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It’s Sunday morning and I went to church with Jesus, just the two of us. I walked the 20 minutes of the wooded path following the signs carefully placed to let travelers know where He is. As always I first passed St. Francis, then Mary Jesus’ mother along the way. Finally in the clearing I saw the way to where the three disciples were sleeping and then just beyond them, there He was.

Since I had my GPS phone I marked the location of where I found Him. Now I can send His co-ordinates to anyone who’s interested. And since I knew it would sound like a far-fetched tale to anyone who hasn’t also gone to see Him, I took pictures. One of Jesus Himself at prayer. One of the rock I sat on for worship.

For music a male and female cardinal did a duet. They also added a visual reminder that the Spirit was near as they flashed their red-orange feathers amidst the 100 different greens of the forest. The sermon was quite good.

I told Jesus I didn’t have anything prepared for worship and He told me it was alright, He had it covered. He said most of the stuff He hears at worship anymore is more ‘wish-list’ than prayers and that it’s seldom anyone just sits with Him. He longs for creation to say the words “Thy will be done” and mean it. The grasses, the planets, small creeping things they do just that. It’s the sons and daughters of Adam, who pretty much go their own way.

It took me a while to respond to His provocative observation. After all, I’ve spent years praying such wish-lists. I’ve learned and taught that God has three answers to our prayers: “yes” – “no” – and “wait.” Cracker-Jack theology. Prayer 101.
What’s being formed in me as I sit here with Him today however is something quite different. The take away message from our conversation and the silent sermon is that God’s answer to prayer is always a resounding “Yes.”

God’s answer to our prayer is always “Yes” when we lay down our wish-list and pray for His will to be played out in the drama of our life. God’s answer to prayer is always “Yes” when we surrender our will to His will and walk into the life He desires to live through us. God’s answer to prayer is always “Yes” when we stop running our lives in our own wisdom [foolishness] and submit to God’s Wisdom and His Love. God’s answer to our prayers is always “Yes” when our prayer consists of more listening than talking – more hearing than speaking – willing obedience rather than negotiating.

We do not hear the “Yes” of God or experience its blessing while we’re arm-wrestling God for control of the details of our lives or while we’re making decisions for our future from places of the unhealed pain of our past. It’s only when we step into the stream of intercession that Christ and God’s Spirit are praying on our behalf without ceasing that we experience God’s “Yes” and His peace. The invitation to live God’s “Yes” is yours and mine today.

Rather than going back over the wooded path returning from Sunday morning worship with Jesus, I chose the sun-filled prairie path instead. It was over-flowing with milkweed and assorted prairie grasses that hundreds of butterflies of multiple species could not resist. Several times I stopped in sheer wonder of their delicate beauty and amazing colors. These creatures, I thought, have long known the secret of living the life God designed for them – a life of desiring only what God has already provided – a life without sadness or regret – a life that echoes eternity.

My worship time this morning gave me a new conviction; to live my life so that God might say “Yes, Yes indeed!” to my prayers and my life. I invite you to join me in this adventure. BLESSINGS AND JOY, THE CELTIC MONK

SUNRISE OVER THE BELL TOWER AT THE ABBEY OF GETHSEMANE

I’m aware that my last post “THE CONSOLATION OF GOD” was both vague and heavy – and I thank those of you who quickly and compassionately responded through emails, phone calls and visits. What a blessing to have love reflected back into one’s life. What a blessing to sense the Spirit of God speaking through friends who I admire, trust and love.

Just this week a colleague [who isn’t on the blog roll] phoned me saying he just heard the news via the Presbytery Grapevine that my kids and grandkids were moving from down the street to 1,500 miles away. Yes, its true. But next he said the most remarkable thing. He said “I’ve called to cry with you” and he meant it. While the heaviness of their leaving does grip me, I’ve been blessed to allow my tears to come and to go.

Pondering this new reality, I’m reminded of the little scripture phrase that says it this way: “It came to pass.” It came to pass. What I’ve learned to understand by that is that situations and even people don’t ‘come to stay’ in our lives, but to pass-by or pass-through. When the situation or the people are difficult — the fact that they’ve ‘come to pass’ is really, really good news! But when a situation or people are beloved — their passing through brings a heavy heart.

In your life and mine we’ve had numerous occasions to fill in that blank after we say ‘it came to pass…’ It came to pass-that a parent or sibling died. It came to pass-that a marriage failed. It came to pass-that a job ended. It came to pass…that an illness took root in our body. It came to pass-that our 5-year-old went to kindergarten, or our 18 year old went to war, or away to college. All these came to pass and then something new came after them.

In this temporary existence we call our life much will come to pass. Overwhelming joys as well as overwhelming sorrows come uninvited. When we experience ourselves in one of these pass-ages surrounded by good friends it makes the passing a little easier, the heaviness lighter or the celebration more joy-filled. When those who love us come to cry with us, we understand even more keenly the Scripture that teaches us “two are better than one.” I am eternally grateful for the friends who have rallied around me, and my paltry thanks can’t begin to express my gratitude.

But several times over the past few days I’ve experienced a lightness of being not tied to any one person. While taking laundry from the dryer, during a hymn in Sunday worship, walking down the hall just now, I was filled/lifted/released/comforted/ embraced by One who is unseen. Each time this lightness came, I had no doubt and I knew it was Him. Each time He came without my asking. Each time I felt as though I was being upheld and healed. Thanks be to God.

There’s no other explanation for this lightness of being other than the real presence of a God who loves me. And I hope you have concluded, that as things have ‘come to pass’ in your life, there’s no explanation for your well-being other than the presence of a Compassionate God who loves you too.

It’s not often that we talk freely about God’s intervening Presence — inside or outside of church. But I just couldn’t let the experinces of this past week go without a witness. Time and time again I was lifted, when I could not lift myself.

Does it make a difference in your life believing that situations, circumstances and even people have come to pass? Can you recall a moment or moments when you were filled/ lifted/ released/ comforted or embraced? What do you do to cultivate your awareness of the palpable Presence of God?

In the book: THE UNBEARABLE LIGHTNESS OF BEING you can find this bit of wisdom: “When the heart speaks, the mind finds it indecent to object.” This week, my heart has been speaking of the nearness and dearness of the One who created me and loves me…and truly my mind finds it impossible to object. BLESSINGS AND JOY TO YOU. THE CELTIC MONK

Last week I sat amongst a group of bright and talented women as we continued to make our way through Joan Chittiser’s book: CALLED TO QUESTION, A Spiritual Memoir. Though Sister Joan is a Catholic, Benedictine, nun and we are for the most part Protestant, married/widowed, career/retired women, it’s amazing how similar the spiritual touch-points of her life and ours.

Two things from our discussion are still with me. The first is that though life continues to unfold before us,our life is really the sum of the choices we make in response to what we find on our life’s path. Secondly, we can make those choices from our own well of information, or we can make those life-forming choices from the depths of God’s love for us and His life in us. Simply put, we choose to be God, or to seek God.

For those of us reared and educated in the 20th century, in a country that reflects back to us the virtues of fierce independence and the right of might… the humility necessary to daily submit to a God we cannot see, listening for instructions we cannot hear with our ears sometimes seems ludicrous or worse yet, foolish.

But as Chittister reflects on her life and the instances which have been her rudder through a life of turbulent waters, what quickly becomes evident is how peace, beauty, joy and fulfillment came not as she ventured out on paths of her own choosing–or someone else’s–but as she followed paths revealed in the richness of prayer (as listening) and of solitude(as uncluttering). She found in the end that these spiritual practices bouy her, anchor her, and send her out into the world for her own good and the good of others, with or without the consent of the organized structures of her religious affiliation.

This Sunday I’ll be in the pulpit walking the tightrope of acknowledging the celebration of Independence Day while in faithfulness to the Gospel I’ll remind folks that life ‘under God’ is meant to be lived in dependence upon the Creator and interdependent within a community of faith — truths that our culture does not honor and which the redeemed cannot ignore. Our individual freedom (s)is held within other of God’s loving guidelines.

The peace, beauty, joy and fulfillment we seek will never be dictated to us by a leader, or given to us as inalienable rights through any document of any nation. It simply is not theirs to give. They are instead the gifts of God, freely given, to any who choose to accept the freedom God offers, from all that binds us. They are the abundant gifts to all who find refuge in the Christ. The freedom that will be celebrated with fireworks this weekend is merely a dim, dim reflection.

So I choose on this Independence Day to remember the One who has truly set me free, while also acknowledging the blessing of living in a free nation. I choose on this Independence Day to remember the words God gave Moses to take to Pharoah: “Set my people free, that they might worship Me.” And wonder what those words could mean for this nation at this time in our life together. With those thoughts echoing I’ll reflect on my/our freedom’s, hoping not to draw from the shallows of my own well, but from the depths of God’s. BLESSINGS AND PEACE TO YOU, AS YOU DEPEND ON HIM. The Celtic Monk

I continue to work my way through my candidate year as a Benedictine Oblate of St. John’s Abbey [Collegeville, MN]. While in the Rule of St. Benedict prayer is considered work the work I’m refering to is the more elusive work of discernment.

One conclusion I’ve reached in my discernment process is that its a good thing at 56 years old to still be able to ask the parallel questions: “What do I want to do?” and “Who do I want to be?” when I grow up. That’s preferable rather than slugging away for 20 or 30 or 40 years at a job or vocation one loathes (or even worse, the lukewarmness of what one will tolerate).

This work of discernment asks us to look at our lives using criteria uncommon in the 21st century culture of America. Presently, I’m employing the lens of the Benedictine vow of stabilty.

Should Benedict have meant by stability for his followers to dig a hole and stand in it… I would fail his criteria miserably. I now live more than 1200 miles away from the place of my birth and formative years. I’ve had at least three clearly distinguishable career paths. I’ve lived in three states and enjoy jumping on a plane at some regular interval for a brief change of scenery. If stability means not moving from this spot, my Oblate candidacy is doomed.

However I believe that the stability of life and vocation Benedict set as a standard is more than “location, location, location.” And I can honestly say that each change of career path, each move to another place, each difficult personal decision was made with a single, stable intention of heart; that my choice, my way ahead, would please God and be worthy of His blessing. So even if and when my choices did not yield all that I hoped they might, my spirit was somehow bouyed beyond my ability to make it so. Stability of heart is under-rated, don’t you think?

What are the multitude of things we cling to that provide false stability? A job, a car, a relationship, a house we’ve outgrown or that has outgrown our needs? There are many trappings and creature comforts that mask true stability that comes only from hearts genuinely dependent upon God.

“God Alone” it says over the metal gate into the cloistered area of the Abbey of Gethesemane. My stability and yours is found in those two little words. And because Christ chose to self-identify Himself as the Way…sometimes practicing stability means moving. BLESSINGS OF PEACE AND JOY, THE CELTIC MONK

CHRIST’S JOURNEY and OUR OWN

We walked the path from Bethany on the top of the Mount of Olives, down to the old city wall of Jerusalem. Along the way we stopped at the Church of Pater Noster – the place on the Mount of Olives where Jesus taught the disciples the “Lord’s Prayer.” Here on the walls of the shrine, the Lord’s Prayer is printed on ceramic tiles in 115 languages. Next we stopped at the Church of Dominus Flavit – where it is believed that Jesus stopped to weep on His way to the Garden to pray. The architecture of the church is tear shaped and offers a perfect view of the Temple Mount. The Garden of Gethsemane hosts a 2,500 year old olive tree that still send out shoots.

As we entered the old city, we came to the Church of St. Anne, mother of Mary, the Mother of Jesus. The church has perfect acoustics. A highlight of the trip for me is as we sat and sang our songs of faith and echoed a song of some pilgrims from Poland.

While the Via Delarosa is more well-known to our Catholic sisters and brothers, it was a meaningful experience to walk the path Jesus did on His triumphal entry into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, and the path He continued to walk as he was stripped and given a cross to carry to Golgotha.

Thankfully we are a resurrection people. We know that there is more to life than such suffering and dying. We know that while we may experience all manner of setback, cruelty or pain – there is a balm in Gilead. Like our brothers and sisters the Jews, we are a people of hope that God’s blessing upon us will one day be revealed to the nations. “While tears may remain for a night, joy comes in the morning.” PSALMS

After a meaningful visit and communion service at the Garden Tomb, we’ve returned to our hotel and are packing our bags even as I write. We’ll have dinner here at the hotel and at 8:15 p.m. the bus will take us from Jerusalem back to Tel Aviv to catch our plane home. A red-eye of biblical proportions which leaves at 12:35 a.m. Our trip home will clock in at about 26 straight hours of travel.

It’s hard to believe that we’ve been here two weeks. The time has disappeared in seeing, learning, laughing, weeping, eating, and praying. We’ve been blessed, encouraged, and challenged – sometimes by what we’ve seen and sometimes by one another. I am fairly certain that no one was ‘unchanged’ by our time here. God indeed had something to speak to each one. Some shared their learnings as they were revealed, others will be unpacking their learnings for years to come. But like the Chosen People who have hosted us these past few weeks – we continue to believe in the faithfulness of the God Who is, Who was, and Who is to come… and perhaps we’re a little more convinced of His willingness to bless us.

“Toda” is the Hebrew word for “thank you.”

“Toda” Jerusalem
“Toda” Israel
“Toda” Jacob and David
“Toda” those who have prayed for us back home.

Bless God’s Holy Name.
WITH JOY AND PEACE, THE CELTIC MONK

We stood in the Garden of the Nations and listened to a Hassidic Cantor remember the six million Jews who died in the Holocaust. He remembered them with the traditional mourning prayer, the Kaddish, which we had just said the day before together at the Western Wall for Glen Poston.

As I read the opening remarks in the first exhibit of Yad Vashem, I could not help but draw similarities that would not be popular in the Israel of today. When I read about how the Nazi’s first began to segregate and then take away rights of the Jews in the late 1930’s and early 40’s I recalled the reduced options of those who live in Israel now behind fences and in segregated neighborhoods. I am not drawing any conclusion as to how the situation here might proceed. It’s just that when any people see other people or people groups as objects—often bad things happen. I will pray for the peace of Jerusalem and all Israel.

We also visited the Museum of the Book… where the actual scroll fragments found at Qumran are stored. It’s a holy place. It will be a long time before the ministry of antiquities actually gets through everything found in those caves. How stunning to see pieces of ancient Hebrew Bible text, older than any that existed before this find. I want to learn more especially about “The Rule” which is an ancient code guiding people to live together in peace and order. It was likely a precursor to the “Rule” of Christian monastic communities.

We also had a chance to stroll in an authentic Israeli market as Jews from all over Jerusalem shopped for their Shabbat meal. Breads and fish and flowers abounded as folks hurried to get to their homes before sundown.

Today was a day of contrasts. The hope of the “people of the book” lay beside the memorial of such a massive extermination plan as the world has ever seen. May God give us His love in our hearts for all people. May we not grown weary in seeking peace. May all creation hope in a way of love. BLESSINGS AND JOY, THE CELTIC MONK

I attemptd to send this to you all earlier this week and noticed it did not come through for some. When I tried to re-send, no luck. Let’s try it again. If all else fails I’ll email it once I’m home. Sorry if you get MULTIPLE copies of this edition!

Early this morning we visited Bethlehem. We left behind our Israeli guide and driver and were met at the security fence by an Arab Christian driver and guide for the morning. Bethlehem is one of the regions under the control of the Palestinian Authority. There is an uneasy peace between the two sacred towns of Bethlehen and Jerusalem since the Intifada of 2000.

What to say about all of that? It’s just difficult. Since the fighting, the Christian population has decreased from 70 percent to 30 percent. Life is difficult for all people; Arab Christians and Muslims alike in Bethlehem. Living behind the security fence inhibits the exchange of goods and services… prevents folks from working… it reminds everyone that peace is distant.

There are no easy answers here. We [Americans] cannot imagine what it would be like to one day not be able to visit friends or family a mere 8 miles from our homes; or no longer be able to get to our job, or shop at our favorite stores. But if I remember my Intifadas… it was Bethlehem that fired the first missle into their neighbor Jerusalem’s backyard — and while those in Bethlehem started this particular skirmish… Israel finished it separating even families from one another.

So imagine if you can leaving Bethlehem and having two young soldiers with weapons walk through our bus before giving us the okay to re-enter Jerusalem, which we’d left only 3 hours earlier. Yes indeed, there are no easy answers.

The afternoon brought us to the Western Wall. Out of respect to the Jews who worship here, we covered our heads and approached the wall to pray – men on the left, women on the right separated by a curtain. Our guide Jacob had given us an english translation of the Jewish prayer of mourning called the Kaddish, which we prayed on each side of the curtain, for Glen Poston who was to be with us on this trip, but passed away unexpectedly. Mary (Glen’s mom) and Sam (Glen’s brother) placed a small lapel pin in the shape of the state of Ohio (Glen’s home) in the wall as a memorial. The pin had a bicycle on it, as Glen was a bicycle enthusiast. We celebrated Glen’s life and God’s goodness.

Earlier in the afternoon we sat on the steps going up to the temple that were in place when Jesus would have entered the temple mount. While some of the upper stairs have been reconstructed — we chose to have our prayer on those steps which very likely were walked on by Jesus. Sitting on the stairs we looked across the valley to the Mount of Olives, Jesus’ favorite place to pray while in Jerusalem.

Indeed our day was very full. Full of new sights and sounds. Full of places that until today were only names. Full of questions of war and peace. Full of mourning and trust. We ended the day a good tired. That’s the tiredness that comes when your day has been well spent. More than once I heard someone say spontaneously “we are blessed.” Indeed we are. And to you who are reading this you’re included in that blessing. May we remember God’s faithfulness is good times and bad. JOY AND PEACE, THE CELTIC MONK

One thing there is little time for when you’ve traveled 6,000 miles and backwards two centuries, is reflection.

Yesterday, after our morning trek into Bethlehem, we entered Jerusalem through the Zion Gate…visited Kind David’s Tomb the holiest site in Judaism… climbed the steps to the Upper Room and continued a walking tour of the Jewish Quarter of the Old City. We saw several underground excavations of houses destroyed in the Roman conquest at the time of the destruction of the Temple in 70 A.D. And that was before lunch — really.

Our hotel sits just across a valley from the Old City facing south and a little east. From the floor to ceiling window we can see the Mount of Olives and the Muslim Quarter [which in reality is more like the 2/3rds] within the walls of the Old City.

This morning I heard the loud speakers blare the Muslim call to prayer before the sun came up. Now as the sun cuts through the morning haze the surface beauty of this troubled city begins to take shape and form.

There has been a law in Jerusalem for some time that the facades of all the buildings, homes and offices, must be “Jerusalem stone.” Everywhere you look are creamy white limstone blocks, some chisled, some smooth. They hide the differences and the unrest of a nation that is always on red alert status.

So this morning I pause to pray for the people of Jerusalem and of Bethlehem. As the sun now rises over the cloud bank that delayed the dawn, I pray for the delayed peace that Christ came to initiate. I pray for the day (and hope that it is soon) when those who wear crosses, and those who wear yamalkas and those who stop to pray when the speakers blare, will live together as seemlessly as this mass of Jerusalem stone buildings. There is no human facade that can make it so — only the Prince of Peace can make it true. BLESSINGS AND PEACE, THE CELTIC MONK