If my life today had been a movie, its title would have been ‘Surrounded by Hope’. It seemed everywhere I turned I either heard or saw the word hope. Not a bad message to have washing over you on this steamy, July day.

The not-so subliminal message began while listening to a CD of a lecture by church historian Diana Butler Bass. In describing a book she had recently read on the subject and study of happiness, she quoted the author as saying there are basically three things that need to be present in a person’s life for them to describe their living as happy: Meaningful work. Meaningful relationships. A sense of hope in the future.

While I was listening to this CD, I was making my rounds of some Twin Cities hospitals as I visited church members following surgery or illness. As I continued to listen to Bass speak, my eyes fell on a mural painted along a wall on the freeway: Hope is Life. Colorful swirls of paint flew out from this roadside message making the words seem to dance in the deathly heat rising from the asphalt. Hope certainly had my attention now.

Moments later MPR radio host Kerri Miller announced that Bishop John Shelby Spong and Sister Joan Chittister were going to be on her radio show talking about, what else? Hope! I began to think there was some kind of cosmic conspiracy drawing me into its vortex ready to brainwash me to the virtues of hope. But then I woke up and told myself that I was not the only person needing this message, needing to have this unwieldy word unpacked. So I looked at the other drivers in their cars and began to believe that they too were receiving the same message: Hope. Hope. Hope. We were, all of us, linked by a common message. It made me feel, well, hopeful.

It is fair to say that the last few weeks have been not quite so hopeful. With both our state and federal governments unable to play well with each other, it has led to some dismal conversations around supper tables and at coffee shops. As the people of Africa once again are gripped in a horrific drought and we see images of children dying in the arms of parents and caregivers, it is easy to move into despair. When we allow ourselves to think about the vast extremes of weather around the world which points to the kind of climate change scientists have warned would happen, it can cause many of us to place our heads in our hands in grief. For me personally,all this global pain,accompanied by several situations in the lives of friends and in our church community, have created a climate where it could become easy to be taken to the depths.

So for whatever reason the Universe decided to open my eyes to hope today. Not only did the word show up in countless places and conversations. It also showed up as I witnessed a hospital worker in navy scrubs walk into the quiet, candlelit chapel and sit down to pray. Its face was shining forth in the gardens planted by the Sisters of St. Joseph where I had a meeting today. Flowers planted in circles, vegetables reaching toward heaven, neatly tended soil shown forth the work of both Creator and co-creator. In a moment between meetings, I held a baby we recently baptized. She proudly showed me her shiny, new tooth and boldly waved goodbye knowing we all believed her to be both beautiful and brilliant and, most certainly, loved.

Hope, I have come to understand, is not something we have or don’t. It is something we choose. And so today I choose hope? What messages are you choosing these days? For what do you hope? If what the book that Diana Butler Bass was quoting is true, our ability to hope is directly tied to our ability to be happy. Are you willing go choose hope, to be happy, and to have the courage to help your hopes take wing?

It seems to me the alternative is not so promising. So, I’m in. Are you?

“The wonderful thing about simplicity is its ability to give us contentment. Do you understand what a freedom this is? To live in contentment means we can opt out of the status race and the maddening pace that is its necessary partner. We can shout “NO!” to the insanity which chants, “More, more, more!” We can rest contented in the gracious provision of God.”
~Richard Foster, Freedom of Simplicity

Every morning I receive an email with a short piece of prose or poetry from a website called ‘Inward/Outward.’ These writings never fail to nudge me and fill my spirit. Today’s offering was no exception. These words by Richard Foster hit me with their full power.

Contentment. Now, there is a word we don’t hear often or, at least, not often enough. Its pursuit seems, in so many ways, counter-cultural, at least in our American way of seeing the world. To be contented must mean we are not working hard enough, our goals are not high enough, our desires not full enough. We are taught from a very early age to ‘never be contented’ with what we have but to strive for more….whatever more means. It is the way we reach beyond ourselves toward a success that is planned just for us by some unseen force we cannot name. This is the message that sometimes gets labeled ‘the American Dream.’

Now I don’t want to give the idea that I have anything against the creation and pursuit of goals, of making a good life. To create a comfortable, safe, productive life in which we pursue what we love doing, are surrounded by people we love, in which we have our basic needs met, is what I believe we mean when we talk about the ‘common good’ for all. It is a way of life that understands that ‘more’ is not necessarily better. Understanding the simplicity  of ‘enough’ in our lives can lead to this experience of contentment.

Perhaps I was drawn to these words because for whatever reason I had a full body experience of contentment this past weekend. It was not a particularly profound experience but one I did take note of. My weekend was simple, not too many things going on. I did a little work around the house, replanted some flowers in a window box, took a trip to the farmer’s market and then sought relief from the heat inside the house. At one point of the afternoon I walked to a neighborhood coffee shop and did a little writing and spent time with a novel. At one point of this experience I realized that my body had relaxed into the soft leather, low-slung chair. I looked around at the other people present. One man was nursing a cup of coffee while playing solitaire on his computer. A woman and her young daughter were having a sweet, intimate conversation, their heads close to one another as they shared this time on a sweltering Saturday afternoon. Another couple, a man and woman, were engaged in a quiet conversation I heard bits and pieces of that showed their genuine concern for one another. The ceiling fans whirred overhead as my iced coffee glass produced moisture on its surface. I nestled even further into this comfy chair recognizing the pure contentment I felt.

All was not completely right with the world or our country or even our state. All was not even completely right in my own life. But I was still contented. Contented to have what I needed, to be able to read a good book and have a cool drink to ward off the heat. Contented to have enough provisions that I recognized God’s movement in it all. My prayer is that, each day, all people may have a glimpse of just such contentment. Enough of a glimpse to embrace a simplicity that leads to a life of contentment and freedom for all….one day at a time, one life at a time.

Blessed be.

Winding my way around Lake of the Isles one day this week, I caught a glimpse of two people lounging leisurely on a park bench. The bench was not really facing the lake but was positioned under an enormous oak tree whose shade created a canopy over the couple. Each held a book, hard cover, and they sat reading as if they had been walking along and the only right and sensible thing to do was to sit down and read for a while. I knowingly smiled and breathed more deeply as I passed them by.

The evening before I had read an essay by author Pat Conroy about the powerful joy of summer reading. He told of the summer reading lists he assigned himself as a child and how he continues to do that well into his later years. It was a practice he shared with his mother and sister. In the summer heat and humidity of his native South Carolina, these three lovers of books kept a stack from which they each drank liberally, sharing their insights and reviews with one another as the lazy, warm days unfolded.

I can relate. Many summers of my childhood were spent setting a goal of reading through a particular series or genre. From biographies to mysteries to romance novels, the summer was made even more luxurious as I was accompanied by characters and places foreign to my own life experience. It was like taking exotic vacations from the comfort of an easy chair. I still do this. While winter is ripe for curling under an afghan with a good book, summer time reading always seems to be blissful.

Books have the power to shape our lives in profound ways. I listened yesterday as our youngest son, now twenty years young, prepared to attend the midnight showing of the final Harry Potter film. He and friends were preparing their costumes and entering into an excitement that had accompanied not only the opening of the movies but also the arrival of the the newest book. He spoke of how these books had shaped and defined his childhood. “And now it is coming to an end.”‘ he said.

Indeed it is. Not only are the books ending and the films completing their cycle of life but most of those who began this journey as children are also coming into a new cycle of life. My hope is that these readers who squirreled away in their bedrooms to read the ever growing number of pages in this series, continue to find new authors, new characters, that capture them with such fervor. No doubt the ways in which they have been shaped by the adventures and pursuit of goodness of this boy wizard will always remain an inspiration tucked away in their memories. But other stories will, over time, capture their imaginations and their hearts. It is the deepest hope and desire of all authors to do just that.

There is a saying in Talmudic literature that says God created people because God loved stories. As humans who live stories both tragic and comedic, I can’t help but believe the Holy is never without a good tale. As humans who are shaped and inspired by the imagination of writers, poets and storytellers alike, there never seems to be enough of a good telling to satisfy our longings.

And so I give thanks today for all those who continue to spin the yarns that entertain and uplift, that offer wisdom and redemption, whose words preach caution and offer hope. May each of us find the perfect book, the best story, to keep us company through these summer days. May we find the cozy chair, the shaded bench or the well laid blanket that will allow for a respite from the work and obligations of life. And as we sink into the words that are before us, may we imagine the Spirit’s presence moving from the page to our heart, offering a connection with author and reader that has never been before and may never be again.

A holy, reading moment.

“I have tasted the fruit of the earth, O God.
I have seen autumn trees hang heavily with heaven’s gifts.
I have known people pregnant with your spirit of generosity.
Let these be guides to me this day.
And may Mary who knew her womb filled with your goodness
teach me the wisdom that is born amidst pain.
May I know that deeper than any fallowness in me
is the seed planted in the womb of my soul.
May I know that greater than any barrenness in the world
is the harvest to be justly shared.”
~J. Philip Newell

Yesterday morning I began my day with these words from Celtic Benediction by J. Philip Newell. This small, beautifully illustrated devotional book is one I return to over and over again. My experience of it yesterday did not disappoint.

You see, one of the scriptures read this past Sunday was the parable of the sower and the seeds. For those unfamiliar with this story, it is one in which Jesus once again uses imagines and experiences common to those first hearers of his good news. He tells of a sower, a gardener, who goes out to sow the seeds of his garden. Some of his seeds fall on soil in which they cannot find a home and the birds make quick lunch of them. No fruit or veggies to be born from those seeds! Some of the other seeds were thrown into soil that was rocky where their roots could not find the depth they needed to grow deeper as well as taller. The sun drew them out but then scorched the plants they bore and, again, there was no harvest. Still some other seeds fell into an area where there were lots of thorns and the thorns choked what ever had been able to grow. Finally, some of the seeds found a home in soil that was just right…..soft enough to burrow into, not surrounded by plants that would hinder their growth, in the place where there was enough sun and moisture to grow into their fullness.

This is a story that has a myriad of interpretations. The number of sermons preached on this text must be astronomical. I tend to believe this is one of the reasons Jesus’ lessons to us tended to be through storytelling. Depending on wherever we are on life’s path, no matter the circumstances, we can find a morsel of truth or challenge or hope that seems directed specifically to our life’s situation.

That is just what happened on Sunday when an unusually small number of people showed up for our 11:00 worship service. Rather than trying to continue on as if we were a mighty number, I had people pull their seats closer together and we spent time reflecting on this story and what it might have to offer our lives and our world. Reflecting conversationally about times we had planted seeds that grew well, we gave thanks for those seeds that matured, usually through little effort on our part as seeds are wont to do. We also took time to talk about the times when we had planted seeds that had failed and what lesson that might have offered us.

Finally, we prayed for the seeds that we believe need to be planted in our world. Those that will bring about healing, hope, justice, compassion, love. Each person had a sense of the deep needs of our nation, our neighborhoods, our families and our faith communities. We firmly held to the belief that ‘deeper than any fallowness in me
is the seed planted in the womb of my soul.’ Like all gardeners we were reminded that there is a movement of Spirit that is pure Mystery and we’d be served well to connect with that which we cannot see,but certainly feel, as often as possible. It is then that we can gently touch, and be touched by, ‘the harvest to be justly shared.’

What seeds are longing to be planted in your soul this day? What seed do you have to offer the world, for its healing and for your own? Each of us is a part of this powerful on-going story of planting and harvesting. May the One who is the Great Gardener walk with us showing us the finest and richest soil in which to plant the seeds that only we can plant.

” In these times when anger
Is turned into anxiety
And someone has stolen
The horizons and mountains,
Our small emperors on parade
Never expect our indifference
To disturb their nakedness.
They keep their heads down
And their eyes gleam with reflection.
From aluminum economic ground,
The media wraps everything
In a cellophane of sound,
And the ghost surface of the virtual
Overlays the breathing earth.

The industry of distraction
Makes us forget
That we live in a universe.
We have become converts
To the religion of stress
And its deity of progress;
That we may have courage
To turn aside from it all
And come to kneel down before the poor,
To discover what we must do,
How to turn anxiety
Back into anger,
How to find our way home.” 
~John O’Donohue 

Nearly every conversation over the past several days has unsurprisingly turned to the state of our Minnesota government’s inability to make decisions and work together. Our United Methodist bishop, Sally Dyck, asked all churches over the weekend to pray for, not only our leaders, but all those men, women and children who have been plunged into fear and uncertainty over the loss of jobs and services due to the state shutdown. Yesterday at church the prayers were all accompanied by furrowed brows and looks of complete confusion. The sense of helplessness to affect change is palpable.

This morning a friend pointed out this poem of John O’Donohue. Its words hit me square in the solar plexus. I have to admit that over the last days I have been imagining a moment at which all the people in Minnesota would intuitively decide that “enough is enough”. They would get up from their kitchen tables, their desks(if they are still blessed to be sitting at one), get off the bus, leave the library or the restaurant, open their car doors, and walk directly to the lawn of the State Capitol building. They, we, would stand there in a silent protest for all that is being left undone, for all that begs for creative action, for ways in which the common good is being violated. Perhaps it is the ‘sixties spirit’ of my adolescence that has been fanned, allowing me to once again see how large numbers of regular citizens can and do make a difference.

But as I played out this image in my head I realized what I was really seeing mirrored a painting of John August Swanson entitled ‘Festival of Lights.’  You can view it at his website http://www.johnaugustswanson.com. In this beautiful painting of people seeming to come from the very stars themselves, the figures stream from the mountains carrying a single candle that illuminates their faces. Over hills and valleys they move, appearing to come from the ends of the horizon, forming a wave of face after beautiful face. The faces are not smiling faces but they are strong and committed.  Perhaps they are carrying the anger reflected in the poem as they try to find their way home. It is a powerful image.

Frankly, I can’t imagine how this will all turn out. But I do believe it is going to take some deep listening on everyone’s part. Some deep listening and trying to understand what it means to work for all the people and not just some. It will take some anger that is well placed and an ability to rid oneself of the seduction of the distracted life. Not only for our elected leaders but also for those of us who put them where they are.  And it will take the kind of illumination that is portrayed in this beautiful piece of artwork…single lights coming together to form something greater. All this and the ability to kneel down before the poor and see ourselves.

Finding our way home is going to take all the light we can create…..together.

“You can’t always get what you want, but if you try sometimes, you might find, you get what you need.”
~The Rolling Stones

At a meeting this past week I shared what is perhaps an oddity about me that I realized later might be best kept secret. I am not even sure how the subject came up but I told the group about how I actually enjoy going to a store where they are out of whatever it is I have come to purchase. This happens to me with regularity while shopping at the small, though wonderful, grocery store, Trader Joe’s. On more than one occasion I have gone shopping with certain items on my list only to find one of them ‘temporarily out of stock.’ The first time it happened I was somewhat shocked. “You mean I can’t always have what I want?”, I thought but didn’t say to the young store worker. “You mean there isn’t more stashed someplace just waiting for me to come buy it?”

I think one of the reasons that this inability to have my wants met gives me such a good feeling is that, in some ways, it connects me with a time gone by. A time when stores were smaller and there weren’t immense amounts of storage space where extras were kept. A time when you had maybe only one choice of a particular item, at the most a couple of any one thing. A time when merchants stocked shelves with items that didn’t have a shelf life(always a troubling thought for me.) When things could spoil if they sat there too long.

Another reason I find joy in ‘out of stock’ is that it in some way connects me with how the majority of the rest of the world lives. In small towns and remote areas around the world people have a certain self sufficiency that finds its home in the fact that not all things are available at all times. In this country, this is the bedrock of the slow food movement. Does It really make sense that we might be able to have strawberries in January in Minnesota? Living with the rhythm of the seasons means that at some point of the year something will be out of stock.

I recognize that these words come from a place of great privilege. The fact that I can even find a sense of pleasure from not being able to have what I want proves I also have had very little experience with not having what I need. Nearly every day I meet someone who would give anything to have what I most assuredly take for granted. Perhaps in some odd way this ‘out of stock’ experience connects me with these dear ones as well. Whether yes or no, I am humbled by being in their presence and often offer a prayer for their deepest needs, maybe even a chance at a want or two.

In the grand scheme of things finding a particular item at the store out of stock is small potatoes, so to speak. But I am thankful for the opportunity it provides, to reflect on all I do have, to connect with the experience of the wider world, and to count my blessings. Over and over again.

On these amazing summer days, much is ‘in stock’. May this weekend find you celebrating the gifts of this season, one which brings some of nature’s finest beauty and plentiful bounty. And may you,too, find occasion to count your own blessings.

“To imagine is not simply to see what does not exist or what one wants to exist. It is also a profound act of creativity to see what is.”
~Susan Griffin

At a writing workshop I took a few weeks ago, the teacher read this quote of Susan Griffin. I jotted it down in a notebook I was using along with several others that needed more pondering time than the class allowed. Yesterday I was reading through my notes from the class and came upon these words again. Their pull for me lies with a long held belief that each of us is born with everything we need to make the life to which we are called. From the time we were placed within our parent’s arms, we were ‘wired’ in particular ways that are unique to us. Anyone who is a parent can attest to raising individual children in the same environment, setting the same boundaries and rules, dishing out an equal amount of love, only to be amazed at how unique and different each child becomes. Many times we can see it from that first glimmer of personality, with the infant’s first cry or smile. Some of us battle at the world with clenched fists while others move through their lives in relative calm and ease. There are certainly environmental factors that come into play, ways we are wounded, ways we come to know success, that add to who we are. But there seems to be, I believe, a uniqueness to each of us that is seeded from our beginnings.

Griffin’s words on imagination captured my attention also because they seem to speak to the juggernaut the political leaders of Minnesota have created for themselves, and thereby, for all of us as our government has shut down. Both ‘sides’, as they want to describe themselves, could use a good dose of imagination to find ways to work together for the common good of all people. The imagination is a powerful thing. It is what helps us create the stories by which we give meaning to our lives. It is the tool that brings about all great inventions and cures. Imagination brings us the gifts of art, music, dance, poetry, film and plays. It also is what helps us dream a future. The imagination is what helps us give language to our experience of the Holy that moves through our lives is ways that are felt but not seen.

In order to bridge this enormous chasm our leaders have created, there is a need to see not only what does exist and what does not exist within each person from diverse viewpoints, but what actually is present within each. Perhaps it is Pollyanna of me to think that each elected leader wants for all children what they want for their own children…. to have adequate food, safe places to live, health care when they need it and schools that will prepare them well for their future. I can’t help but believe that they also want for their own parents what every one else does…..enough resources to live comfortably without fear, the health care they need as they age, safe places in which to live out their final years, neighborhoods in which they feel at home. Each person, no matter what side of the aisle, has within them what they need to come to the table, to employ their imagination, to solve this situation that is causing pain and anguish to so many.

It has been my experience that it is difficult to let one’s imagination work while at the same time clenching fists or shouting loudly. It is also nearly impossible to enter imagination’s playground while holding too tightly to a need to be in control. After all, the gift of imagination is that it takes us places we had not expected, weaving what is visible and invisible, what was and what can be, with all the realities of what already exists. Sometimes, almost always, it begs for compromise, for risk, for compassion, and above all, a deep, deep listening. Listening to others and to the whisper of the Holy breathing through all.

And so, dear leaders of Minnesota, my prayer for you all is the ability to lean, gently lean into the soft body of imagination, to allow the deepest part of you to listen to your brothers and sisters with whom you share this courageous task, to see with the eyes of your heart, not only your children or your parents, but all the young and old ones who are counting on your glorious imagination. And in it all that you may hold tenderly what has been and what is yet to be with the wisdom that was planted within you.

We are all counting on you.

This morning I began the ritual of ‘putting up’. Putting up was a term I remember hearing from my childhood. Women dressed in aprons stood sentry in hot, humid kitchens to can or freeze summer’s fruits and vegetables. They were ‘putting up’ the gifts of warm weather for the colder weather that was inevitable. My southern Ohio childhood did bring a winter of sorts but nothing like the Minnesota cold I have come to know as a transplant. The joy that a jar of strawberry jam or cling peaches can bring in the bleakness of January is not to be under estimated.

This particular day was all about strawberries. Early this morning,my husband and I joined people of all ages as we picked some of the final strawberries of the season. The red, juicy berries are now cleaned and bagged and have found a home in our freezer until the right moment when I will pull them out to bring color and sweetness to a cold winter day. These gifts of June will create an experience of time travel in which, not only will the berries be enjoyed, but the also a retelling of the story the other pickers. The Hmong women covered head to toe in a variety of prints to protect them from the sun. The lone man in the yellow muscle shirt who looked like he should be riding a Harley instead of picking strawberries. The older gentleman,none too pleased with what he thought were slim pickin’ for berries, who shared his story of being a retired church organist who once made his home in Stockholm, Wisconsin. Will it be possible to eat the berries in January without remembering those with whom we began our ‘putting up’?

As I think about it these last few days for me have all been about putting up. I have spent the last several days at the family cabin in northern Wisconsin to celebrate the 4th of July. It has been a tradition for more than 20 years and the days have, over the years, been made up of many configurations of people.Some of us have remained constant. Our children have brought different friends over the years and this year are old enough to not need that extra playmate to keep them happy. A book, a boat, the lake itself seems to suffice. The children of the lake neighbors have now grown, married and have children of their own. Each year is a little different but still very much the same. The joy of arrival. The simplicity of cabin life. Boat rides. Late night dinners. The July 4th flea market where there is never anything new. (But, truth be told, we wouldn’t have it any other way.) The small town parade with the fire engines, local camp floats, and the same clown as every year.

In a sense, when many of us gather together every summer in whatever we have created as traditions, we mentally ‘put up’ morsels of memory for the coming winter times in our lives, those times which can seem cold and unkind. Along with the harvest of our gardens, summer is also about storing up stories and images to reflect on and warm us in the winters that will surely come. In the scriptures Jesus actually warns against storing up things on earth where ‘moth and rust consume and where thieves break in and steal’. Instead he encourages us to ‘store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.’

As I read that scripture, I believe the putting up of the gifts of Creation to be a heavenly treasure, one that fills us with awe and connection to the Creator who breathed us into being and promised to feed us from the Earth. With each jar of brilliant red berries and each long, lovely green bean we once again renew our covenant to be caretakers of the Earth. With each experience of a sun kissed morning or the sound of children’s laughter wafting over the lake, we are reminded of the awesome blessing that is summer Sabbath. As the loon calls hauntingly and the eagle dips into clear, shining waters, we can recommit to glimpsing heaven on earth which is, after all, a part of our life’s work. The configuration of the people may change but much will always stay the same. It is the way of life.

I am thankful for all that has been ‘put up’ over the last few days. These gifts of summer will go a long way on a frigid, February night. And so they should.

What are the gifts of summer you will be putting up?

Blessed be.

As I was preparing dinner last night, a report on the nightly news caught my attention. Apparently, yesterday in the midst of a busy day at New York’s JFK airport, air traffic on some runways was halted due, not to threats of terrorism, but to the presence of turtles. Terrapins, to be exact. It seems the turtles are making their way across certain runways in pursuit of laying their eggs in the sand of Jamaica Bay which borders the airport. It also seems this is a yearly activity that has often played havoc with the comings and goings of jumbo jets and the pilots who fly them. It was fascinating to listen to the air traffic controllers and pilots report to one another the progress of the lumbering turtles while they waited to take to the air headed toward far flung places around the world. To hear the humor and compassion in their voices was really quite remarkable.

For some reason it reminded me of my pilgrimage last year on the island of Iona. Before we began what was to be our three and a half hour walk around the holy sites that dot the lovely isle, our guide reminded us:” Remember. On pilgrimage we travel at the pace of the slowest pilgrim.” I watched as anxiety flashed across a few faces. Some in our group were quite fit and perhaps had seen this walk as exercise for the muscles and heart as well as the soul. But with the intention clearly stated, we journeyed on together, each of learning to match our rhythm to one another until we became, not individuals, but a community of pilgrims. The walk actually took us nearly twice the time we had planned but no one minded because we had come to know ourselves as now intricately woven together on this journey.

Thinking of the turtles and the wisdom gained in this pilgrimage experience, I pondered how often we forget about those who travel more slowly than our own pace. It becomes so easy to walk over or at least around them. I also thought about how often these days it seems we hold so little value for the sometimes smaller, more vulnerable around us. For those who live on the edges of our society, those who need the care and attention of all who are stronger and have more resources. It becomes easy to push ahead with our powerful force ignoring all that is in our way. We do this in a physical way sometimes but mostly we do it with how we organize our common life together as neighborhoods, as cities, as nations.

The terrapins who are making their way across runways and past enormous metal people-movers, do so for one reason: to bring life to the world. What endeavor is more noble, more holy than that? And so, for all the pilots, the baggage handlers, and the controllers who watched these slow moving beings make their own pilgrimage in the busiest airport in our country, I offer thanks. Thanks for your patience and self-control. Thanks for your compassion and humor. Thanks for remembering that on this pilgrimage we call life, it is always a right and good thing, to travel at the pace of the slowest pilgrim.

When we do, we are often offered the promise of new life.

There is a time between sleep and waking when dreams seem more vivid and the images planted in your resting brain become etched in profound ways. This is the time when you are not quite asleep and not quite awake, the time when you struggle to remember what day it is and where you are. It must be,in the Celtic tradition,a thin place of sorts, that place where this world and eternity coexist.

I had an experience of this in-between land this morning that I am still gently wrestling with. In the span of time between being unconscious and conscious, I heard this voice in my head:” Pour out your heart.” I tried to come up from the darkened waters of sleep to connect these words with a dream I had been having, tried to attach the voice to some unknown being that played a part,opposite my own, in a nighttime drama. But I could not recollect any story that had been playing out in my sleep. Only the words: “Pour out your heart.” The words seemed so significant that I even repeated them out loud to myself so I would not forget.

And now this message has been following me about all day. Pour out your heart. What could it possibly mean? Pour out on what, to whom? What exactly am I supposed to be pouring from my heart? Compassion? Love? Empathy? I have to admit to feeling a little like the Kevin Costner character in ‘Field of Dreams’ who kept hearing the voice saying ‘build it and they will come’. He proceeded to plow over his Iowa cornfields and build a baseball diamond where dead but heavenly players came to play the game they had loved in life. But ‘pour out your heart’ is a little less concrete than Kevin’s baseball message. There is little direction other than the message itself.

But a good message it is. How could I go wrong pouring out my heart into every action I take? My work. My home. My family. My friendships. All the many things about which I feel passionate.There are also the small seemingly unimportant acts that make up each and every day. Buttering toast. Drinking coffee. Loading the dishwasher. Making the bed. Passing a stranger on the street. Setting the dinner table and eating with intentional gratitude. What about pouring heart into all that?

I have no idea why or how this message came to me. But it has given me much to ponder and consider on what could have been an ordinary Wednesday. But then again, if we pour our hearts into each day, can there even be such a thing as ordinary?

Minnesota writer Robert Bly has translated a poem of Antonio Machado. It ends with the lines:
“Last night as I was sleeping,
I dreamt- marvelous error!-
that a fiery sun was giving
light inside my heart.
It was fiery because I felt
warmth as from a hearth,
and sun because it gave light
and brought tears to my eyes.
Last night as I slept,
I dreamt-marvelous error!-
that it was God I had
here inside my heart.”

What a gift it was to have an early morning message that has so filled my day. With questions, with longing, with humor and hope and, even, with God.