As we continue our journey into the silent land, it is not surprising that the ease of the practice waxes and wanes. Why shouldn’t it? That is part of life. There is the old joke about the visitor to New York City who sees a man with a violin getting out of a cab and asks, “How do you get to Carnegie Hall?” The violinist responds, “Practice. Practice. Practice.” Practice is important, but practice does not make perfect. Sandy Koufax did not always throw a strike. Tom Brady gets intercepted. Violinists play wrong notes. It is not for the want of practice that they don’t always get it just right.

Furthermore, in his book, Into the Silent Land, Martin Laird writes, “Union with God is not something we acquire by technique…” Indeed the technique and the practice are disciplines that help us to quieten our minds and open up in ourselves space for recognition of the most profound truth. The God that we search for dwells within and always has.

Laird goes on to write, “The illusion of separation is generated by the mind and is sustained by our attention to the riveting soap opera, the constant chatter of the cocktail party that goes on in our heads.” When those are not enough we distract ourselves from the feeling of separation from God through work, entertainment, alcohol, drugs, and any other of a number of addictions. But our separation is not real.

Ruah and pnuema the Hebrew and Greek words, respectively, for breath are also the words for spirit. In the first creation story in Genesis God animates the creation as the Spirit swoops over the waters and through the void. In Genesis’ second creation story God animates the human through the Divine breath. Later, the resurrected Jesus commissions his disciples by breathing upon them. Our breath is God’s breath.

It is through attentive breathing that I am gaining some ability to quieten my mind. Focusing on the in and out of my breath, God’s breath, settles the chatter certainly. My mantra is not a word but the inhale and exhale. More important to me than the technique is that my breath is from God. My breathing is the work of God within me. I can focus on the feeling in my nose or throat. I can go more deeply into my chest, diaphragm and belly as the breath of life fills me.

In the Rector’s Forum these past few weeks Fr. Stephen Wade has used words with the breath to help us center. A very common prayer to use in this way is the Jesus Prayer. Inhale as you think “Lord Jesus Christ.” Exhale “Son of God.” Inhale “Have mercy on me.” Exhale, “A sinner.” (I hope Steve or readers will share their breath prayers in the comments.) These words can help when breathing is not enough.

Regardless of the words or lack of them, these are ways to quiet the chatter, exit the mental cocktail party, and connect with the God that is within you and has been from before you took your first breath (Psalm 139).

Blessings and Peace,
Gene

As I have continued my study and fledgling practice of centering prayer this past week I have made some interesting personal discoveries. First of all, I have discovered that it is not my monkey brain chattering away nonsensically that has been a challenge to quietening my mind. It seems I am able to get past that hurdle easily. The next hurdle is much higher. That is my responsible brain, if you will.

It is the part of my mind that reminds me that I must take care of this chore, call this person, plan this meeting, shop for food, pay that bill, and so forth. It is the part of my brain that makes its own lists (because I usually forget to write things down) and wants to keep me on track and in control of my life. Mostly this part of my brain is just reminding me to do this or that, but it also has the capability to chide me. It asks, “Why did you forget to pay that bill?” “Shouldn’t you vacuum and dust today?” “What is so hard about remembering to pray for that friend?” This part of my brain is a bit like a scolding parent who feels that a day is only as good as the number of things crossed off the to-do list.

This bit of my brain seems to be hardwired and is very persistent. But that is OK. An important part of this practice is recognizing when my brain wanders off done this familiar path. Upon recognizing the wandering I bring my mind gently back to the prayer word. It is very important to be gentle with myself. Otherwise, the practice becomes onerous. It becomes another one of the “oughts” or “shoulds” that fill my life and weigh me down.

As I gently return my mind to the center, to my prayer word, and to my vision of God, I am finding that I can stay in place a little longer than last time. When I do I benefit from the quiet that has been offered to me and I have claimed in the moment. The oughts and shoulds subside for a while, the lists also move off to the side.

One image Fr. Martin Laird uses in his book, Into the Silent Land, is that of a wheel with spokes radiating from the center. God is the hub and we are the spokes. As we calm our minds in prayer we move closer to the center, closer to God. At times, probably most of the time, the journey is incremental. When my monkey brain or responsible brain intrudes I move away from the center. It is important to have patience, kindness, and gentleness with myself .

These three–patience, kindness, and gentleness–are unexpected gifts of the practice. They may be as important as anything I have learned so far. They also may be just as hard to practice. The world is not patient, gentle or kind. It has taught me not to give myself the benefit of these virtues.

For now, as I continue this exploration of centering prayer I will do my best to practice patience, kindness, and gentleness with myself especially when the responsible brain sneaks in. May you do the same for yourself.

Blessings and Peace,
Gene

Last week I wrote about the practice of silence. This practice of silent or contemplative prayer has been on my radar for years, but I have not been a practitioner of the form taught by Fr. Thomas Keating and others in the Centering Prayer movement. That does not mean I have not tried it.

My first foray into Centering Prayer was over twenty years ago at St. Margaret’s in DC under the tutelage of our interim rector who is now the Bishop of Maryland, Eugene Sutton. I made another attempt at it in seminary. Both times I felt like I was doing something artificial. Perhaps it was because I already felt comfortable with silence. I did not seem to have trouble clearing my head as other people seemed to. Whatever the reason, I did not find Centering Prayer as helpful as others did.

A few weeks ago as we entered the new year, I, as so many of us do, was wondering about what I might make a new start on. I had a short list of things such as less screen time and more exercise, the types of resolutions oen might expect. Days later as I was reading Elaine Pagels new book Why Religion? I came across a reference to Thomas Keating. The very next morning I received an email from a parishioner with the Thomas Keating’s obituary attached. Was the Holy Spirit trying to tell me something?

On Monday a friend who is a missionary in rural Argentina shared in her daily email a quotation from Thomas Merton, “Let me rest in Your will and be silent. Then the light of Your joy will warm my life. Its fire will burn in my heart and shine for Your glory. This is what I live for. Amen, amen.” Just yesterday, because I seemed to need additional nudging, I came across Into the Silent Land by Fr. Martin Laird; a book I started years ago but never finished. At that point it became clear that whether the Holy Spirit or serendipity was at work, I was being led to reexamine this form of contemplative prayer.

The hardest part of contemplative prayer is calming what the Buddhist monks call “The Monkey Brain.” This is the part of the brain that seems to be chattering away whenever our mind is not otherwise occupied. It can be the noise of what needs to be done today, our internal tapes that tell us about our worth or lack thereof, or the brain that focusses on the latest stimulation regardless of its importance, “Look a squirrel.”

The practice in Centering Prayer is to sit comfortably in a quiet place. Then find a mantra-like word to focus on and return to when the monkey brain takes over. The word can come from reading scripture, be a word we are drawn to such as love or peace, or a simple prayer such as the Jesus Prayer. We use the word or prayer to quiet our thoughts. As we do so the quietened mind has room to listen for God’s voice, the voice that comes out of silence as it did in creation. The silence may be all we “hear” but more may revealed as the silence settles into us.

I will be revisiting Centering Prayer in the coming days, as well as reading Into the Silent Land. I will report on my experience. I encourage you to make your own foray into the contemplative. Comment here or directly to me. Let’s find out how this journey affects our prayer and our life. God is calling let us to make room in our life for “the still small voice” of the eternal .

Blessings and Peace,
Gene

As we approach a weekend where snow is anticipated I think about one of the gifts of a snowfall—silence. Have you ever noticed how when snow is falling the world becomes quiet? A kind of hush falls along with the snow. The hush can be an invitation to quieten ourselves, slow down, breathe deeply and be at peace.

Last week I quoted John of the Cross who wrote, “God’s first language is silence.” I imagine John was thinking that prior to God speaking creation into being there were no words. God created speech as a vehicle for creation. At its best, when we speak it is a means of communication. But we know how so much speech is just noise. It is the babbling of people enamored with the sound of their own voice. As Shakespeare wrote, “full of sound and fury signifying nothing.”

So we are invited into a conversation of silence with God. We are invited to sit, quieten our minds and hearts, and listen and to and for the heartbeat of God. One might respond, “What good will that do. I need to tell God about a friend who is sick, worries about my marriage or other relationship, sadness about my job, and so much more. How can I do all of that if I am silent?” Good question, but perhaps it misses the point.

If we believe, as we say that we do, that to God “all hearts are open, all desires known and no secrets are hid” then God know our cares, worries, and joys as soon as we do. God does not need us to speak our petitions for them to be known to God. However, more than anything God needs us to listen and we need to listen to God.

We need to listen for God’s answers to our spoken or unspoken prayers. We need to listen for what God wants us to know about ourselves and God’s love for us. We need to listen for the silence that was before there was noise to distract us from the love of God. The late Thomas Keating who spent much of his life promoting Centering Prayer, would say that silence allows us to rest in God. The silence is not fraught with the cares, sorrows, or joys of our daily existence. It is a tonic that allows us to be at peace for a time, and through that peacefulness to be strengthened to carry that peace out into the world for others.

Few people are able to just sit down and begin centering or contemplative prayer without some guidance. If you find the idea of silent contemplation intriguing and want to learn more there are several excellent books available that can help you learn more, including Open Mind, Open Heart by Thomas Keating, Centering Prayer and Inner Awakening by Cynthia Bourgeault, Finding Grace at the Center by Pennington, Keating and Clarke.

No matter how you approach contemplative prayer start slowly. Set aside just a few minutes at at time and working up to longer periods. Be patient with yourself as there are many temptations to get frustrated and bail out because it isn’t “working.” Be patient with God as God’s voice finds its way through your particular silence. Ultimately this is a practice of love and as Paul told us love has many attributes and also requires much of us. But love is the answer for ourselves and the world.

Merry Christmas! Yes, it is still Christmas. The season of Christmas, also called Christmastide, lasts twelve days the last of which is January 5—Twelfth Night or the Eve of the Epiphany. Twelfth Night used to be a time of celebration also, think Shakespeare’s play of the same name. According to Wikipedia:

“Twelfth Night is a festival in some branches of Christianity marking the coming of the Epiphany… the Church of England, Mother Church of the Anglican Communion, celebrates Twelfth Night on the 5th and ‘refers to the night before Epiphany, the day when the nativity story tells us that the wise men visited the infant Jesus.”

This description is accurate except that the Magi visited Jesus not as an infant but as a toddler. He was about two years old according to the timeline in Matthew. But over the centuries we have conflated the birth, adoration of the shepherds and adoration of the Magi into nearly simultaneous events. The Magi in our crèche have been traveling through the nave of the church getting closer and closer to the stable these past weeks. They will arrive this Sunday. With their arrival Christmastide ends.

Epiphany, unlike Christmas, is a day not a season. Yet, many learned priests and laypersons talk about the season of Epiphany, but that does not exist. The days between Epiphany and Ash Wednesday are Ordinary Time, just as are the days between Pentecost and Advent. After the expectancy of Advent, the celebrations of Christmas and Epiphany (and New Year’s Day) I think we need some ordinary time.

However, Ordinary Time should not be confused with blah or boring time. Rather, Ordinary Time is a period of integrating what we have learned, experienced, and wondered on during Advent, Christmas and Epiphany. Ordinary Time is a period to sort out what we have sensed in ourselves as we waited during Advent. It is a time to live into what we felt as the Christ Child was born again in our hearts. It is a period for taking the meaning of Epiphany, the revelation of Jesus to all the world, and putting it into practice in our lives.

Ordinary Time can be the time when we sit in silence after the hubbub and festivities and listen for God. St. John of the Cross wrote, “God’s first language is silence.” Ordinary Time may well be the time to train our ears and minds to listen for God in the silence.

I will write more on silence and practicing the presence of God in the coming weeks. For now, sing Christmas carols, drink wassail (in moderation), take down the Christmas decorations, and enjoy the final day of the Christmas season this Twelfth Night.

May the Star of the Epiphany lead you closer to Jesus as it did the Magi over two thousand years ago.

Christmas blessings,
Gene

As we enter the last days of Advent the anxiety does not lessen but rather increases. Perhaps that is why our last candle for Advent represents Love. St. Paul tells us about the attributes of love in his First Letter to the Corinthians. He writes that the very first characteristic of love is patience.

Our patience can be tried during Advent with so many extra things required of us—writing cards, parties, baking, decorating, shopping and the traffic, oh my goodness but the traffic. Everyone who is driving seems to be distracted by phones, decorations, signs, lights, and others in their car. It also seems as if the number of cars on the road doubles during this season.

If you have been around the Parish House this week you will know that our patience has been tried by fire alarms going off and the elevator being on the fritz. These are both due to flooding in the elevator pit. Trying to coordinate the plumber, the elevator company, and the alarm company has vexed Jill to no end. All this is happening as we make the final preparations for Advent IV and Christmas.

I was talking to a friend this morning who after hearing me kvetch reminded me simply, “Regardless of all that is happening, Jesus will come.” That is, of course, absolutely true. Yet, it can be so hard to remember when we are obsessed with making it just right.

Let us remember the Holy Family and their trials. Mary was in the ninth month of her pregnancy. They had to walk 98 miles from Nazareth to Bethlehem. They could not find a place to rest and ended up in a stable full of animals. She gives birth in the middle of the night without a midwife or anesthetic. Follow that up with shepherds coming to visit who have experienced an angelic visitation. Mary’s response was not to get vexed but to “ponder all these things in her heart” and so can we.

Regardless of our concerns, worries, and trying to make Christmas perfect, Jesus comes. Jesus comes amid the chaos of the stable and the chaos of our lives. Jesus comes to remind us that getting it just right is not so important. What is important is getting him in our hearts for this Christmas and every day of our lives.

For another take on the chaos of the first Christmas watch this video https://youtu.be/kWq60oyrHVQ

Preparing for the Presen(ts)ce–December 14, 2018

As a child, waiting for Christmas was so difficult. It all started to get amped up with our annual visit to see Santa Claus at the downtown Thalhimers department store in Richmond Virginia. The family would all dress up, pile into my mother’s 1963 Buick Le Sabre and make the fifty-mile trip to the city. When we arrived my dad parked the car in the underground parking garage (so cool). We crossed the street and entered Thalhimers. Next we rode the escalator (also cool) up to the sixth floor where Santa was enthroned.He was surrounded by twinkling, snow-covered Christmas trees and attended by elves.Of course there was the line of children and parents waiting their turn.

Usually our wait was not long. Somehow my parents knew the best time to arrive. While we waited in line my parents did some shopping. Once we made our wishes known to Santa and had our photo taken, it was time for lunch. This we had in the fifth-floor Thalhimers restaurant (cooler still). There were white tablecloths, heavy silverware, nice china and uniformed waiters. These were the stuff of Hollywood motion pictures, and not what our family was used to. We children were so spellbound by the restaurant that we did not wonder about the shopping bags at my parents’ feet. Although later when we returned to the car and they were placed in the trunk our curiosity was piqued.

Of course, all of this heightened the excitement and longing for Christmas Day and what Santa would bring. There were still schooldays, homework, chorus concerts, fruitcake making and other seasonal activities to distract us. But when we went to bed at night it was wondering about the presents that kept us awake.

Sometimes I wish the yearning of that little boy for his Christmas loot, could be tapped into by the adult as he waits for the coming of Jesus. But my adult longing for Jesus’ birth is subtler than the longing for Santa Claus. It is also deeper. When Christmas arrives there is not the frantic present opening of the child’s Christmas. There is the wonder I experience in the candlelight, the carols, the greens, and the miracle of birth.

There is also the wonder that something as inconsequential as a mother giving birth in a stable in backwater Palestine making any difference. How many other children were born that night or any night? How many births excite a family, yet are not marked as holy days. There is so much to wonder about in this singular child’s birth. There is so much to marvel about: long treks to faraway towns, angelic hosts, shepherds in the fields, animals making way for a baby. There is also more to come: The Magi, the family fleeing violence by emigrating to Egypt, their return home, and a child growing up out of our sight into the man we call Christ, the Messiah, the Prince of Peace, Our Lord and our Savior.

My goodness but a child’s Christmas is fun. However, the adult’s Christmas can be so much more if we settle into it through Advent expectation and prayerful preparation. The adult’s Christmas can be powerful enough to change our lives and our world. All we need is eyes to recognize the miracle, hearts to live into its call, and minds to carry it all with us into the new year. Then our lives become a never-ending Christmas present for ourselves and all we meet.

The Wonders of the Advent Wreath—December 7, 2018

The Advent wreath is a wonderful thing. It leads us through the season of Advent very simply andintentionally. While the overall theme of Advent is preparation and expectationthe wreath and its candles give us themes for each Sunday. The themes are notcomplex theological concepts like soteriology, substitutionary atonement, or doublepredestination. They are, in order, Hope, Peace, Joy and Love. These are simpleenough for a child to grasp, but also allow for deep reflection during Advent.

Hope is not just a desire for something to be. Hope reflects what the dictionary calls an archaic meaning, that is “a feeling of trust.” When we say our hope is in the Lord we are putting our trust and faith in God’s love for us and all of God’s creation.

Peace is not just a cessation of war or just a sense of tranquility. It is what St. Paul called “the peace that passes all understanding.” Like the Hebrew word shalom, this peace implies a sense of overall well- being, including: general welfare, harmony, wholeness, prosperity, and completeness. Another way to express this sense of peace is to say, without irony, “God is in heaven and all is right with the world.”

Joy is more than a transient sense of happiness. To have joy (or Gaudete in Latin) is to live out of a place of deep peace and security knowing that God is your greatest love and the one who cares for you. Absolutely nothing, no matter how terrible, can rob you of the joy in God. (A great expression of this joy is in this ancient song https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2KSxg9Ij5r8 )

Love is something greater than a St. Valentine’s Day card. This love is the love of God for all, and Jesus’ commandment to love one another. This love is expressed as the desire for each person to be fulfilled in God. I want the best for you and you want the best for me. We do not even have to like one another to love one another, for this love for all rises above emotions and desires. The greatest expression of this is when we can love even our enemies.

May each of you be find these four aspects of the season. May the Hope, Peace, Joy, and Love of God enfold you this Advent and for ever more.

Advent blessings,
Gene