"Summer is the time when one sheds one's tensions with one's clothes, and the right kind of day is jeweled balm for the battered spirit.  A few of those days and you can become drunk with the belief that all's right with the world."  ~Ada Louise Huxtable

This morning as I walked out the door I detected the faint scent of fall in the air. I shook the thought and smell out of my head. It is too soon to be turning the corner toward autumn. There are still too many things to do to savor the gifts of summer. I have not picked raspberries yet, or blueberries. I have not seen the North Shore in its summer finery. I have not had nearly enough ice cream cones or watermelon or red, juicy tomatoes. There is still too much to squeeze out of these precious days.

Summer is a time of opportunity. A time to try new things, master a new skill. Like the person inside a house I walked by on my walk today. The sounds of novice drumming filled the air. Bang! Crash! Ta-dum-ta-dum! All in broken, tentative rhythm. For this person it must be the 'summer of learning to play the drums.' I was reminded of the different summer goals I've set for myself over the years: learn to sew, do a swan dive,drive a car, read all the Nancy Drew mysteries, twirl a fire baton, learn the hula-hoop. Hour after warm hour I remember working to perfect these new skills that require the leisurely time only summer can provide. Do you remember similar things from your own childhood or adolescence? 

Further along on my walk, I was greeted by a cheery "Hi!" Two fresh faced four year old girls were lining up a croquet set and a bag of tennis balls at the edge of the front porch. "Guess what?" the one with Pippi Longstocking braids asked. "We get to have a picnic tonight. We get to decorate the table and we are planning all the games." I had never seen these two girls before  in my life and yet  they talked animatedly about the summer fun they were preparing. One girl had some red, blue and yellow face paint that had now merged with her sweaty, little skin giving her face the appearance of a melting rainbow. They beamed their excitement and anticipation of tonight's festivities toward me. For them, it could be their 'summer of planning parties.' 

Today marks nearly the middle of July, a midsummer marker of sorts. There is still time to set a summer goal. What might you use these warm and long days to accomplish? Is it time to dust off the piano keys or pick up the guitar again? Has your bicycle been out of the garage yet? Have you always wanted to enter something in the State Fair? (There's still time!) Or what about that monstrous novel you've been wanting to read(or write) forever?

There's no time like the middle of July to grab summer by the horns and fulfill a long held dream. Come September the drummer down the street may be in band. What goal would you like to accomplish in what's left of summer?

Happiness. I have been thinking alot about happiness lately. I have even been asking people if they are happy. Try it some time. You get surprising results. I am not sure what prompted this examination of happiness. Perhaps it was the recognition that I don't, perhaps, laugh as much as I once did. It was an odd discovery about oneself. I think of myself as happy most of the time. But when I realized that, in truth, I do not laugh as often as I once did, it was a kind of wake up call. So, I have been doing a personal survey of happiness.

"Happiness grows only in the sweet soil of time." writes Wayne Muller in his book Sabbath. "As our time is eaten away by speed and overwork, we are less available to be surprised by joy, a sunset, a kind word, an unplanned game of tag with a child, a warm loaf of bread from the oven. But for all our striving and accomplishments, our underlying need for happiness does not withdraw and disappear. So we pursue happiness on the run, tying to make our lives more and more efficient, squeezing every task into tighter increments, hoping to somehow 'get' our happiness when we are able to fit it in." That pretty much sums up my daily life. How about yours? 

Yesterday I was zooming through a neighborhood in St. Paul when a lawn sign caught my eye. "What if there is more to life?" the sign read. I nearly threw on my brakes, hoping to read the smaller print that lay below the large, bold letters of this compelling question. What could this possibly be an advertisement for? Who would put this sign on their lawn? I looked for others like it as I sped along, hoping it was some kind of neighborhood conspiracy to wake us all up to ourselves. What if there is MORE to life? And just what is 'more'?

Well, I suppose everyone would answer the 'more' question differently. For some, more is knowing they have enough food to feed their children and the money to pay their rent.  But I think the source of this question is more existential than that. I have a feeling it ties back into my own happiness question. What does it mean to live a life well, one that brings happiness? What does it mean for you? 

It is said that the Buddha equated the spiritual life with a life of happiness. He was often known to offer blessings of loving kindness with the words "May you be happy." Oddly enough,on the 4th of July I happened upon a copy of the Declaration of Independence and read the words written by those who dreamed our country into being, lifting high the goal of 'the pursuit of happiness.' Our very existence as citizens of this country was shaped by the notion of happiness.

These warm summer days can provide time for ruminating over many things. What better thing to allow our minds to roll around in than the state of happiness? Are you happy? Are you making room for happiness to walk in and ask you to dance, to make you laugh? If you, too, have been considering your own happiness, I invite you to join me in the pursuit of this spiritual life. And may our searching contain a few good belly laughs. 

May your weekend be filled with laughter……..

"You are the future, the immense morning sky
turning red over the prairies of eternity.
You are the rooster-crow after the night of time,
the dew, the early devotions, and the Daughter,
the Guest, the Ancient Mother, and Death.

You are the shape that changes its own shape,
that climbs out of fate, towering,
that which is never shouted for, and never mourned for,
and no more explored than a savage wood.

You are the meaning deepest inside things,
that never reveals the secret of its owner.
And how you look depends on where we are:
from a boat you are shore, from the shore a boat.
~Rainer Maria Rilke

Last week I found myself, once again, involved in a conversation about the use of inclusive language for God. I have been at this 'church stuff' for a lot of years and, I have to admit, this is one of those conversations I thought would be over by now. And yet, the issues are so complex and so rooted in tradition and power that it continues to be revisited with regularity. Which is, I have to admit, a good thing. Our scriptures, written at a certain time, and our hymns, written at still  other times, are laden with male images for God, a fact that has led to a fairly narrow way of imagining and addressing God. And yet none are exclusively so. The Bible is full of other beautiful images: potter, eagle, mother, even El Shaddai meaning 'mighty-breasted-mountain'. 

And so the next day after this conversation, when I ran across this poem by Rainer Maria Rilke, using such compelling words to describe the Sacred, I was heartened. Future. Immense Morning Sky. Dew. Daughter. Guest. So many images and words to describe the way God moves in our lives! Why would we ever want to limit ourselves? But my favorite line of all is:  'And how you look depends on where we are:from a boat you are shore, from the shore a boat.'

Such truth. How we describe the movement of God is tempered by where we are from, what our life experiences are, how much searching we have done, and what it is we believe we have found. As we struggle with our faith and life's challenges, our words expand and contract to fit our experience. As our hearts are flooded with joy and amazing gifts, they change shape once again. If we are in the boat, the Holy may be the welcoming port of our arrival. If we are on the shore, God provides a beacon of light and protection on the stormy sea.

The danger in creating too small a dictionary  of names for God is, not only idolatry, but the creation of too narrow a stage on which the Holy can play. This small arena soon leads to our own narrowness. And wouldn't it be a shame if we missed an opportunity for a new, fresh, and inspired experience of God? One of the exercises I have used for expanding my vocabulary about God is to simply say,"God is like ___________________ because_____________." After filling in the blanks, it becomes a kind of game, one in which I am on the shore sometimes, and in the boat still other times.

What are your ways of speaking about God? How do you name the Holy One's movement in your life? These summer days are ripe for creativity. I invite you to take stock of the many ways you name God. Stand on the shore. Or get in the boat. What might you discover……about yourself and about the One who made you?

t 

"Friend, please tell me what I can do about this mud world I keep spinning out of myself!"
~Kabir

There are times in our lives that are simply filled with greater clarity.There are the days that flow out just as planned, one foot in front of the other, all the order imagined takes shape and, there you have it, a perfect plan, perfectly executed. When we are in these times of smooth going, it can seem as if we are on top of the world. It is very easy to become prideful about how organized and together we are, turning our faces away from the Humpty Dumpty we all fear we are. 

But more days, I believe, are like the ones the ancient mystic Kabir speaks of: mud pies that spin out of our center. These are the days that find us waking up fuzzy-headed without a clear sense of  which side of the bed is the best to begin our daily walk. Trying to shake the cobwebs free from the night's sleep we stumble into yet another seemingly futile journey of seconds, minutes, hours until we fall back into the bed we crawled out of earlier. What happened in the in-between hours? What muddy mess did I make? Or was I so busy squishing through the mess of yesterday that I never got to today's muddy laundry?

It has been my experience that these mud world times are really not the mess they may appear to be. Instead, the days when my 'mud world comes spinning out of myself' are the days where creativity is happening though I am usually oblivious to it. While I'm spinning, there are greater powers at work that are planting ideas, song fragments, little poems, and all manner of creative ideas into the muddy, moving mess of my life. It can feel discombobulating but if I hold on gently enough, I arrive at some new place, almost always a better place, equipped with something brand new. This new place is not one that could have happened if I'd made neat rows, stacked things in increasing order of size, lined other things in drawers. This new place had to make its way through the chaos of creativity,the over-flowing drawers,into mud worlds, through spinning, to arrive, to be born.

We should know from our origin story, Genesis, that creativity is born out of chaos. Out of spinning fragments of light and dark. Through spiraling globs of mud and splashes of sea. Until stars were born. And moons. And suns. And things that creep and crawl and walk and fly. Until those of us created in the image of the One who breathed it all into being would get to live out creation every minute, every hour, every day. 

So that's what we are doing with this mud world that spins out from each of us. We are helping create the world anew. Day after day after day.  What a life!

I am busy packing up the car to head north for the Fourth of July. It seems impossible that this holiday, so central to summer, is here already. I will spend it, as I have for over 25 years, with family and dear friends at the cabin in northern Wisconsin. It is a holiday with many rituals that have changed and shifted over the years and this year will bring, yet more, changes. For many years our boys brought friends and the neighboring cabin owner's nephews also were present. We lovingly referred to them as 'the boys of summer'. These 'boys' are now, for the most part, men. Some will be present while others will spend their time with other friends, no longer a part of the ritual that held us together for so many summers.  Instead girlfriends are now involved and there are those waiting the birth of babies and even one little one for us all to adore. The Princess of the Lake.

This is one of those holidays that means very different things to different people. For some it is the patriotism of the celebration of our country's freedom. For others it is the true height of all that spells summer: lakes, boats, ice cream, parades, lightly sunburned skin, walk-around foods and eating outside. For still  others it is simply a few days to pull away from the office to try to soak up the freedom known primarily by those younger that sixteen. And of course, there are fireworks. Those completely indulgent, slightly dangerous, displays of oohs and ahhs.

Whatever your experience of this holiday, it is one of those days that binds us together as Americans. It is the day when even the least patriotic rustles through their bureau drawer to find something red, white and blue to wear. It is the day when we all stand at attention when our veterans march by. Most of us cannot know what they have known and so the only response that seems appropriate is our feet on the ground, our eyes on them, signaling our honor, silently offering our thanks. We watch the children, freckles emerging with each passing moment, their faces smiling as they lick ice cream cones or run for the candy thrown in the parade. Every small town across the country hauls out its fire engines and police cars, shines them up and turns the siren on as loud as possible to the delight of the children as they move along the parade route. Queens wave from the backs of convertibles as we herald the many festivals that will flow out from this signature holiday that celebrates such things as strawberries, apples, lumberjacks, and, in Wisconsin, even cow-pies. 

At some point we might look around at the color, the smiling faces and the sheer frivolity of it all and realize we have forgotten any worries we had. We might even have relaxed into a nonproductive moment, simply being. And wouldn't that be wonderful?

What ever our experience of this mid-summer delight, it is surely a time to remember that we live in a beautiful, blessed country and to give our thanks.

"The wind blows where is chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit." John 3:8

We have a very interesting set of circumstances happening in our church sanctuary. Over the past two weeks, and for yet another one to come, there is a large crane that has been moved in to facilitate cleaning the stonework. Still tarnished by the old coal dust and years of use, dirt and other debris, this is the summer of cleaning. The crane's presence has also necessitated the movement of pews and a general appearance of 'fruit basket upset' in the normally ordered space. This past Sunday all the pews on one side of the church were scrunched together in a picture that looked somewhat more like moving day than a place for worship. Yellow caution tape was strung across doors to keep people from getting into certain doors where the sanctuary seating was rendered unusable.

Most people have been patient and gracious during this process knowing that it won't last long and that the outcome will be worth it. Still, I had to think about what a wonderful metaphor it was for the spiritual journey. Like most churches, people here have their 'regular' pew in which they take up residence each Sunday morning. Sometimes this pew has been 'theirs' for decades, perhaps even passed down from the time they were children and their family sat there. Now none of this is formalized, of course, but just try sitting in their pew and find out what happens! In some ways it would be much easier if we employed the nameplates I've seen in British churches where the family name is printed on a plaque and placed in the pew so as to warn any interlopers. What this all says about hospitality and welcome to guests boggles the mind.

But this past Sunday, most people from a particular section had to move to 'the other side'. What to do? Where to sit? I was not in the sanctuary to see the jockeying about but I am told all went well. I wonder if those who were sitting in an unfamiliar seat had a different experience of the hymns sung, the scripture read. How did the sermon sound from a different pew? Was prayer deeper on the other side of the room? I wonder if people met folks they haven't before or if they recognized someone they hadn't seen in years. I'm sure the stories will be told over the next few weeks that will illuminate these questions.

The spiritual life is full of pew changing, I believe. Sometimes we have taken our place in a seat that has become comfortable, easy to see from, hear from and then comfort leads to complacency. It might be just that time that the Spirit blows through our lives and we are moved to see and hear things from a different perspective, a more challenging or enlivening viewpoint. The Spirit's blowing can also cause us to leave our seats altogether for awhile. Take a break from what's familiar and seek out other traditions or no tradition. Sitting in faith in the same place can sometimes be a wonderful thing and other times can bring a sense of longing, of loss, of a deadness that wants to be reborn.

At the end of next week, the pews will be returned to their normal places. The crane will be removed and, what looked messy and upset, will be orderly once again. It is my hope that those who were displaced this past week might continue to move around the sanctuary looking for new perspectives on their worship life. Like Goldilocks looking for the perfect chair, perhaps some will move from place to place and realize that each section has gifts to offer and that what they thought was the perfect spot really doesn't exist. So it is with the spiritual journey. And in that moving that was forced by cranes and cleaning, perhaps new friendships will be forged as people meet and decide they not only like sitting near one another but that a cup of coffee together, or even dinner, might be equally as great. 

Sometimes the Spirit works in mysterious ways. A screwdriver. A crane. Some rags and buckets of soapy water. Who knows where it will all lead? 

"Taoist philosopher Lao Tzu said:"The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step." Right now, said journey feels more like 50 thousand miles. And still the work is the same: one step at a time." 

What to do with a morning that begins with a horoscope like this? That is my day's quest. When I read this daily, sage advice, I laughed out loud. The blending of the wisdom of Buddhist teaching and the guidance of the stars tickled my funny bone. But within a few minutes it brought me to a deeper place. What journey am I on right now? In my life. In my work. This year. This day. What about your journey? Where is your journey taking you?

The metaphor of journey is so rich. I do think about it often and yet I am not sure I truly live with the powerful gift of it. It is so easy to get up every morning and plan a day in which much may be 'accomplished' but few miles are traveled. Days can be frittered away, checking off the little details that nag at any life. But what about the journey? Has the first step even been taken? Or in the accomplishments, is the movement more stationary than forward? 

This stepping out is so much easier to recognize in others than it is in oneself. It is so easy to look at someone else and ascertain whether or not you think they are making steps on their journey. I can give all kinds of opinions about choices people are, or are not, making that will move them on their path. It is not so easy, or comfortable, to always be as honest with myself. The excuses come much more easily about what is keeping me from taking that important first step.

So, receiving this free, guiding advice via the morning paper has brought me up short, has thrown the mirror toward my own waiting face. Like most people, I have a few deep desires that fall into the 'some day' category. 'Some day', I'll finish that manuscript. 'Some day', I'll lose those extra pounds. 'Some day', I'll mend that wounded relationship. Some day….some day….some day…..

What are your 'some days'? What journey is asking one step from you? Given the fragility of each precious day, perhaps today is the one on which to take the first, important step. As always, I am happy to share my horoscope with anyone who thinks it fits their journey on this 'one day at a time' life.  It sure spoke to mine.

vigil: a purposeful or watchful staying awake during the usual hours of sleep; a watch kept; the evening or day before a festival, or the devotional services held then…..Webster's New World College Dictionary

The word 'vigil' has been floating through my brain for the last 24 hours. I had the privilege yesterday of sitting vigil with a family whose loved one is teetering between this earthly life and the next. The silence, the prayers, the scriptures spoken, the stories told, the tears and the laughter, all created a nest in which the dying one was held. Each of us represented a twig, a piece of grass, a feather that created this nest that was bound together with unspoken love. We sat suspended in time, keeping watch, full of devotion. It was a holy time in which the presence of the Sacred breathed with us.

Vigil. It is not a word we use often. And yet we have all, at one time or another held vigil or have been held in vigil. Anyone who is a parent has probably spent more than one night at the bedside of a sick child. As we kept watch, we have mopped their feverish brow with a cold cloth, told stories to keep them calm and comforted, held cups of cool water to quench their thirst. As adults we can probably remember when we were younger, coming home after having been out too late, to find a parent sitting quietly on the couch, the television blinking in the darkness. Someone had sat a vigil of protection over our lives that night, having devoted their lives to watching over ours. 

Many gardeners are, right now, sitting a kind of vigil over the plants they put into the ground earlier this spring. With watchful eyes and hopeful palates, they wait for tomatoes, green beans, corn, raspberries. While the work of weeding and watering gives the human something to do, the vigil kept is about being in some kind of relationship with the living green things that will nurture human bodies. The vigil is really about nurturing the soul.

I imagine those who have relatives serving our country keep vigil. Watching the news, listening for reports of the areas in which they know their loved ones to be. Perhaps they keep a photo of their father, mother, child, sister, or brother in a special place. Perhaps they even create an altar with a vigil light that is lit in an effort of protection and filled with prayers. It is a vigil that is filled with love, fear, and great hope.

Still others I know have sat vigil over a pet that is old, ill and dying. I remember one September night five years ago as our son and I kept vigil over the family dog who had begun to have seizures. We knew in our hearts that he was dying but we didn't want to believe it. And so we lay on the floor on each side of him, reaching out our hands when another uncontrollable contraction of muscles gripped his furry, loved body. It was one of the sweetest, saddest nights of devotion, of keeping watch, I can remember. 

For what have you kept vigil? Who has kept vigil over you? Though it is a word that seems old, from another time, its action is necessary for the on-going relationships we all hold. And may it always be so.

Have a blessed weekend…….. 

"In each of us dwells a pilgrim. It is the part of us that longs to have direct contact with the sacred. We will travel halfway around the world and endure great sacrifices and pain to enter the sanctuary, whether it is a temple, shrine, cemetery, or library. This is the way that is no way, but a practice." Phil Cousineau, The Art of Pilgrimage

Yesterday I sat with my co-workers in our monthly meeting dedicated to stopping whatever we are doing and taking the time to share a treat, some time together and a few laughs in the midst of a busy work schedule. In addition to the fine chocolate and key lime pie yesterday, we shared memories of what we did in the summer as children. Since we all come from different parts of the country and span a few generations, it was fun to hear what those important summer rituals were. Bike riding. Swimming. Working on our tan.(We are wiser now.) Special resorts returned to summer after summer. Camps. Catching fireflies. Spending time with cousins, siblings and friends in a much more relaxed way and the freedom all that holds.

As I listened to those around the table tell of their summer escapades, I began to notice the ways in which their faces lit up. Smiles turned into glows. Wrinkles smoothed as faces took on the younger look of the story being told. Each face told the gift of a summer practice…..that breathing deeply, slowing down, openness of the walk of June, July & August. What was your summer childhood like? Can you remember the way the rhythm of the days changed from the structure of school to the laziness of going from pajamas to swim suit? If you don't have a vacation coming any time soon, I highly recommend the practice of remembering those summer days of running through the sprinkler, of sliding till your stomach hurt on the slip-n-slide as you wrecked the grass in your yard. Remember and tell some one.

I am not sure summers hold this kind of all out freedom they once did. We are so plugged in, so tied to work that many of us have created equally programmed lives for children. My children certainly enjoyed the camps and classes they took in the summer, the sports that shaped their days. But they also loved those times when the house heated up and the only sensible thing to do was head to the basement, turn the lights low, watch a movie, read a book, eat a popsicle and have the opportunity to drift off into a nap. Sounds good, doesn't it?

These warm, short nights, I can still hear the kids on our block playing baseball down the street. Many of them have been riding their bikes all over, hoping to find a little something to do at a friend's house or at the local coffee shop. When I see them, they have a very similar look on their faces as my co-workers did yesterday. Boredom with summer has not yet set it, but it will eventually. Right now, however, the muscles of school-focused faces are relaxed and their eyes are full of light and a certain kind of joy. I witnessed that yesterday as memories were shared.

Summer can be a pilgrimage. We can choose to walk in the way that is no way. With an openness to the gifts of sun, heat, light and enormous doses of green and color, we can change the rhythm of our living, creating a summer practice.. Sound good? No matter the enormity of the work that needs done, each of us can take a few moments to breathe deeply of the pure gift that is a summer's day. 

Ready. Set. Glow. 

If you were awake this morning at 6:28 a.m. you could have welcomed the beginning of summer. Today we will experience the day of longest light and the night of shortest darkness. For years this was something that went unnoticed to me. But now that the marking of this day has become a part of my yearly celebrations, I wonder at how this honoring slipped out of favor with, not only people of faith, but the majority of people in general. It is clear that for several hundreds of years, a celebration of the longest day and longest night, Summer and Winter Solstice, was something that was important to people.It was how they knew that life was continuing and that their God was at work. This was true especially to those who lived further from the equator where the extremes of light and darkness is so pronounced. Since the metaphors of light and darkness are so prevalent in the scriptures, it seems logical to me that marking these turning-points of the year would be important. 

The Welsh poet Thomas Telynog Evans writes:

All the sweetness of nature was buried in black winter's grave,

and the wind sings a sad lament with its cold plaintive cry,

but oh, the teeming summer will come bringing life in its arms,

and will strew rosy flowers on the face of hill and dale.

In lovely harmony the wood has put on its green mantle,

and summer is on its throne, playing its string-music;

the willow, whose harp hung silent when it was withered in winter,

now gives forth its melody.

Hush! Listen! The world is alive!

Today is a day to celebrate the mysterious and awe-producing ways our Creator God moves in the world……bringing the sad laments of black winter out of the grave and continues to bring life, held in the arms of teeming summer. How could we, how should we, miss the opportunity for praise at such a magnificent wonder? Those who once lived closer to the rhythms of the earth knew something we, in our concrete jungles and technological lifestyles, have forgotten: This world is a magnificent on-going creation of which we are only a small part. 

But make no mistake, our part is very important. We are the witnesses. We are the ones who tell the stories and prepare the next generation of storytellers and dreamers. If we take our role seriously we can recapture the habit of stopping our spinning lifestyles  long enough to notice the seasons changing, the play of light on the shadows we cast on this longest day. We can say our prayers quickly and purposefully on this shortest of all nights.

Hush! Listen! The world is alive!