Month: October 2014

loving what really is

Minding our thoughts and protecting the world around us from their darker shades of grey is an essential tool in bringing peace to our world, person by person, family by family, team by team and church by church. As we continue the work we have begun in the recent Dream...

from our window

Lord, I stand at my window and wait for you with basil in the window-box I dream of the farm I do not have. With a small place to live I dream of the mountain retreat I do not have. In the darknesses of my little rooms I dream of...

He can smell your neck

Jesus used real-life metaphors to teach us how to live the spiritual life.  He spoke of wine and bread, wheat and coins, seeds and harvests.  He so often said "The Kingdom of God is like…" and then launched into something which had much more to do with farming than church....

brooding between breaths

When we breath in and out, there is a space between those two events.  That space seems to me to be connected to that great myth-moment in which God brooded over the wildness of the planet in our Hebrew creation story.  My dog Kai broods over me often these days....

death

This is the lid of one of the funeral urns I am making for a show at Edge Gallery next month.  The vessel holds cremains (the remains from cremation - c-remains)  until they can be disposed of in the earth. In our liturgy we say, ashes to ashes and dust...

breath

The elephant with whom I lived in Thailand taught me more than any living sentient being on the planet. I have liked most of my teachers and tried to love them all, but this one changed me more than the rest combined.  She was kindness enfleshed and in that way,...

beauty safari

An orchid, resting on a bed of ice is beautiful. The softness of the petals and the hardness of the ice; along with the one thing they have so much in common - transience - is gorgeous. It is impossible to underestimate the importance of beauty.  John O'Donohue reminds us...

Mary and Martha

When Jesus encounters Mary and Martha, the house is busy.  Mary sits at Jesus’ feet while Martha is busy in the kitchen trying to get food prepared for the many guests who have come to hear the Teacher speak words they want and need to hear. It is easy for...

rest

  Today is a day for Sabbath-making.  Lunch will be a cacao e pepe in a Parmesan bowl with a glass of red wine and some home-made pickles. This simple dish is merely a matter of making some pasta, tossing it in some of the pasta water with a good...

Wild Geese and the Holy Spirit

The Holy Spirit is wild. I love that the celtic church called her "The Wild Goose."   I have seen wild gooses and I get it!  I can see why their great celtic spiritual depth, born out of suffering and intimacy - femininity and earthiness-  was able to show them that...