A weekly curated collection of essays, poetry, and reflections for your spiritual journey. From The Wisdom Years.
Let there be
an opening
into the quiet
that lies beneath
the chaos
where you find
the peace
you did not think possible
and see what shimmers
beneath the storm
-Jan Richardson, The Cure for Sorrow: A Book of Blessings
Watching, Waiting, Working for Jesus
As Bro. Curtis Almquist reminds us, “Lent is upon us.” Ash Wednesday is tomorrow. We remember the time Jesus spent in the wilderness before he began his public ministry. It was a time for Jesus “to re-align himself to why God had given him life: to claim the right purpose, the right power, the right voice God had given him.” The focus of Lent, says Bro. Almquist, “can create space anew for the light, and life, and love to Jesus to teem in us and through us to our desperately broken world. Lent is to help us.”
From Society of St. John the Evangelist.
Visit their website for their Lenten study offering.
Love: The Fire of Transformation
Ilia Delio sees love as a fire of transformation. God’s fire, she says, “is destructive because it can swiftly eliminate all self-illusions, grandiose ideas, ego-inflation, and self-centeredness.” God’s fire will forge us into an ever-radiant new presence of God because God is forever being born within us.
From Center for Action and Contemplation.
CAC will offer virtual sit meditations during Lent. Learn more here.
Our Struggle with Riches
God is not against people having wealth – of money or talent or strength. The problem is that our wealth makes us think that we are self-sufficient, that we don’t need God. Jesus told us to be like little children because they understand that they need help.
From Ron Rolheiser.
For the Love of God
Were the desert mothers and fathers just a set of cranky, people-hating monastics? Or did they really give up all they had and move into caves the better to love God?
From Renovare.
Benedictine Way Of Life
Benedict cautions us to “listen with the ear of your heart.” This is the call to the spiritual life, says Deacon Joanna Seibert. It is a way to live in the world still connected to God. “First, we are to listen and pay attention. We are to use the ear of our hearts. We are to connect to something outside ourselves, hearing and loving. We hear and learn about love in a community outside of ourselves.”
From Joanna Seibert.
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