Waiting for the Sun

The season of Advent began on November 27.
"Advent" usually refers to the Christian liturgical season that ushers in Christmas- waiting for the Son of God to be born in the world and the hearts of humans again. 

But, Advent- which means "to wait or to come"- has its roots in the pagan winter solstice. The Hungarian name for the same holiday means "passage" and refers to the passing of time while waiting for the return of the sun.

Christmas wasn't a Christian church holiday until the fourth century C.E. when Pope Julius I declared December 25 as the birthday of Christ. Many believe this date was chosen to replace a pagan holiday and give it a Christian meaning since December 25th had been the date of the Roman holiday of Sol Invuctus- the celebration of the Unconquered Sun. Sol Invuctus was a time of merry making, feasting and gift giving.

Whether you are Christian, Pagan or secular, the Advent season is a time of waiting. Waiting through the darkness, marking time as the longest night of the year approaches- Winter Solstice. Waiting for the return of the Sun or the Son.

In the Pagan tradition, the Winter Solstice is the turning point of the year and a good time for spiritual work. Consider incorporating a new tradition into your daily life during this time of the year as you wait for the return of the Light to the darkened world.

• Watch the sun rise and greet the new day with a prayer.
• Contemplate the benefits of darkness. Consider what darkness brings to the natural world and the gifts of darkness in your life.
• What lies dormant within you, waiting to come to life?
• What needs to be renewed in you?
• Contemplate your own mortality. Where were/are the dark moments? What are you looking forward to the coming light revealing in you?
• Reflect on the cycles in your life- the endings and the beginnings.

Solstice Prayers
by Patti Wigington
http://paganwiccan.about.com/od/yuleprayers/qt/EarthPrayerYule.htm

1.   Cold and dark, this time of year,
the earth lies dormant, awaiting the return
of the sun, and with it, life.
far beneath the frozen surface,
a heartbeat waits,
unitl the moment is right,
to spring.


2.   See the gray skies overhead, preparing the way
for the darkness soon to come.
See the gray skies overhead, preparing the way
for the world to go cold and lifeless.
See the gray skies overhead, preparing the way
for the longest night of the year.
See the gray skies overhead, preparing the way
for the sun to one day return,
bringing with it light.


3.   The longest night has come once more,
the sun has set, and darkness fallen.
The trees are bare, the earth asleep,
and the skies are cold and black.
Yet tonight we rejoice, in this longest night,
embracing the darkness that enfolds us.
We welcome the night and all that it holds,
as the light of the stars shines down.


4.   As the earth grows colder,
the winds blow faster,
the fire dwindles smaller,
the rains fall harder,
let the light of the sun
find its way home.




"So the Christians and the Pagans sat together at the table
Finding faith and common ground the best that they were able
Lighting trees in darkness, learning new ways from the old,
Making sense of history and drawing warmth out of the cold."
Dar Williams in her song, "The Christians and the Pagans"

For the Season of Hospitality

Practicing hospitality means welcoming visitors and strangers as a holy guest. It means welcoming the Divine in the body of a love one or a stranger. Being a person who practices hospitality means living your life as though every day were an ‘open house’......

dismantling the barriers to welcome in our daily lives and creating a world where people choose to become a friend instead of remaining a stranger.

What barriers have I erected for safety and out of fear that I might consider dismantling in order to practice hospitality during this holiday season? 

How can I use what I have to bless others?

What can I cut back on myself so that I have more resources to practice radical hospitality?

“In her book, The Lady in the Palazzo, Marlena De Blasi says, "It's not what's on the table, but who's in the chairs."

Don't misunderstand; food and hospitality are intimately related, but sometimes we need to adjust our priorities. Great cooks and not-so-great cooks often share the same problem: pride and ego can get in the way of connecting with others.

And isn't connecting what it's all about?"

quote: Susan Ely (http://thesharedtable.com)
photo: www.digsdigs.com

           I hear these words about “the poor”

and brush them into the corners of my mind.

I cannot think about them now

I am too preoccupied

with the choice of hors d’oeuvres for my party

and the color of my new shoes.

I am too anxious

about the      impression I make

to decide for diminishing

or to question the givens.

I am too cautious

to risk the highway

that leads away from safe places.

Convenience blankets me,

stifles the clamor of a hungry world.

Sara Covin Juengst in Breaking Bread, the Spiritual Significance of Food
          photo: www.digsdigs.com

"When we speak of hospitality we are always addressing issues of inclusion and exclusion. Each of us makes choices about who will and who will not be included in our lives....It is instead a spiritual practice, a way of becoming more human, a way of understanding yourself.

Hospitality is both the answer to modern alienation and injustice and a path to a deeper spirituality."                                                                                                             

Father Daniel Homan and Lonni Gollins Pratt in

Radical Hospitality: Benedict's Way of Love
photo: www.digsdigs.com

Is Your Heart Open? What Will It Take To Open It?

If your everyday practice is open to all your emotions, to all the people you meet, to all the situations you encounter, without closing down, trusting that you can do that - then that will take you as far as you can go. And then you'll understand all the teachings that anyone has ever taught.

Pema Chodron

                                                    photo by Susan Murphy

Rumi's Awakened Heart

"One day Rumi asked one of his young, snotty disciples to give him an enormous amount of rich and delicious food. This young disciple was rather alarmed because he thought Rumi was living an ascetic lifestyle. Rumi used to pray all night and eat hardly anything. The disciple thought, 'Aha, now I've really got the master — what he really wants to do is to go off somewhere secretly and eat all this food!' So he decided to follow Rumi. He followed him through the streets of Konya, out into the fields, out into yet further fields. Then he saw Rumi go into a ruined tomb. 'I'm finally going to unmask his pretensions,' the young disciple thought. But what he found was a totally exhausted bitch with six puppies, and Rumi was feeding the dog with his own hands so that she could survive to feed her children. Rumi knew that the disciple was following him, of course, and turned to him smiling and said, 'See?' The disciple, extremely moved, said, 'But how on earth did you know that she was here? How did you know that she was hungry? This is miles away from where you are!' Rumi laughed and laughed, 'When you have become awake your ears are so acute that they can hear the cries of a sparrow ten thousand miles away.' 

from The Way of Passion: A Celebration of Rumi by Andrew Harvey

The Open Heart

"When the heart opens, we forget ourselves and the world pours in: this world and also the invisible world of meaning that sustains everything that was and ever shall be. When the heart opens, everything matters, and this world and the next become one and the same." 

from Ten Poems to Open Your Heart by Roger Housden

May my feet rest firmly on the ground
May my head touch the sky
May I see clearly
May I have the capacity of listen
May I be free to touch
May my words be true
May my heart and mind be open
May my hands be empty to fill the need
May my arms be open to others
May my gifts be revealed to me
So that I may return that which has been given
Completing the great circle.

Terma Collective

Even When Things Seem Bleak, We Must Do What We Can

It was a chilly, overcast day when the horseman spied the little sparrow lying on its back in the middle of the road. 

Reining in his mount he looked down 

and inquired of the fragile creature,

“Why are you lying upside down like that?”

“ I heard the heavens are going to fall today,” replied the bird.

The horseman laughed. “ And I suppose your spindly legs can hold up the heavens?”

“ One does what one can,” said the little sparrow.   

 --Author Unknown

When Akiba was on his deathbed, he bemoaned to his rabbi that he felt he was a failure. His rabbi moved closer and asked why, and Akiba confessed that he had not lived a life like Moses. The poor man began to cry, admitting that he feared God’s judgment.  At this, his rabbi leaned into his ear and whispered gently, “God will not judge Akiba for not being Moses. God will judge Akiba for not being Akiba.”   

 --From the Talmud

I understand hell in two ways. First, there is the this-worldly hell I make for myself and others when I fail to act justly and with compassion. Second, there is the other-worldly hell invented by bullies who delight in sadistic fantasies of endless torture and use these fantasies to frighten others into yielding to their will. I take both hells very seriously.

--Rabbi Rami Shapiro

The more faithfully you listen to the voice within you, the better you will hear what is sounding outside. 

And only he who listens can speak.

Is this the starting point of the road towards the 

union of your two dreams– 

to be allowed in clarity of mind to mirror life 

and in purity of heart to mold it?   

--Dag Hammarskjold

I've learned that you can tell a lot about a person by the way she handles these three things:

a rainy day, lost luggage, 

& tangled Christmas tree lights.    

--Maya Angelou

Action is what separates a belief 

from an opinion.

--Ibu Patel

What Inspires You?

I saw that question: "What inspires you?"  in a book recently and have been thinking about it and how important it is to pay attention to the things that arise in our lives that inspire us....fill us with the urge to do a particular thing. There are many actions to which we can be inspired so the question just flung out there like that is a broad one.


So- what inspires me?


I am inspired by the passion people show for their work or their life. Another thing that inspires me is a good quote. Very often a person's quote lets me see a glimpse of the passion that inspires them. I know that Emerson didn't like quotes much so sorry Ralph Waldo, but in today's fast paced world, a quote is a portable tidbit of insight....inspiration on the go. 


Some of my fave quotes:

When one door of happiness closes, another opens; but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one which has been opened for us.  --Helen Keller

It was a dangerous thing to do, for those who enter the heart of a sacred question and feel the searing heat it gives off are usually compelled to live on into the answer.

--Sue Monk Kidd

I've learned that you can tell a lot about a person by the way she handles these three things: a rainy day, lost luggage, & tangled Christmas tree lights.    

--Maya Angelou

You will find, as you look back upon your life, that the moments when you have truly lived are the moments when you have done things in the spirit of love.    

--Henry Drummond

The important thing is this: To be able at any moment to sacrifice what we are for what we could become.    

--Charles Dubois

The truth is that our finest moments are most likely to occur when we are feeling deeply uncomfortable, unhappy, or unfulfilled. For it is only in such moments, propelled by our discomfort, that we are likely to step out of our ruts and start searching for different ways or truer answers.   

--M. Scott Peck

I am also very often inspired visually by a collection of items that I find in an unusual place. Seeing how a shop keeper displays an assortment of wares on the corner of a shelf or seeing images in a book or a magazine that are arranged in a creative way inspires me to create myself. Years ago I cut this picture out of a magazine. I can't remember which one...I think it was a travel magazine. It shows a shop in Mexico that sells religious icons. The rosaries and images of Mary and the saints are piled together in an organized chaos of color and texture. It is now framed an hangs in my office at home. It remains for me one of my most visually inspiring images.







There are a few books of images and ways of seeing that inspire my creativity. One of these is:







"A Home for the Soul" 
by Iowa architect,
Anthony Lawlor.














The last thing I would mention when it comes to what inspires me is probably the most important thing on the list but the least easy to explain. What inspires me the most is my relationship with what I choose to call The Divine. It is the sum total of all that encourages me, touches me, speaks to me. This relationship is nurtured through the people I meet, the things I read, the songs that touch me, the art that gets my attention, the way that the trees and the flowers speak to me, the wind and the water...yes the water is important. Everything that is in my life informing me, enriching me, educating me.


 I don't really have a picture of this so I have chosen to include one of my drawings here. My drawings were originally begun as a way to pray when words were not adequate and they still remain a powerful form of communication for me. 




What Inspires You?