A Rule of Life

As we approach the end of Lent, and the beginning of Holy Week, a question may rise in your mind, “What next?” Whether you have given up some food item or bad habit, or taken on additional activities such as prayer, Bible reading, or service as part of your Lenten journey, how do you feel about all of that ending on Easter?

• Relief – “now I can eat what I want!” 
• Satisfaction – “This has been a good time: I am glad to have done it and I am glad it is coming to an end.”
• Guilt – “Another year when I have failed to live up to my resolutions.” 
• Hope – “This has been a great experience, and I want to keep doing something, maybe more or maybe less, to build upon what I have done. Perhaps I can start doing this regularly? 

There is a way to continue on the journey begun this Lent; define and commit to your own Rule of Life. That phrase, “Rule of Life” is not intended to seem daunting and rigid. It has roots over 1500 years ago in the Rule of Benedict written for one of the earliest monastic communities. The Rule provides guidelines for how to live together, worship God, and minister to their neighbors. Middleham and St. Peter’s own Daughters of the King is a contemporary branch of the tree that has grown from Benedict’s roots.

Like a trellis that supports a rose or a grape vine, your Rule of Life can help you become more intentional about how you shape your time and your relationships. Because you write a Rule to address the specific circumstances and issues in your life, it provides a way to stay on track and to remember what is important. When your life changes, you change your rule to reflect the new situation.

In How do I create a Rule of Life? The Rev. Jay Rozendaal, provides a place to start. He notes that there are many things that you already do that would be a part of your Rule of Life, such as regular times for prayer and worship, community service projects, family activities or workouts at the gym. Starting with what you already do may be surprising and encouraging. When considering what else to add, he notes:

It should be do-able (do not set yourself up to fail) but not superficial (do not just take an easy way out); it should be a commitment but not a straitjacket. 

If you are intrigued by the Benedictine perspective, I recommend the workbook Creating a Rule of Life by the Community of Reconciliation at the National Cathedral. It includes a series of areas to consider, several sample Rules, and additional resources. Since that particular community is based in Washington, DC, you could also attend their weekly, monthly or special events. If you want to read a book, At Home in the World: A Rule of Life for the Rest of Us by Margaret Guenther is excellent.

Not everyone is interested or in a life situation that supports this kind of commitment. But for some, it is a useful tool.

I invite you to take a moment, pray to God for guidance, then be quiet for a minute or two. Close the silence by saying aloud “Amen.”

Whether you want to commit to a Rule of Life may not happen right away. Nothing may happen in the time of silence. Whether or not something happens really doesn’t matter. What matters is that you have set aside some time to open yourself to God. At root, that is what any Rule of Life is about; for those who have adopted a Rule of Life, it is one way to continually open themselves to God.

Bruce Calvin

Be Still and Know that I am God

When I am trying to pray or meditate, but my “monkey mind” is jumping around and I am unable to become centered, or when I am particularly anxious about something, I practice this very simple meditation on Psalm 46:10, “Be still, and know that I am God!”

The form of meditation is to take slow, deep breaths while repeating the entire verse once; then – continuing to breathe slowly and deeply – repeat the verse by phrases as follows, pausing as long as you wish between each phrase to let it sink in.

               Be still, and know that I am God.

                      Be still, and know that I am.

                              Be still, and know that.

                                    Be still, and know.

                                                    Be still.

                                                          Be.

I repeat this process as many times as I need to until I feel more calm and centered, and my mind and heart feel more spacious and open to receiving God’s presence. Different phrases speak to me at different times. Often it’s “Be still”, or “Be”. This morning, as I was feeling anxious about what is happening in the world and in my own life, the phrases were, “Be still, and know that I am. Be still, and know that. Be still, and know.” I emerged calmer, more centered, and deeply grateful.

You may want to try this meditation and see what emerges for you.

Nancy Warren

Forward Day by Day

If you looking for an easy-to-use way to take a few minutes everyday to read some scripture, read a short commentary, and pray, Forward Movement Publications has several formats that you can use. This company

is an official, non-profit agency whose mission is to reinvigorate the Episcopal Church day by day. Since 1935 we have published the quarterly devotional Forward Day by Day, as well as pamphlets, booklets, and books that encourage and nourish people in their lives of prayer and faith.

Forward Day by Day is a small booklet which is available at all of the worship locations in the parish at no cost.  Each day it lists recommended readings from the Psalms, the Hebrew Scripture, New Testament letters, and Gospel.  There is a short reflection on one verse or short section of one reading exploring the meaning of that passage.  There is also a request to pray for a diocese, program or service related to the Anglican Communion across the globe.  You can use as much, or little, of these materials as you desire or have time.  If you read the all of the scripture passages over a period of three years, you will have read through the Psalms and Gospels several times, and covered significant portions of the Hebrew Scriptures and letters. 

The authors of the scripture reflection change each month, so there is a chance to experience a variety of perspectives and writing styles.  Writers include ordinary people as well as church professionals.  For this month, there is a very powerful writer, described as an

Oklahoma prison inmate who first wrote in these pages in 1998. He was paroled in 2003 and is now working as a substance abuse counselor.

If you prefer an electronic option, you can read Today's Meditation on your computer, friend it on Facebook, follow the Twitter feeds, and soon they will make it available in various mobile platforms.  This is convenient, since you can also access the scripture readings digitally rather than need to carry around your Bible. There is also the option to read and leave your own comments about the reflection of the day on the web page.

There are a variety of other resources provided, including How to Use, a Morning Resolve, and a Prayer Chapel which includes a place to submit a prayer request, light a digital candle, and a library of prayers from the Book of Common Prayer and other sources.

I use the booklet myself to read, mark and inwardly digest scripture everyday, and highly recommend these materials.

Bruce Calvin

Changed by Silence

During a young adult retreat session, one person asked me about the point of meditation and being internally silent. I would paraphrase the question as “What’s the point of turning off my thoughts when I have so much I need to get done?” At the time I found myself inarticulate, fumbling for an answer, knowing that the question is very important.

Another person suggested that it is like pushing the reset button, clearing out the garbage and starting over. That analogy does capture one aspect. A constant stream of thoughts keeps us stuck in one place, limiting our ability to see alternative perspectives or opposing ideas. So by letting go of old thoughts, new ideas and perspectives can emerge. The image is a garden choked with weeds; once the weeds are cleared out and the soil is loosened up, new plants can grow and flourish.

But there is something left of out by that explanation when the spiritual dimension is considered: God. How do the ways we pray crowd out God rather than open up to God? Using that garden metaphor, what might grow up in the soil if we kept cleaning out the weeds? If our prayers are full of our words, chattering on about our concerns, hopes, fears or thanksgiving – all important and valid topics of prayer, I will hasten to add – do we allow God to reach out to us? Changing metaphors, when do we let down the wall of words or open a door in that wall to let God sit with us, be with us, listening for what God may have to say?

Sarah Coakley describes how she was changed by the silence, in her article Prayer as Crucible, in the March 22 issue of Christian Century. Professor Coakley has an impressive resume as an academic and theologian, but risks an intimate glimpse into her spiritual life by explaining she continues to be radically changed by silent prayer. Since there is a strong taboo in the Anglican/Episcopal churches against talking about our individual spiritual life and experiences, much less by an academic theologian, her revelations are powerful. Her experiment in her 20’s with Transcendental Meditation (TM) meant

a seismic shift of seemingly unspeakable proportions began to afflict me. Whatever was going on here was not only "transcendental" but severely real. Clearly I was going to have to make some metaphysical choices, and fast. 

While ancient Christian forms of meditation and silent prayer were yet to be rediscovered, she turned away from TM and stayed within a Christian perspective. She describes the experience of an

extraordinary sense of spiritual and epistemic expansion—of being taken by the hand into a new world of glorious technicolor, in which all one's desires were newly magnetized toward God, all beauty sharpened and intensified. Yet simultaneously all poverty, deprivation and injustice were equally and painfully impressed with new force on my consciousness.

And

Lest this seem like a claim to some special supernatural encounter, I hasten to add that the daily practice of silence itself was usually more like the tedious quotidian discipline of brushing one's teeth than anything else. It was the effects outside prayer . . . that were initially hard to quantify and yet palpably transforming of all my previous theological assumptions. 

So, I would like to thank Professor Coakley for articulating what I could not on that Sunday morning. I am hesitant to recommend her article because her use of the technical language of her academic field makes it a challenge for even a partially trained person like me. I will continue to read, mark, and inwardly digest my copy, and will report back if anything articulate emerges.

Bruce Calvin

Prayer, Walking, and Labyrinths

During the recent Middleham and St. Peter’s young adult and family retreat, I introduced to the adults the spiritual practice of walking prayer. It is a practice I use since I have great difficulty in sitting in one place and meditating. But if I am able to move, to walk while also quieting my thoughts, I find it easier to reduce the constant chatter for longer periods of time. It is even better if I can walk in a labyrinth.

Every month I try to go to the Cathedral Crossroads at the National Cathedral on the last Tuesday evening of the month. Among other activities, they spread out two canvas labyrinths, one in each transept, to allow for prayer through walking. There is always a musician, often a harp and Native American flute player, providing soft music that echoes the length of the nave. Everyone walks in their socks, to protect the canvas pattern from wear and dirt.

Every time is a different experience. Sometimes it is crowded, so we need to share the paths and figure out how to get around each other. Sometimes I am alone, or there are only one or two other persons. At the end of the evening, everyone still in the Cathedral is invited to join in the service of Compline, a corporate closing for the day.

Sometimes, as I walk, I become calmer, less anxious, more able to get on with life when I am done. Letting go of my thoughts helps to let go of negative feelings accumulated over the day. Sometimes, new perspectives or insights will emerge from the quietness. Occasionally I sense a presence that might be the Holy Spirit. Even those all to frequent times when I feel like I didn’t get much out of the walking, I know I need to do it anyway. I cannot predict or control what will happen, but I need to show up and walk if anything is going to happen. That is true of all spiritual practices.

If you have never tried it, my only advice is to ignore whatever anyone says you are supposed to do. Just start walking at whatever pace feels right, and see what happens. Oh, and do try to stay on the path, though I have seen persons make their own path. Many people, like my Mom, never could figure out why anyone would want to do it, though she was willing to try it once. Each person is different.

David and I have been building a garden around a simple five circuit labyrinth in our yard, combining my interests of gardening with labyrinths. The photo on the left is from last May shows the grass paths that run among the flower beds.  Each week you can read about what is blooming and see pictures at Labyrinth by the Bay. If you are ever in the neighborhood, please feel free to stop by and walk the paths with a view of the Bay.

More information about labyrinths can be found at the Grace Cathedral, where the current awareness of use of labyrinths was started by Dr. Lauren Artress.

The Labyrinth Society has a worldwide labyrinth locator, so when you are far from home, you can find a place to walk a labyrinth.

Bruce Calvin 

Food for Thought

How is it that so many of our holidays, religious and otherwise revolve around food? Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year’s, Fourth of July, Easter to name a few, all involve social gathering and eating. Lent, on the other hand, often revolves around not eating. After we gorge ourselves on pancakes and sausages on Shrove Tuesday, we might momentarily feel like not eating for a week. We might even feel we can give up certain foods for forty days. The notion of fasting might even enter our minds.

Jesus considered it. In fact, the Latin name for Lent, Quadragesima, means forty or fortieth, and refers to the forty days Christ spent in the desert, fasting and praying, which is the origin of the Season. We in our humble ways pay tribute to this event during Lent. Most of us don’t truly fast, although that is a term that can be loosely interpreted. Does that mean you can only have water? Does that include eating small meals once or twice a day, or one larger meal at the end of the day? Are we still fasting if we just modify our diet, go meatless, if you will, and eat only vegetables, fruits, seafoods, salads, pastas, and beans? That actually sounds healthy. Hardly a sacrifice.

So what are we doing here? Giving up bad food, eating healthier food, feeling better. Maybe that’s what God intended!

Joan Shisler

Retreats: a break with the usual

This last week, I took a 36 hour retreat at St. Anne’s Hermitage in Smithsburg, Maryland. The time was spent in reading, prayer and walking. Oh yes, also sleeping. I found the time away from my usual routine was a good way to give space to the Holy Spirit to breathe some newness into my heart and soul.

A retreat can be as simple as setting aside an hour or two from your daily routine with the intention of spending it in reflection, prayer, and meditation. The place could be one of your favorite spots in nature or going into a room in your house and shutting the door. It is a time to turn inward through prayer, reading, or meditation and being open to an infusion of God’s grace. A retreat is an ancient form of spirituality going back to the time of Jesus who would regularly draw apart from his ministry for times of quiet and prayer.

Fr.Showers

Using the Daily Examen

We all wonder how, or even if, God is present in our lives, other than those times when we are specifically involved in religious or church activities. Everyday things like attending a meeting at work, loading the dishwasher, or commuting on crowded roads certainly don't feel spiritual.

The Examen is a tool designed by Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Jesuits, to build a spiritual awareness by reflecting on what has happened during the day.  In fact, he thought doing the examen was so important, he required the members of the Society of Jesus to use the examen twice a day: at Noon, and before going to bed at night. 

Rev. Adam Thomas wrote a description how he used a form called the Awareness’ Examen in Encountering the Examen.  The five steps or questions that he considers and writes about in his journal are: Be mindful, Be thankful, Be Humble, Be reflective, Be responsive.

If you want to use the examen, you can simply spend a minute for each step:

1. Open yourself to be aware of God's presence
2. Give thanks for what happened during the day
3. Remember and review the day, noting both the good and the bad
4. Select one event and pray about it
5. Respond to what you have experienced

There are many resources that describe the Examen and provide different versions of the steps on the web.  If you are still looking for something to explore during the remaining days and weeks of Lent, consider this unique form of prayer.

Bruce Calvin

Anglican Prayer Beads

Since early times, people of many different religious traditions have kept track of their prayers to God by using pebbles, beads or a string of knots. In the mid 1980s the Rev. Lynn Bauman blended the Roman Catholic Rosary and the Orthodox Jesus Prayer Rope to create Anglican Prayer beads.

Anglican prayer beads are made up of four sets of 7 beads called “weeks”. The number 7 signifies wholeness and completion. It also represents the 7 days of creation, the 7 seasons of the church year, the 7 sacraments and the 7 days of the temporal week.

Separating the weeks is a single bead called a “cruciform”. These four beads form a cross.

Anglican Prayer beads use a cross instead of the crucifix used in the Roman Catholic Rosary. Separating the cross and the weeks is an “invitatory bead”. This brings the total number of beads to 33 which represent the number of years in Jesus’ earthly life.

Many prayers in the prayer book are easily adapted to the prayer beads but the beads also lend themselves to our own prayers. The King of Peace Episcopal Church provides sample prayers and detailed instructions.

I find praying with the beads helps me to be mindful and quiet and better able to focus my prayers as I work toward a deeper relationship with God.

Leah Rayburn

The Jesus Prayer

There is an ancient prayer with roots in the early church that simply says “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me.” A longer variation is: “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.”

I had read about the prayer many years ago. My first exposure was through The Way of a Pilgrim, written anonymously by a nineteenth century Russian. The book describes how one person incorporated the Jesus Prayer into every moment of his life, developing a practice of unceasing prayer, as Paul wrote in 1 Thessalonians 5: 16-18:

Rejoice always, pray constantly, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. (Revised Standard Version) 

As a prayer rooted within and central to the Eastern branches of the Christian church, it is considered a building block to establishing a life of prayer. One early sixth century writer, John Climacus, recommends the use of the prayer in his Ladder of Divine Ascent. By the way, Climacus was a member of St. Catherine’s monastery in the Sinai desert that David and I visited in January.

It is only within the last few years have I actually tried to use the Jesus Prayer in my own life. I started during a time of deep despair and pain, when I needed something that would stop the churning of destructive thoughts and feelings. By focusing on the words, which carried my pain and my need for mercy, I could often let go of the self judgment and guilt. Inhaling on the first six words, and exhaling on the last words moved me from shallow anxious breathing to slower, deeper breaths. Over and over I would repeat the prayer, because if I stopped, the other negative thoughts would quickly return.

It did make a difference, and has became one of my spiritual practices. Later, I was able to call upon my practice, reciting the Jesus Prayer as I was lying in the Emergency Room waiting for hours until I was finally rolled into surgery to have my appendix removed.

You may want to try it out for yourself. Rather than wait for a time of crisis like I did, recite the prayer to yourself for just a few minutes at first. Certainly no more than five minutes. As that begins to become comfortable, you can lengthen the time, or look for periods when you can pray it while doing something else. It is like yoga or working out in the gym; the more you practice, the more limber and strong your prayer can become.

If you want to learn more, there is a newly released video, Mysteries of the Jesus Prayer: A Pilgrimage to the Heart of an Ancient Spirituality by Norris J. Chumley and John A. McGuckin that explores the places and people who formed and were formed by the Jesus Prayer. I have written a review of it on my other blog Know that I Am. 

Bruce Calvin

The Two Channels of Faith

Every year I read an additional book during Lent, often with designated readings for each day of the season. This year I selected Lent with Evelyn Underhill, edited by G.P. Mellick Belshaw. Underhill (1875-1941) was an English, Anglo-Catholic mystic and retreat leader who still provides guidance to the Christian mystical tradition through her writing.

In one passage from The School of Charity, Underhill describes the “mysterious inner light that glows at the heart of Christianity” as being fed by two different parts, or in her words “channels” of our learning about and understanding that which is Holy.

Along one channel a certain limited knowledge of God and things of God enters the mind. . . . Along the other channel, God Himself comes secretly to the heart, and wakes up that desire and that sense of need which are the cause of prayer.

In a world which tends to focus either on intellectual knowledge or on emotional feeling of/for God, she provides a much needed reminder that there is a place for both the mind and the heart. It took me many years on my faith journey to learn this simple truth of how closely they are tied together.

Underhill continues by pointing to a more challenging reality:

with the deepening of prayer, its patient cultivation there comes – perhaps slowly, perhaps suddenly – the enrichment and enlargement of belief, as we enter into a first-hand communion with the reality who is the object of our faith.

As a reluctant mystic, I have had small glimpses of “the reality who is the object of our faith,” but am far from any first-hand communion. Have you had a sense of God being with you in particular times or situations?

Lent: Not Just About Giving Up Chocolate

I borrow the title for this blog entry from an article from Lubbock Online, the internet home of the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal. It picks up our theme for this blog, questioning the prevalent idea that  giving up something for Lent is what you are "supposed to do."

Incorporating a new practice is becoming increasingly common, said the Rev. Edson Way of St. Christopher’s Episcopal Church. Some people choose to adopt disciplines like Bible study or volunteering — activities that are, Way said, “motivated toward self-improvement and improvement of the surrounding world.”

You can read the whole article at Lent: Not Just About Giving Up Chocolate.

So, what are your hopes and plans for beginning a new practice?  Please let us know by clicking on the "comments" link just below this article.  You will be asked to copy the letters in the word verification box when you are done, to prevent spam/robot comments.

Never responded to a blog before?  Maybe you can make that your new practice in Lent, to comment on this new way of sharing community?

Bruce Calvin