on EWTN, a Catholic television channel. I can see why the reformists of the 16th century "protested" against this kind of church - so much pomp, circumstance, gold, incense and robes. Catholic ritual is such a physical expression of faith that is so different than the expression of faith I am getting comfortable with in my Quaker Meeting. It is fascinating, though, and oh so delightful to my pagan sensibilities.

There are many fascinating traditions and symbols in the Easter Triduum, or three day period between Maundy Thursday and Easter Sunday. The Holy Thursday mass includes the blessing of the host and then the host is kept in an "alter of repose" during Good Friday and Holy Saturday when no mass is spoken. Neither this mass nor the Good Friday service, which is not a mass end with the typical concluding words. It is not until the Easter Mass that the conclusion is spoken. In essence it is all one service that starts with the Mass of the Last Supper and doesn't conclude until Saturday night or Sunday morning with the Easter Mass. Hows that for symbolism?

On Friday I accepted the invitation in our Meeting bulletin to attend an interactive Stations of the Cross devotional at a local mega-church. I had been thinking about going to the Catholic cathedral to see their devotional but it didn't work out. Possibly, the Spirit was working to give me the best experience possible. The whole experience was rather intense - as it was intended to be. The church it took place at was so, so different than West Hills and that was at first disconcerting. The place has a coffee shop inside it! But the devotional itself took place in a small side chapel that seemed much more intimate. Like a traditional Stations of the Cross we physically moved through a set path marked with symbols of Christ's Passion from the Last Supper to his burial but this one was multi-sensory and quite physical.

The host church used the Scriptural Way of the Cross as the format and a wide variety of props to bring the process to life. They re-created the garden at Gethsemane with potted plants and a fountain, had a recording of a rooster crowing signifying Peter's denial and had real thorns and whips for us to touch. Some of the most moving pieces to me were the railroad spikes we could pound into a large stump to feel what it was like to crucify a man, mirrors to see ourselves and our family as Jesus saw us and a bowl of myrrh and aloe like that used to embalm his body. Any teacher wanting to use multiple learning styles could have taken a page out of their book - we were asked to read, write, empathize, draw, look, listen, smell and feel throughout the entire process. The devotional ended with a plate of bread and goblets of wine so that we could partake in holy communion with the sacrficed Christ (which I chose not to do.. more on that in a minute).

Easter Sunday at West Hills Friends was much, much more light hearted - as is appropriate for Easter Sunday. I played an angel in the original production of The Kingdom of God Comes At You At One Million Miles Per Second in which a number of preachers teach people the proper stance or pose to brace for impact. Finally Jesus shows up to remind folks bracing isn't the point, moving is. Any Easter service that includes very bad renditions of People Get Ready, 25 balloons and 8 bags of candy is my kind of Easter service. It was definitely a morning of joyous celebration and community.

So what did I learn from all of this Easter Stuff? Well, one thing I learned is that I have a deep appreciation for the solemnity of a real celebration of the Resurrection of Christ. It really is no laughing matter and not something to be celebrated in pastels and bunnies. Jesus of Nazareth died a terrible death. Crucifixion is a nasty thing - like many other nasty things we humans do to each other. If you believe in original sin and the need for a savior then the Resurrection of Christ is a big, big deal. It is, in fact, the deal.

Rudolph Steiner speaks of how the Christian festivals fall a few days after the Earth festivals because we need to feel the "lower" energies of the earth before we can feel the "purer" energies embodied in the human realm and the angelic realm of Christian religion. When push comes to shove I am not a Christian. I don't believe in original sin, I don't believe in a fallen creation or a fallen man. I don't believe in the need for an external savior or any sort of intermediary between myself and the divine. I am too much of a pagan universalist for that. But I see the utility in working with these ideas. Over the last few days I have wrestled with such big ideas as the need for physical props in worship of a non-physical divine presence, my own fears and hesitations in life, why people perpetrate terrible crimes against each other and how I relate with other humans. I haven't come to good answers on any of those things, but I've had some thoughts, and that's the first step.

After my very long weekend of Easter Related Thinking I am spent. I have thought deeply and felt deeply. I am tired and feel overworked. My Easter Sunday ended with a fantastic steak house dinner with my dad that left me grateful for the richness, nutrition and elegance. It also left me feeling stuffed and in need of a few days of fasting to get back on track. That's the way I feel about thinking too. I some time for assimilation and digestion, I need a fast.


*Photos are all by Walwyn on flickr.com. They are pieces of art from French churches. Thank you for your contribution.