Tag: prayer

Gathered Wisdom, Mar 15, 2025

Marjorie George

A collection of inspiration and resources for your spiritual journey, gathered from websites, blogs, and pass-alongs that have been shared with us.

Let me not look away, O God, from any truth I should see. Even if it is difficult, let me face the reality in which I live. Help me to see the world through other eyes, to listen to voices distant and different. Let me not look away.
-The Rt. Rev. Steven Charleston, Spirit Wheel
From Well for the Journey

Reflections

Conversations for Lent

Join the Wisdom Years community as we consider how Jesus is present in all of our life through some guided conversations this Lent.  We will gather by Zoom on Thursdays, March 20 through April 10 at 4 p.m. Central time.

If you would like to receive the Zoom links for the weekly conversations, send an email to marjoriegeorge62@gmail.com. (If you were part of the recent study on Ladder to the Light you will receive the Zoom link automatically,)

For the weekly conversation topics, go here.

Ash Wednesday

In the story of Jonah’s running away from God, Amanda Opelt finds pride in the prophet’s action. She calls us to look at our own prideful ways (“the most sly and insidious sin the Christian will struggle with”) and take on humility this Lent.

Read the reflection.

From Renovare.

An Ever-Unfolding Purpose

What does it mean to be guided by the Holy Spirit? Brother Keith Nelson of Society of St. John the Evangelist says “the pressure exerted upon us by the Holy Spirit is always creative, generative, and life-giving beyond what we can anticipate or imagine.” We are pressured from within to always become more, but the goal is not to be perfect.

Read the reflection.

From Society of St. John the Evangelist.

The Desert: A Place of Preparation

“The desert is that place where we go to face our demons, feel our smallness, be in a special intimacy with God, and prepare ourselves for the promised land,” says Fr. Ron Rolheiser. Desert-time, he says, is time “to courageously face the chaos and the demons within us and to let God do battle with them through us.”  This is Lent.

Read the reflection.

From the blog of Ron Rolheiser.

Grace Is God’s Name

Grace is not something God gives, it is who God is, says Richard Rohr. “God’s job is to make up for all the deficiencies in the universe,” says Rohr. “What else would God do?”

Read the reflection.

From Center for Action and Contemplation.

Lent Resources

Lent Reading Guide from Renovare
Using lectio divina, this guide draws on excerpts from the Gospel of John that give a big-picture account of Jesus’ passion, crucifixion, and resurrection. The lectio divina method is not just reading, but opens up conversation with God.
Find it here.

Virtual Sit Meditations
Join the staff of Center for Action and Contemplation every Sunday during Lent at 8:30 a.m. (PT) for a period of silence and contemplation. In addition, sign up for the free Lenten email series. Every week, you will receive a teaching in your inbox to inspire your Lenten practice and prepare you for the next virtual sit meditation.
For the details.

Gathered Wisdom is an offering of The Wisdom Years, a ministry devoted to the spiritual journey of the last third of our lives.

If this post was forwarded to you, sign up to receive Gathered Wisdom in your email by subscribing at wisdomyears.org.

To learn more visit our website.

Gathered Wisdom, January 15, 2025

Marjorie George

A collection of inspiration and resources for your spiritual journey, gathered from websites, blogs, and pass-alongs that have been shared with us. From The Wisdom Years.

At the heart of any effective practice, whether it is explicitly spiritual, inherently creative, or rigorously physical, is a structure that clears and holds open a space and time for slowing down and letting go.

-Oriah Mountain Dreamer, The Dance
From Well for the Journey

With this edition, Gathered Wisdom expands its content and moves to monthly distribution. We hope something in this edition will spark an idea, bring you comfort, open a revelation, make you laugh, make you cry, or strengthen your resolve to be the best person you can be today, leaning on the grace of God.

Reflections

King Herod and the Wise Men

The Epiphany story we have been told since our earliest years is about three majestic “wise men,” three strangers from the East who bring gold and incense and myrrh to honor the child Jesus. What then happens to them we do not know, and that is the point. “The idea is that they now disappear because they can now disappear. They have placed their gifts at the feet of the young king and can now leave everything safely in his hands,” says Fr. Ron Rolheiser. Herod, on the other hand, wants to kill him.

Read the reflection.

From the blog of Ron Rolheiser.

A Resistance Position

Jesus calls us to be the salt of the world – “to give the world taste, meaning, purpose, direction, desire,” says Richard Rohr. As Christians, we are asked to become “a true alternative to the normal motivations and actions of society,” not in some grand and braggadocios manner, not even always in charge, but to offer that which the world doesn’t already have and sorely needs. 

Read the reflection.

From Center for Action and Contemplation.

Peace in the Face of War

How can we say the world is a safe place and we are all in God’s hands when we see the atrocities that come upon so much of the world? “How can we prayerfully engage without completely losing our sense of sanity or peace?” asks Tiffany Clark in her essay on praying faithfully but realistically. Clark includes six practices for how to “remain fruitfully and sustainably engaged.”

Read the essay.

From Renovare.

Online Courses and Programs

From Grateful Living:  
In 2025, Grateful Living offers three new 5-Day Pathways, a brand new live online course, and an annual year-end online retreat. A new program, The Practitioner Circle, combines all the offerings for one price. Explore the 2025 Program Guide for details on each program.

From Elders Action Network – The Power of Purpose
The path of purposeful aging is accessible to all – and is fundamental to health, happiness, and longevity.  With a focus on growing whole in later life, Richard Leider helps participants discover their purpose and create a legacy.

Online, Tuesday, Jan. 21, 10:00–11:30 am PT / 1:00–2:30 pm ET
Register HERE

From the Library we recommend

Midwinter Light: Meditations for the Long Season, Marilyn McEntyre, Broadleaf Books.
Winter is quieter than other seasons, sometimes lonelier, and it opens us to pay attention. We surrender to natural forces and rhythms; our lives may be changed utterly as we grow deeper, more patient, more attentive to what’s outside our doors, in the night sky, or hibernating deep within ourselves.

Find it at St. Mark’s Bookstore bookshop in the The Wisdom Years/Aging/Eldering section or at your favorite independent bookstore.

Briefly

“Three Wise Men.”  Epiphany Wisdom 

“The three were hermits on an island in the Black Sea, very pious and humble and loving to all men but terribly ignorant.  A bishop goes in a steamer to see them and teach them a few prayers, but finds them too old and stupid to learn.  At last, he gets—or thinks he has got—one very short and simple prayer into their heads, and leaves the island, feeling rather contemptuous. 

Then, when night falls, he sees a bright light advancing swiftly over the sea behind the steamer. The old men have come, walking on the waves, begging him to be patient with their great stupidity and to teach them the prayer again.”—Tolstoy.

From Joann Seibert. Read the rest of the reflection.

Gathered Wisdom is an offering of The Wisdom Years, a ministry devoted to the spiritual journey of the last third of our lives.

If this post was forwarded to you, sign up to receive Gathered Wisdom in your email by subscribing at wisdomyears.org.

To learn more visit our website.

Gathered Wisdom, Oct 29, 2024

Marjorie George

A weekly curated collection of essays, poetry, and reflections for your spiritual journey.  From The Wisdom Years.

A prayer for All Saints Day, November 1:
We pray for the “whole family of God, the living and the dead, those whom we love and those whom we hurt, bound together in Christ by sacrament, prayer, and praise” (Book of Common Prayer pg 862).

Who are the Saints

On November 1 each year, the Church celebrates All Saints Day in which we remember those we love but see no longer. In this sermon, Richard Rohr tells us saints are those who have been wounded and healed – not just people who reached perfection, but ordinary people like us.

Listen to the sermon.

From Center for Action and Contemplation.

The Unclarity of Holiness

We live in a time of chaos and confusion. We long for clear and fruitful outcomes, and we want to know how we will get there, if we will get there. Br. Lucas Hall says we are to trust that “these confusing things, these things that we can’t clearly parse, will be used to the promised victory of God.”

Read or listen to the sermon.

From Society of St. John the Evangelist.

Love Beyond Death

Why do we continue to pray for the dead? It is not because they need God’s mercy and forgiveness. It is to continue to be in communication with them, “to remain mindful of the special oxygen they breathed into the planet during their life, and to occasionally share a celebratory glass of wine with them.”

Read the reflection.

From Ron Rolheiser blog.

Four Stories of Mercy

The little girl needed someone to help her cry, so she climbed up into the lap of the nurse at the girls school in Sudan. Sister Marilyn Lacey of Mercy Beyond Borders tells this and more stories of compassion.

Watch the video or read the article.

Found in Daily Good.

Election Night Vigil

Join the Brothers of Society of St John the Evangelist in a vigil on Election Night, Tuesday, November 5. In the face of anxiety, uncertainty, and exhaustion around the 2024 Presidential Election, we invite you to join the Brothers in prayer to God our Creator and Governor for unity, guidance, and protection. The vigil begins at 7:00 PM Eastern Time in St. John’s Chapel, following the Holy Eucharist, and continues until the final polls close at 1:00 AM.

Join at any point in person or online at ssje.org/livestream.

Gathered Wisdom is an offering of The Wisdom Years, a ministry devoted to the spiritual journey of the last third of our lives.

If this post was forwarded to you, sign up to receive Gathered Wisdom in your email by subscribing at wisdomyears.org.

To learn more visit our website.

Gathered Wisdom, Oct. 15, 2024

Marjorie George

A weekly curated collection of essays, poetry, and reflections for your spiritual journey.  From The Wisdom Years.

Community means strength that joins our strength to do the work that needs to be done.
Arms to hold us when we falter. A circle of healing. A circle of friends. Someplace where we can be free.
Starhawk, American author and activist
From Well for the Journey.

Living into All the Honey: Embracing Grief and Joy

Poet Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer reads poems that span grief and joy from her new collection, All the Honey. She speaks of what she knows now about grief she didn’t know before her son died.

Watch the video.

From Karmatube

The First Bible

We are all connected, says Richard Rohr. Everything is part of everything else. Rohr says, “We now take it for granted that everything in the universe is deeply connected and linked, even light itself, which interestingly is the first act of creation” (Genesis 1:3).

Read the reflection

From Center for Action and Contemplation.

Knowing More Than We Know

How do we make decisions? Is it only facts and probabilities that we depend on to try to find the right choice? Or do we rely on some inner sense that we just know is correct? Mary’s acceptance of becoming the mother of Jesus did not come from reason.

Read the reflection. 

From Society of St. John the Evangelist.

On Friendship

“One of the richest experiences of grace that we can have this side of eternity is the experience of friendship,” says Ron Rolheiser. “True friendship is only possible among people who are practicing virtue,” he adds.  “A gang is not a circle of friendship, nor are many ideological circles. Why? Because friendship needs to bring grace and grace is only found in virtue.”

Read the reflection.

From Ron Rolheiser.

Join Election Night Virtual Prayers

Everyone is invited to join Election Night Virtual Prayers hosted by The Episcopal Church Office of Government Relations from 8 to 10 p.m. (ET) Nov. 5. 

Bishop Sean Rowe, who will become Episcopal Church presiding bishop on Nov. 1, will offer an opening reflection and prayer.

Episcopalians from around the church will hold silence and lead participants in prayers together for peace, the nation, and all people and countries.

For details, click here.

Gathered Wisdom is an offering of The Wisdom Years, a ministry devoted to the spiritual journey of the last third of our lives.

If this post was forwarded to you, sign up to receive Gathered Wisdom in your email by subscribing at wisdomyears.org.

To learn more visit our website.

Gathered Wisdom, Oct 1, 2024

Marjorie George

A weekly curated collection of essays, poetry, and reflections for your spiritual journey.  From The Wisdom Years.

Your sacred space is where you find yourself over and over again. 

-Joseph Campbell, A Joseph Campbell Companion 

New Beginnings

Retirement is one of the many transitions we face in the last third of life. And though we may choose it and welcome it, we still will go through difficult emotions. Hilda Davis offers this Flourishing in Transition (FIT) ritual as we seek clarity for the path ahead.

Read the article.

From the Fuller De Pree Center.

Autumn and Impermanence

Autumn reminds us that there is a time to let go. Every autumn, says Joyce Rupp, “I turn and face the big question: how to cherish who and what I have but to hold these gifts freely, with open hands and heart.”

Read the reflection. 

From Joyce Rupp.

Patience with God

Our greatest faith struggle, says Fr. Ron Rolheiser, is being patient with God. Jesus said the meek will inherit the earth, but mostly it doesn’t seem so. Justice does not seem to prevail. “How long, O Lord?” we ask.

Read the reflection.

From Ron Rolheiser.

Practicing the Gospel

The early Franciscan friars were more interested in practicing and living the gospel than in simply teaching about it. What about us? The prophets ask, “Why aren’t you doing what you say you believe?”

Read the reflection.

From Center for Action and Contemplation.

God Callings

It is not just in our quiet time that we connect with God. Everything we do, all day long, is part of our following and serving God.  Sometimes we are doing, other times we are being – it is all our offering to God.

Read the reflection.

From Joanna Seibert.

Gathered Wisdom is an offering of The Wisdom Years, a ministry devoted to the spiritual journey of the last third of our lives.

If this post was forwarded to you, sign up to receive Gathered Wisdom in your email by subscribing at wisdomyears.org.

To learn more visit our website.

Gathered Wisdom, July 16, 2024

Marjorie George

A weekly curated collection of essays, poetry, and reflections for your spiritual journey.  From The Wisdom Years.

I pray that I may serve by doing what is mine to do, knowing I will remember and forget, find and lose, knowing too that your infinite grace is everywhere when I choose to be attuned.

-Danna Faulds, “Prayers to the Infinite” 
From Well for the Journey

What Is New and What Is Old

There are going to be tears and holes in the fabric of our lives. That is when we must remember our history – that Christ has always been with us, has always rescued us. “Remember your past, draw on your past, how you’ve been provided for, sustained, protected, healed, empowered up until now,” says Br. Curtis Almquist.

Read the reflection.

From Society of St. John the Evangelist.

May You Live Long Enough

To be able to laugh at your most embarrassing moments in the past; To side with your former adversaries, if only for a glancing moment; To experience prayer as the automatic breathing of petitions for others’ good; and other short bits of wisdom.

Read the reflection.

From Joanna Seibert.

The Point Is to Grow 

It was out of deep grief that Paula D’Arcy’s heart was opened. “Now that suffering was a lived experience, I realized there was so much I needed to change about how I understood life,” she says. “I had to move beyond my old conclusions.”

Read the reflection.

From Center for Action and Contemplation.

Learning To Trust The Slow Work Of God

How long does it take to become more like Jesus? Oh, a lifetime or so. “Transformation almost always happens at a pace slower than we would expect or desire,” says Carolyn Arends.

Read the reflection.

From Renovare.

Have I Been Saved?

That is the wrong question, says Fr. Ron Rolheiser. The real question, especially at this stage of life, is “How can I help?” “A non-negotiable part of meeting Jesus,” says Rolheiser, “means being sent out, and not just alone on some private spiritual quest or individualized ministry. It means being called into community . . .”

Read the reflection.

From the blog of Ron Rolheiser.

Gathered Wisdom is an offering of The Wisdom Years, a ministry devoted to the spiritual journey of the last third of our lives.

If this post was forwarded to you, sign up to receive Gathered Wisdom in your email by subscribing at wisdomyears.org.

To learn more visit our website.

Gathered Wisdom, Jan 30, 2024

Marjorie George

A weekly curated collection of essays, poetry, and reflections for your spiritual journey.  From The Wisdom Years.

May you arise each day with a voice of blessing whispering in your heart.

-John O’Donohue, “For Belonging,” To Bless the Space Between Us

A Lenten Fast to Live By

For what do you hunger? Can you even name it? Peace, yes, and freedom from fear. Safety for our children. A sense of spiritual well-being. And yet, our very daily practices undermine what we claim as our desires. Join the Wisdom Years community for a Lenten fast that invites us to lay down the old patterns and habits that deplete us and obstruct our full access to the divine image into which we were created.

Our study is from Feb 15 to March 21. We will meet weekly on Zoom for conversation, or you can use the material on you own.

To learn more

From The Wisdom Years.

Vocation: The Call is Lifelong

Your vocation, your calling in life, what you are to be now, will come out of your greatest strength and your greatest need, says Brother Curtis Almquist in this reflection on vocation. “When we are younger,” says Bro. Almquist, “our vocation – our calling – is more about what we are to do. When we are older, our vocation – our calling – is more about what we are to be.”

Read the reflection.

From Society of St. John the Evangelist.

Prayers for Election Season

Like Christmas decor at Walmart, the U.S. presidential election season arrives earlier and louder every time around, says Brian Morykon, director of communications for Renovare.  Unlike Christmas, the election season—and politics in general—seems to many of us to have little redeeming value. To help us bring the presence of God into our lives in this election season, Renovare offers this prayer for the election season.

Read the prayer.

From Renovare.

Grieving as a Spiritual Exercise

Henri Nouwen once wrote, “The great challenge is living your wounds through instead of thinking them through.”  The choice we face in grieving, says Fr. Ron Rolheiser, is whether we are taking our hurts to our head or to our heart. “You need to let your wounds go down into your heart. Then you can live them through and discover that they will not destroy you.”

Read the reflection.

From the blog of Ron Rolheiser.

Sanctuaries of Silence

No place on earth is silent any more, says acoustic ecologist Gordon Hempton. And yet the silence of the natural world connects us back to the land in a way that nurtures and enchants us. Hempton says in silence he disappears.

Watch and listen to this peaceful video.

Found at Karmatube.

Gathered Wisdom is an offering of The Wisdom Years, a ministry devoted to the spiritual journey of the last third of our lives.

If this post was forwarded to you, sign up to receive Gathered Wisdom in your email by subscribing at wisdomyears.org.

To learn more visit our website.