Stones of Hope, Stones of Healing

The air outside has been so light and buoyant the past few days that I have had this strong desire to lift my arms and fly!  Looking out over these cliffs, over this river, I see an eagle gliding above- and have to remind myself that I do not have wings, but only feet that they are fixed firmly and humanly to this ground.

This feeling of rising is almost like falling in love. My heart yearns to dissolve into something larger than myself. But like sweet infatuation, I am also disoriented- running up against spiritual paradox.  Before me the chasm opens to reveal not only light, but darkness, and I longingly seek the eyes of the beloved to find my way home.

~

I write of this spiritual paradox now, in these strangely mystical words, because there are too many things that happen daily which leave me breathless and disoriented- sometimes with awe and hope, sometimes with fear and despair, and most often with a profound sense of both. In the end, when all is said and done, and the events of the day have dissolved into deeper meaning, I am left holding in my hand only a stone of hope.

On one of these events, this past Saturday, I hiked with my family in the beautiful ravine of Letchworth Park in Western New York.  I was moved by the beauty of the gorge, even as I feared the treacherous descent from cliff edge to the river below. This sense of treacherousness was heightened when I learned that a police officer we saw on the hiking trail to the lower falls had just returned from saving a man's life-- a man who he told the group of hikers ahead of us was a vet, who would have ended his own life by jumping from a cliff that protruded into the water. As I stood there on the edge, looking out over the river, I contemplated the despair of one unable to re-enter this world- and I whispered the words of the Navajo prayer, spoken in ceremony for those returning from war- May you walk in beauty- praying that the broken man might find a way to return to balance and harmony with life.

When I left the park, I noticed in my rearview mirror the same police officer with his face in his hands.  These are times of chasmic weeping- not of petty personal wounds, but of a deeper ache for a world in despair. At home, in the sanctuary of my meditation, I have made it a daily practice to hold the names of the fallen in stones, collected from walks I have taken in the surrounding woods and from the distant ocean shores. I hold each stone in remembrance of lives lost, in prayerful intention, and in hope for healing. (This was a practice that evolved after attending a War Healing Circle at my congregation this past May... during which we held stones, while the names of those soldiers who had died since the last gathering were read aloud.)

Today I hold these stones not only for the victims of war, but for all the dear ones I am holding, and for the ones forgotten and unseen. Beneath the clear blue New York skies, it is hard to imagine the dark maelstrom that now pelts the Gulf Coast in Hurricane Isaac's wake. Seven years ago, I watched on tv screens as Hurricane Katrina bore down on New Orleans, ripping through the levees.  Stuck in bed with the flu then, I watched continuously, as the flood waters rose and then cleared- leaving only the bodies of the dead. I watched news flashes of floods receding to reveal a world full of people who had been overlooked, forgotten, unseen- and I felt the helpless pull to do something- anything- to heal our human need.

But healing is not something we learn to do over night; it has probably taken me at least seven years to learn how to heal myself, and I am only beginning to learn how to heal others. Last night I gathered in a room with several people in another city that, like New Orleans, is full of too many people that too many others never knew- or cared- existed. The people gathered there in Newburgh spoke of their visions for the Hope Center- a place of possibility, community, and spiritual center for a city in crisis.

As each one spoke, I listened intently, and I was moved by a familiar love-- a love that has compelled me lately to extend my hands, with an energy stronger than gravity, to other hands that greet me.  A love that has poured out in tears, in stones, and in a longing to fly.  And a love that has moved me to face the darkness of my own resistant shadow side.

These experiences- of light and dark, of love and shadow- are all a part of the journey.  I have begun reading the first book I chose from my spiritual director training syllabus: Entering the Castle by Caroline Myss. This is a book about mysticism which- to de-mystify- is really about living the words of my favorite prayer of St. Francis:  Make me an instrument of your peace...It is about doing the inner work of self-examination, prayer, and contemplation to become a channel for grace. I am reminded that I must do this shadow work to enter the wholeness of my soul; I am reminded that I must dive within if I am to help restore what is broken in this world. Entering the Castle explores the work of St. Teresa of Avila- including her ascent through the castle of her soul into elevated states of spiritual consciousness to become intimate with the divine.  Hmmm...falling in love, becoming intimate... It seems that this is the work of getting closer, and I am reminded of the words of my spiritual director when we first met- you know, this call to be a spiritual director, it is really a call to be closer to God.

And "getting closer" is what we do when we stand in a circle at the end of our meeting, joined together hand in hand.  My spiritual director holds my right hand, and he leads us in prayer- for our community, and for this broken city.  My left hand is joined to the hand of a man who has transformed his life- from prison to freedom and grace; who is an integral part of this community, and whose hand in mine is a stone of hope. When we have prayed and let go, we turn in a hug of friendship.

I know then that I am not here to solve the city's problems, but to be there- bound in relationship- to the ones I join my hands with.  As a people of this world we are falling fast, over the edge of cliffs.  But as we reach out our hands to one another we are held back from the edge by beauty, and we are saved by the grace of each other. And we know, as we walk this journey, that we are not alone.  These hands we hold are stones of hope, and they are stones of healing. There is a love that wraps itself around us, lifts us, gives us wings to fly, and will not- ever- let us go.

And may you return whole, and safely...

Saturday was an emotional day for my UU community, as we gathered together in fellowship and ceremony with our minister, Rev. Chris Antal, prior to his departure to Afghanistan. Ministers from his support cluster joined Chris in leading a moving service, as we offered blessing for him, his chaplain's assistant, and their families.

Chris can be seen and heard in this video from yesterday's deployment ceremony for the 450 New York Army National Guard soldiers of the 101st Expeditionary Signal Battalion. They will travel to Fort Bliss for training, followed by a nine-month deployment to Afghanistan. When I first heard the video, I misheard his words as "and return us whole". Listening again, I hear he says "home"...But, as I think of the path that lies ahead, that first mis-hearing rings true.... and I pray for a whole and safe return for all...

Gratitude and Blessing for One Who Serves

This Sunday UU minister Rev. Chris Antal, who has served as the consulting minister of my congregation this past year, leaves on nine months of deployment to Afghanistan as an army chaplain. As the weekend approaches, I am filled with many emotions- sadness, surely, as I read the news and personal accounts of this awful war, and fear the hardship that lies ahead for him, his unit, and their families; but also a deep sense of gratitude and respect for the incredible generous ministry of one I have come to know as both spiritual leader and friend.

There are many stories I could share, but I will leave it to say that having Chris as my minister has had a profound impact on my life. As I reflect on the intangible gifts I have personally received, I am filled with gratitude.  But more than this I am grateful for the ministry that he is offering to the world.  He is one of a small (but growing) number of UU military chaplains.  Our chaplains walk with soldiers and military families through grief and hurt and loss of meaning, in a way that is open and inclusive of all theological beliefs, and accepting of all sexual orientations.  I believe Unitarian Universalism is a healing faith- a saving faith- which is needed most in places of brokenness, and I know that Chris will embody the principles of our faith as a healing presence in a place of much hardship and pain.  

As our UU ministers accompany their units through war, I hope that those of us in the larger fellowship will walk with them from afar. We are integrally connected, yet have created such divides between those at war, and those here at home, safe in America.  I have followed the blog of Rev. Seanan Holland who is currently serving in Afghanistan, and will follow Chris’ blog as he also plans to write.  May we remain in fellowship, separated by geography, but connected by awareness to the burdens they are helping to carry. And may their stories break our hearts open to greater compassion for all those at war, as they serve overseas, and as they return to this soil.

There is a book, put forth by Skinner House, called Bless All Who Serve: Sources of Hope, Courage, and Faith for Military Personnel and their Families.   As I think of Chris this weekend, I offer these words, in gratitude and in hope, as a blessing for one who serves…

May you be safe, in body and in mind, and may you be strong in spirit.  May your presence in Afghanistan help to guide, to heal, and to bring peace.  May you be accompanied, always, by Spirit and by the interconnected web of your larger spiritual community.  And may you walk in courage and in faith,  humbly with your God. 

Dream-State

Listen, your life is speaking...

I hear the sounds of women crying-- and the angry shouts of men who wish they knew how to weep. A stone altar lies before me adorned with precious objects- djembe, ecclesia, kyo-zakura.  These are names in other languages that languish on the tongue, like the names of women and men who walk the edges of my waking: Dream-state. Child of the light. Protector of the sea.

Spirit animals dance here ...snapping turtle, owl, woodpecker, crow.  A circle gathers round to offer rose quartz- stones of love and healing- in a place that has known violence and death. Demons dissolve into murky water, and the lost are reconciled.... The lion lies down with the lamb.

On a devastated city street we are given small bronze crosses, engraved with a word that means to be called. I lay it now on this altar made of stone- with the cherry blossom incense, the turtle-carved drum, the Cape Cod shells, the owl feathers, the singing bowl.

There is a path of healing that opens wide before us, out of these tangled brambles.  A woman is learning to speak. She is telling her story to all who will listen.  A soprano sings back in operatic voice: you must go looking for your life.

Community is afire, and there is no one but us: these people breaking bread on the stoop; these children of light who are facing their pain; these friends who are showing up to fix the broken pieces of our lives.  Together we share the ten thousand things: they are you, and they are me. We are the ten thousand things.

My daughter tells me every part of her body is a different religion.  She has a Jewish foot, a Muslim hand, a Christian arm, and a Buddhist tongue. Her Sikh heart pumps her Hindu blood. I hear her and know she is the universe. The soul of the world runs through her veins.

I see us and know we are the body, the body of this earth we re-create. We are broken and fractured- and on the way to re-membering, with hands that arise to mold the visions of our lives.

Love on all Sides

How do we remain present in difficult times?  How do we remain loving in the midst of hate?

This week, the news is baffling, although sadly perhaps not as shocking as we might hope..as stories of intolerance and hate become commonplace.  Fast food chains preach intolerance of fellow human beings, and crowds line up for chicken sandwiches in support, in the name of Christianity. The Chic-Fil-A case boggles the mind of those of us who consider Jesus one of our sages, who walk in the footsteps of his example, who strive to "love thy neighbor" and "forgive thy enemy"- and interpret his seemingly straightforward message of love to include all people- gay, straight, lesbian, queer, bisexual, transgender included.

In other news, deadly expressions of hate erupt in a Sikh temple, and six are left dead.  The gunman belonged to groups that promoted white supremacist ideologies.  Though one person alone pulled the trigger, he acted in the violent spirit of many- a gathering of multiple individuals uniting themselves around an ideology of hate.  Our hearts are broken- and we stand side by side with the persecuted ones. We extend our love, rightfully so, to the suffering Sikh community. We know that we are one world, we are one community and love knows no boundaries of race, religion, gender, sexual orientation, or national divide.  And thus we stand on the side of love.

But how far does love extend?  In thinking of the ones who preach messages of hate, we want to create a wall between us and them.  But love is not a linear thing; it does not take sides.  It is a gift available to all, an ever expanding circle, all-pervasive, and all encompassing.  If I open myself to love then I must also extend love to the ones who hate- even as I cry in mourning with the ones they have wounded, even as I vehemently oppose such senseless violence. Who are the people who are hateful and intolerant? They are not only these strangers I can barely understand. In some cases, they are people I know and care about. And in some cases, if I truly look deeply into the kernel of my own heart- into places that hold my own pain and anger- they are me.

There is a spectrum of hatred, a slope into violence that most of us cannot imagine ever sliding into... I do not want to equate kernels of anger within me to the ones who spew hatred toward others at the world. And yet, each wall I build between myself and another is a denial of our shared humanity.  To be a true peacemaker means to chisel away at those walls. I begin by breaking down the walls in myself-- noticing seeds of inner pain, transforming them from within.

Prayers of compassion, ever widening circles of love, extend to those who suffer everywhere- to the victims of intolerance, to the perpetrators who live in darkness, and to all the rest of us struggling everywhere in between.

Cultivating Peace with Children

Time with my children is undeniably precious.  I cannot measure this time in clock-strokes, but in the attention given to moments of connection.

Tonight I dance around the living room with my youngest daughter. We dance, snuggle close, singing cheek to cheek. At bedtime, my oldest daughter and I laugh our way through a prayer- recounting the gifts of the day: from friends returned from vacation, to a loose tooth still hanging in there, to a random annoying flea!

These moments glisten like silver strands in the messy tangle of living. This is not just precious time, it is spiritual practice-- the practice of cultivating every day joy and peace.  In the mornings this week, the kids have been accompanying me on the train ride, and walking with me through the woods to the summer camp right next door to my workplace  It's a hard walk for them in the summer heat, but we stop to witness nature along the way-- to feel the lush grass and watch a turquoise-winged dragonfly, to see if there are berries ripe enough to eat.

It is the moments- preparing dinner together, bowing and offering gratitude, listening to random insights from an 8 year old, answering silly questions from a 5 year old- that we practice to cultivate our peace. They wind their way through the whining, the arguing, the difficult struggles. Fall in, fall in I tell myself- when I would sometimes rather build a wall, retreat into solitude away from the messy chaotic times. When time with my frustrating kids seems no antidote to the craziness of this world, and is something I would rather resist.

But liberation comes from giving in, from opening to life without resistance. And cultivating connections at home is an antidote, a way of planting seeds to counter the insanity of life. They feel messy now, but will grow fruitful in time. Creating peace in my home means the continual nurturing of our shared relationships, of our interdependent web.Author Barbara Kingsolver once wrote, "My best revenge against all the dishonesty and hatred in the world...will be to raise right up through the middle of it these honest and loving children." Mothering well is important spiritual work, and I renew my intention to the journey.

Mundane Reflections

Since returning from a weekend away at Zen Mountain Monastery, I have been attempting to actualize the idea of my every day life as the material of my practice.  There is no idyllic dream, no escape from reality, no trip to the mountain that brings profound enlightenment.  Rather, enlightenment is found in scrubbing the grime of the kitchen sink, or in remaining present and awake through the children arguing in the backseat on the drive home, through the husband anxious about time and money, and through the administrative tasks of daily work.

Thus far, it has not been a breeze; in fact it has been somewhat painful. At each encounter with reality I rub up against myself. In dokusan (a one-on-one meeting with the abbot), I was given the dharma to befriend my emotions. At times, I have indulged the friendly feelings with fantasy and dreams, while keeping the uglier ones at bay, tying them up and secluding them in a dark room-- for fear that they might overtake me.  Now, I turn to face those feelings- anger, pain, grief, sorrow- with vigilance, hoping that in their early stages I might tame the tiger while it is well fed and rousing, rather than neglect it until it is famished and eager to attack.

The realizations that emerged from this past weekend came to me unexpectedly. They did not emerge from periods of zazen (silent sitting meditation) or dharma discourse, but from a series of meal-time conversations with monastery residents and caretaking practice (aka sweeping a broom until I had developed a blister on my thumb!).

In attending the Intro to Zen retreat, I had expected a weekend of silence- and truthfully, I was looking forward to that! This was based on all my previous exposure to Zen, from groups that visit the retreat center where I work.  But those groups are in sesshin- whereas the weekend I attended was thrust down in the middle of every day monastery life.  We were there to experience the eight gates, of which zazen is only one. We were there to encounter the self in the midst of the mundane.

As I entered a dorm room with seven other women- some of whom were more chatty than I would have liked- I felt annoyed; and as I sat at meals around full square tables, I silently hoped to be left alone.  And yet, at each meal I found myself in rich conversation with one of the monastic residents- a different one each time. While dinner time conversation is not listed as one of the eight gates, I wondered if perhaps these conversations too were another way of doing liturgy, or academic study, or dokusan.

I do not consider myself a great conversationalist-- especially with people I have just met.  But somehow each monastic resident opened a gate of presence, and each conversation birthed a new insight. Usually these were one-on-one conversations, in which we became fully present to one another (twice almost to the neglect of chores!).  These conversations mirrored the presence that the abbot shared with those who came to see him during dokusan.

The experience of presence was also encountered through work practice, which is another of the eight gates.  Sweeping stairs and chopping tomatoes were activites of meditation.  I recognized that my own mental resistance to certain work- particularly the administrative tasks of my paid employment- comes from an over-identification with the activities.  We live in a society where some work is elevated over others-- where a person who scrubs toilets is regarded less than a person who manages companies. We come to identify ourselves with the work and roles we do in life, and in the process lose track of the self.

But the real self is not defined by work or by roles of any kind. The self is the universe, is reality, is all. In the monastery, work is spiritual practice- and it is not all grand.  Students garden and scrub; a senior monastic teacher prepares the meals; the abbot crawls into the aqueduct tunnel to take measurements for a building project.  By coming to see the tasks of my life as spiritual practice, rather than acts of self-definition, I can deepen my focus and be present in the activity. I make the intention now of focusing on these administrative tasks as work practice, returning to the excel sheet in the same way I might return to the breath, or the sweep of broom, or the slice of tomato.

As I return to the world from the weekend retreat, I walk with all this in mind. While a part of me would love to pack my bags and move to the mountains to become a monk (even monastic life can appear like a dream, a beautiful escape!), I have practice to do-- to face the self, to awaken--  right here and now.

Gracious Gifts

Even after all this time the sun never says to the earth, "you owe me."  Look what happens with a love like that.  It lights the whole sky.- Hafiz

I have been thinking about the gifts that we give and receive, and the meaning we put into them. I think sometimes I give with the hope of receiving gratitude for my consideration, or recognition of how clever my gift might be.  Can I give anonymously, knowing only the simple joy of the receiver's smile and delight? Can I give without the hope of receiving a 'thank you'? Grace is a gift that is given freely- a gift that expects nothing in return. To offer one's overflowing heart generously to the universe for the sake of offering beauty and light, without expectation of receiving anything in return...that is the true way to give.

I received a gift this morning from a woman I have never met.  She is a GED student of my husband's-- one who I have been thinking about and praying for this past week. Last weekend her good friend was killed by her boyfriend in a domestic dispute, and vigil candles burned in city streets.  The student herself has many of her own personal struggles, and this morning she told my husband that it would be her last day of class for awhile, as she will need to find work instead of pursuing her education until her advocate can help to sort out a Department of Social Services mess.

But this morning, she was very happy.  She had spent the weekend praying through a bible study program in her Episcopal church, and my husband said she entered class enthusiastically, bringing him a gift "for his wife" - a basket of honey and almond bath oils and lotions.  While I have never met her, my heart is warmed in appreciation that perhaps in some small way, in the language of unspoken prayer, we are connected. I hope that she finds healing in her life.

As I breathe in the sweet honey scent of body oil, I am deeply appreciative of this stranger's gift. And I pray that the gifts I pass on to others will be given freely in overflowing love, without expectation of praise and recognition in return.