Wellspring: inspiration and guidance for a spiritual journey

Resurrection, by Libby Moore

Easter, again. Sunshine and daffodils, the promise of new life after a long, dark winter. In the Unitarian church where I was raised, Easter meant getting flowers and wearing a new outfit, navy blue with white polka dots, red shoes and a matching hat. The Easter bunny brought colored eggs and jellybeans and lots of chocolate.

This year, though, I was challenged to think about the deeper meaning of Easter in our Unitarian Universalist tradition. In her excellent sermon on Sunday, our minister Kaaren Anderson preached on resurrection and the ways in which we resurrect one another through acts of kindness and love. She said that resurrection is what we do, not what we believe, but I think there's more to it than that.

In our church we often say, when someone has died, "To live in hearts that love is not to die." These past few months I've struggled against this easy-sounding phrase, one I have so often written on sympathy cards. A dear friend from my college days died in January and it simply feels too glib, too facile, to say that loving hearts make her untimely death less awful. Much as I cherish her memory in my heart, I miss her gentle, caring presence in my life.

But something else happened recently that's made me believe that loving hearts do create their own kind of immortality. Putting my granddaughter to bed one evening, I felt a sudden surge of love from my own grandmothers - who both died too young - and an awareness that they had loved me with the same fierce devotion that I feel for Evelyn. During Kaaren's Easter sermon, I understood that their love is resurrected in me, and that love is both giving and receiving - it goes both ways.

The blessing is that the love we give - to our friends and family and the world - resurrects us as well as them. It keeps us alive in the world, as long as we keep loving and the circle of love expands.

Happy Easter.

For the Interim Time, by Joy Collins

Three weeks ago we euthanized our beloved chocolate lab. He was only seven but had ruptured a spinal disc, and despite surgery and rehab, he remained paralyzed and incontinent. There was only one loving choice.

I thought about writing of the outpouring of love and support during a long six weeks of attempted rehab. That in all our despair, exhaustion and grief there was this amazing alive connection all around us. Neighbors who knew us from years of dog walking rang the doorbell. Family members who rarely spoke to us came over with a hug. Church members brought food and dog biscuits. Even the postman who refused to carry treats for that bundle of wagging love left us a card. We were touched by the motley community who held us during our siege and subsequent grief.

But instead, what feels important to me now is the spiritual practice of hanging in there during the grayness of recovery. What John O’Donohue in his book To Bless the Space Between Us calls the Interim Time. When we are still occasionally “ambushed by grief”, where “no place looks like itself”, where “everything seems withheld” and “The path you took here is washed out; the way forward is still concealed from you.” Much of the raw grieving for our baby is past, but the tide turning back to a world of color hasn’t happened. In our culture it’s ok to feel this way for a week – but THREE weeks? For a DOG?

And worse, because Toby was only seven, and we had put our older border collie down just four months earlier, the easy path seems to be a slow slide into cynicism. I don’t believe Toby is up in heaven catching Frisbees with all our past pets. I don’t believe I’m going to see him again when I die. He’s dust in a tin on my bookshelf. Life is a series of losses and then you die. So my skeptical story line goes. And how true is this for other UUs?

And yet. And yet. As a person dedicated to a spiritual life, I refuse to let myself fall into total pessimism. I sort of recognize that in its extreme, it’s no more valid than my friends’ enviable Frisbee beliefs. But without this afterlife perspective, what do I DO? Hence my current meditation (and life) practice of hanging out in the grayness. The Interim Time. Believing things will eventually shift, but not on my schedule. Not judging myself for the feelings of flatness, and lack of delighting in the world. Maybe even being curious about them. Realizing this is a counter-cultural radicalism of having no answer but also not yet moving on.

And so I move, in fits, starts and slides.

What about Lent? by Tina Simson

I envy the devout Catholics who seriously observe the Lenten season. I see them streaming from the small church outside my office window with ashes on their forehead. A badge that seems to say, "This means something to me." It brings their faith into each of the next forty days with reverence and sacrifice.

So I thought about what I could do, as a UU, to honor this time of preparation. If I recognize that these forty days precede  both Easter and Passover, I can consider them leading me to renewal and freedom. That's certainly something to prepare for. 

A friend of mine offers wonderful interfaith e-courses on the site Spirituality and Practice. 

This month there are several offerings that could inspire one's observance of Lent such as the one on Forgiveness-Growth in Love

I took a course from them last year on Rumi and it was a great. The daily reminders that came to my inbox, kept my focus and enriched each day. 

Another wonderful resource I find inspirational is the World Prayer Wheel where you can spin the prayer wheel and find a gift of a prayer from the world's many spiritual traditions. I like to take a spin and then use whatever comes up as a daily meditation. 

When I was a little Catholic girl, we were encouraged to give something up for lent.  I always tried to give up homework but then gave up chocolate instead. As a enlightened adult, I thought this was a trite way to observe Lent, until I realized that this is how my father gave up smoking decades ago. He now says that giving up smoking became a promise he made in the presence of a higher power, no longer just a habit to break.  So I think about this for me, is there something I should stop doing or start doing? Is there a way I behave with those around me that needs tending? Am I judgmental or harsh when I need to be forgiving and gentle?  

I'm looking forward to this season, it's so cold today and in 40 days, give or take, there's a good possibility it will be warm.  If nothing else, that's something to note.

The Divine is Portable, by Joy Collins

What is the one thing you would not consider doing in our scary, tumultuous economy? Buy or sell a house unnecessarily. Yet that is exactly what Maggie and I did in the last month. On a whim, we checked out an open house in our neighborhood, knowing that our home is too small for two folks each needing a home office. We were surprised how wonderful this new place was – and “priced to sell” as they say. We put in an offer contingent on selling ours, and surprisingly, ours went two hours after the first open house.

In shock, we came to grips with the fact we are moving sooner vs. later. Mostly I am excited. But I am also experiencing this odd sense of dread. You see, I am a total homebody . I bond to my house like other people bond to humans. Newly single, I bought my current house seven years ago. It is very small, but light and open. Skylights, cathedral ceiling, few walls between the rooms, looking out on a beautiful ravine. As my friends say, it’s got that “wow factor.”  The new place is older, built in 1940. Mostly updated, with a wonderful office for me and many beautiful classic features. But the windows are small, there are no skylights, and it backs up to another house in our neighborhood. I began feeling buyer’s remorse.

While walking the dog I found myself envying the big picture windows in other homes. Noticing how many panes are in THEIR windows. Seeing the natural settings others have for back yards. Having thoughts about how much better they have it. Mild panic that maybe this new house isn’t for me.

Over these last several years, I find that if I MEDITATE through the obsessing versus ACTING on the obsessing, I do start to question what’s really going on for me. And in this case, it has to do with the feeling of  “home.”

I am most aware of the divine when I am outdoors, or looking out a window onto a tree, or feeling the sun beating through a sliding door onto my face. Below my panic about small windows in an old house lies a primal fear. Fear that I won’t be able to connect with the divine in my new abode. And that without that connection I will feel adrift. I will have lost that feeling of “home.” So I’ve been feeling deeply into where home in fact is. And I must say, when I analyze my past, I see I’ve been adaptable over a life filled with many moves and business travel. I've had many different houses, apartments and hotel rooms. Some with views, many without. I do re-bond if I let go of the old. And that’s because in the end, the divine is portable. She, and "home" are always within me. Gosh, how I keep needing to re-learn that lesson! And so going into our new place, I will try and remember John O’Donohue’s blessing:

May this house shelter your life.
When you come in home here,
May all the weight of the world
Fall from your shoulders.
May your heart be tranquil here,
Blessed by peace the world cannot give.
May this home be a lucky place,
Where the graces your life desires
Always find the pathway to your door.
May nothing destructive
Ever cross your threshold.
May this be a s safe place
Full of understanding and acceptance,
Where you can be as you are,
Without the need of any mask
Of pretense or image.
May this home be a place of discovery,
Where the possibilities that sleep
In the clay of your soul can emerge
To deepen and refine your vision
For all that is yet to come to birth.
May it be a house of courage,
Where healing and growth are love,
Where dignity and forgiveness prevail;
A home where patience of spirit is prized,
And the sight of the destination is never lost
Though the journey be difficult and slow.
May there be great delight around this hearth.
May it be a house of welcome
For the broken and diminished.
May you have the eyes to see
That no visitor arrives without a gift

And no guest leave without a blessing
. 

It’s not about the turkey, by Libby Moore

Like many people, I love Thanksgiving best of all the holidays. I actually love cooking Thanksgiving dinner, preparing all those wonderful dishes and offering family and friends the bounty of our table. Thanksgiving is a time to gather and be grateful for so many things – for new snow covering the leaf-strewn streets, for the sun sparkling and making the day magical, for the blessings of heat and hot water on this chilly cold morning. For friends who feed us beautiful soup on a cold Sunday evening and greet us with hugs. For singing at church and the joy of being with others to worship and celebrate. For the small things – a cup of hot tea, the smile from a stranger in the bustling grocery store, a moment of laughter with a four-year-old.

Some years ago, the last year he was alive, my step-father summoned all of my siblings for Thanksgiving at my house. He had suffered a stroke six or seven years earlier and it left him with aphasia, a difficulty forming words, although his body functioned and he could communicate through a kind of Twenty Questions mode. When I was younger, he and I had battled it out. He was a strict high school vice principal and I was the rebellious daughter, the anti-war demonstrator, the counter-cultural dropout. Once I'd moved away from home, we rarely talked. If he answered the phone when I called, he'd say hi and then hand it off to my mother. After my mother died, we were cordial but remote until his stroke, when he moved to an assisted living places nearby and I became his "primary care-giver." It wasn't onerous, really, just taking him to his many doctors' appointments and checking up on his medications, keeping him company now and again. But over the years, as I spent more time with him and he grew more frail, I grew to appreciate him and to understand that he was who he was. He was an important part of my life and he cared for me in the best way he knew how. At that Thanksgiving dinner with my all my siblings, we went around the table and said what we were grateful for. When my dad's turn came, he pointed to me and said, "Her." It was all he could say, but it was enough for me.

And so, it's not about the turkey. It's about gratitude, and the pain that sometimes goes with it, and the sadness and the hurt and the loss that go along with joy. It's about knowing that there are others who don't have enough and understanding that we share their suffering because we are all part of this human family. It's about knowing that we are blessed with love and sharing and holding one another close in our hearts. May it be so.

Peace and Quiet, by Libby Moore

We've had some gorgeous fall weather in western New York over the past few weeks, although today has reverted to the typical gray rain that I associate with November. The colors have been dazzling, brilliant golds and oranges and reds on maples and oaks and Bradford pears. Some trees have held their leaves until now, but most have dropped in a colorful mosaic, carpeting the lawns and streets and creating a gorgeous kaleidoscope of color. And of noise.

No matter how beautiful they are, those leaves can't stay on the ground where they fall. Somebody's got to suck them up with a giant vacuum cleaner attached to a tractor, or blow them across the lawn to the pile on the street, or mulch them with a riding mower. Whatever method they use, it causes loud whining, screaming, buzzing noises that shatter the quiet peacefulness of my daily walk through the neighborhood and along the canal. I find myself recoiling against the incessant noise, wondering why people can't do this when I'm somewhere else.

My hearing aids amplify the high pitch of those kinds of noises, bringing them to the foreground and forcing me to notice. I discovered something on one of my recent walks, though, that I could just turn off the hearing aids and ignore the buzzing and whining. It felt like a whole new interior world, quiet in my head and peaceful. As I walked, I could quiet my mind, listen to my thoughts and to the still small voice within. It felt powerful, to be able to shut off the world like that.

But turnng off my hearing aids also limited my contact with the real world. I couldn't hear the bicyclist calling "on your left" or the ducks quacking near the house where they get fed twice a day. I couldn't carry on a conversation with the lady walking her lovely golden retriever. I missed the connections with people along the route.

So I turned the hearing aids back on and returned to the real world, which is where I live and interact and connect with people. The noise of the blowers and mowers and vacuums is just part of life in our part of the world at this time of the year, and I'm grateful for all of it, for the beauty, for the colors, for the people, and for their caring about their yards. May we care for one another with as much energy and diligence.

Open to the possibility of God, by Tina Simson

I’ve been thinking a lot about prayer this month. It’s our topic for Wellspring and as an Interfaith Ministry candidate, my colleagues all request, believe and recite prayers in the work we do together. There are Jewish and Hindu prayers, there are Catholic and Muslim prayers and even Pagan prayers spoken in my circle. We express a deep acceptance and understanding of all prayer. So why do I struggle? Why am I more comfortable among the UUs in our bunch, who seem skeptical as the rhythms of childhood prayers fill our ears?

 I grew up steeped in a prayerful tradition. Being raised Catholic we had prayers for everyday of the year, every day of the week and every transitional event in our lives. I remember my first prayer book and the rosary I held that let me count the prayers I said. I remember after confession being given prayers for penance, to ask God’s forgiveness. I even remember writing the “Hail Mary” on 15 pieces of paper and clipping them to the clothesline in order to assure a lovely day for my cousins wedding. I remember my mother’s last question to me every night. “Did you say your prayers?” The answer was usually, yes.

 But as I grew older I moved away from prayer, maybe because it didn’t seem to work for me. I sometimes felt as if I didn't do it good enough, or maybe I wasn't good enough. My mother never got well and my cousin did go to Viet Nam. But then when a prayer wasn’t answered the way I wanted, someone always said, God works in mysterious ways, or God has his own plan. With this trumping all my hard work, I figured I would just try another tack.

 Except for one night, the night my mother died, I soothed her restless ranting by holding her and reciting the prayer over and over and over,

Hail Mary full of grace, the lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women…
Pray for us now and at the hour of our death

 So this morning I was paging through the paper and found a whole column of prayers in the classified section. All of them seem to be Catholic and most are the same exact prayer…Prayer to the Blessed Virgin (never known to fail)…and I wonder what compels someone to pray so publicly and what are their many petitions. And is it true, does this prayer never fail? I’m flipping through the radio stations as I come home from grocery shopping and I hear the Christians reciting Bible passages.  There’s a new Islamic station that comes in from Toronto and I hold the dial as the Call to Prayer fills my ears

I turn the corner and see before me the steel grey sky of an ominous November morning, the sun beaming behind me illuminates the golden oak tree and a flock of birds swoop down showing me their white bellies. I almost forget I am driving as the wordless prayer wells in my heart.

 And I think perhaps that’s what we all have in common, the Catholics with their rosary, the Jews at the wall, the Christians with the Bible and the Muslims five times a day. Through prayer, we all open to the possibility of God. That’s it, that’s all and that’s all that’s needed.

Prayer Everywhere, by Libby Moore

We've been talking about prayer in Wellspring, asking people to write their own prayers and to think about what prayer has meant to them in the past and what it means now. As a lifelong Unitarian, getting comfortable with the practice of prayer has taken me a long time, since it was never part of my upbringing. My first prayers started with gratitude, which felt simplest. "I am grateful for sunshine on this beautiful fall day. I am grateful for the love that surrounds me." No need to identify to whom or to what one is praying. It's easy to acknowledge feeling grateful because so much has been given to me.

But then my prayers started to get deeper and to expand beyond my quiet time in the morning. I find myself thanking God for so many things – for clean fresh water, when so many have none. For the abundance of food, for the quiet and peace in my life, for all the blessings that I receive. And in a more recent development, after talking with my spiritual director, I have started to pray for help. God, help me to be loving and mindful. Help me to know the right path. Help me to know how to be of help to someone else. Asking for help is hard. It means admitting that I'm not perfect, that I don't have all the answers, that I can't do it –whatever it is – alone. But it feels good, at the same time, to acknowledge that I do need help, to let go of the illusion that I have to be independent and isolated and self-sufficient. We need one another, and there is grace in knowing that.

Last weekend I went to visit my youngest granddaughter. At twenty-one months, she's exploding with amazing new language skills and bursting with energy. "I running" seems to be her favorite state of being, so we take her to the park unless it's absolutely pouring rain. She ran, of course, from the playground to the tennis court, her mom and I following. As we approached the tennis court, I noticed chalk writing all over it. My initial thought was that at least she can't read yet because it was graffiti, possibly obscene. But as we got closer, I saw that someone had written along the sideline and again near the net, "God be with us in our life. God be with us in our life." What a simple prayer, written boldly among the tic tac toe games and childish drawings of animals, "God be with us in our life." May it be so, and amen.

Playing god with a Border Collie, by Joy Collins

Our Border Collie, Buddy, is almost 16 years old. I know every dog owner believes his or her dog is the most special, but really, Buddy IS one of the best dogs ever.  And he’s slowly fading due to an inoperable tumor. Buddy also has other issues, like cataracts that keep him from seeing well and because he startles easily, we think he’s also half deaf. But he still prances down the street, and herds us all to bed at night, so he has some good life quality remaining.

Buddy has given me the chance to play God. Because he sees especially poorly in the dark, and it’s now pitch black when I get up, we have a new routine. He and I head out together with me in the lead with one of those big Mag-lite flashlights bought just for this purpose. I shine the light on the stairs so he can get off the deck and into the yard. He waits for me to shine the light on his well-worn path to the bushes. Early on, maybe like between God, and Adam and Eve, I could guide him back by where I shined the light. I’d get him in the outer part of the beam and slowly move it towards the house. He would obediently follow. I was quite pleased with outsmarting a Border Collie.

But lately he’s been exerting his independence by wandering into other parts of the yard, further from the house, into the dark. A rabbit smell? A ground hog whiff? Like Eve, with the apple, curiosity is tempting old Buddy.  As the rigid old God of my childhood, I stubbornly kept the light where I wanted it, waiting impatiently in the cold dark for Buddy to “see the light” and come back. But one recent morning he wandered into my neighbor’s yard, and I had a panicked few minutes where I couldn’t find him. He was clearly scared and disoriented once I discovered him in my neighbor’s garden. I was filled with such love and tenderness as I crouched to soothe him in my pajamas in the dark. I felt such responsibility and softness as I slowly guided him back with the light, my voice, and a gentle hand on his back. I was no longer the judgmental, righteous, I’m-in-charge-God, rather the one full of enormous love, patience and coaxing. Like many Unitarian Universalists, I struggle with whether or not there is a personal god or universally positive force that guides me. But my experience with Buddy has reminded me that regardless of my beliefs, I have a choice. I can live my life exemplifying a conditional, judgmental, flashlight-stubborn god. Or I can strive to be a loving divine presence that has an open heart for all of us flawed, blind creatures who wander in the dark. Can I find the tenderness I felt for Buddy in my interactions with annoyingly imperfect people? Is the awareness that brings this choice part of what we are cultivating in Wellspring?

Now on these dark mornings, I have a new spiritual practice. I allow extra time as I follow Buddy with the light wherever he wants to go. Even though it’s gotten colder on my pajama-clad legs, and the grass has the crunch of frost, I tap into my love for our lumpy, yet wise old dog, and savor the imperfectly perfect time we have left. I practice being the tender god who is patient and willing to be surprised. And then, with a heart now opened wide, I try to carry that experience to every encounter of my day.

Asking for help, by Joy Collins

Recently Jen, one of our ministers at First Unitarian, sent me an email, inquiring if I’d like to get a cup of coffee or go for a walk. I was puzzled. As the mother of a year –old son and a fulltime minster, I know Jen spends her free time with her family. After I read it for the third time I realized she was offering me pastoral care. Me? I started to type my reply that I was doing fine, when I stopped. Wellspring has taught me to be a little less reactive. I stopped, took a couple of breaths, and deleted that first reply.

After all, here’s what is going on: In a ten-day period, we put my dad, with his long term dementia, on hospice care, our 15-year old Border Collie was found to have an inoperable tumor, and my older sister was diagnosed with Stage 2 breast cancer. I was shell-shocked. But as a child I was labeled the “self-reliant” one, so I just kept on functioning.

The evening after I received Jen’s email I went to a monthly dinner with my 20+ year long women’s group. In my mid-50’s, I am ten years younger than the next person. I told them about my yet-unanswered email from Reverend Jen. What then proceeded truly surprised me. My high functioning women’s group – among them a psychotherapist, a Presbyterian minister, a Human Resource Manager and two small business owners – began to tell stories. Stories I had heard before but with a new twist. Each person spoke of devastating times in her life when, to a person, each said she responded to offers of support with, “No, really, I’m fine.” Stories of their dear friends and clergy who, despite the brave words, showed up on doorsteps and in hospital wards with much needed hugs and listening ears. Anne, the Presbyterian minister, talked of the difficulties ministers have with their heroic parishioners. How do you help people who are stoic no matter what? She continued that it is a gift to be helpful to those in need. And an act of humble acceptance of one’s humanity to graciously and gratefully open up to the care.

I think of our Wellspring groups as being “Circles of Care.” Libby mentioned in an earlier blog that Parker Palmer, in A Hidden Wholeness, teaches about groups being “Circles of Trust.” But into our fourth year of Wellspring, we find it’s also a chance to more actively help and be helped. The former is usually easy for us UUs, the latter, not so much. We now have dozens of small groups at First Unitarian. Full of those willing to be helpful, and ever so slowly filling with those tentatively willing to be helped.

So it took me a week to reply to Reverend Jen’s email. It was surprisingly hard to type that I would like to have a visit. The admission alone has caused me to let down my guard and feel some of the fear and loss. She’s coming over Thursday afternoon. I hope I can allow myself to be the vulnerable, unsure person that we all carry during these times of deep distress. I’ll let you know how it goes.