Body Positive

There's nothing wrong with having a beautiful body, training hard, getting healthy and showing the progress on social media. But for a moment, consider the silent perspective....those that are suffering with chronic illness or life threatening diseases and can't possibly think of going for a walk let alone sculpting a body...Learn to witness those who have redefined what health means, beyond what we see displayed in magazines and talk shows. Notice those on the margins with children that can't keep up all the time due to life with disability, and find ways to be inclusive...welcoming...kind.  Most importantly, avoid saying that "everyone can do it"...Because everyone can't....And I never would have understood until it happened to me. Let's celebrate ALL bodies!  Amen #bodypositive

Silence - Wisdom from an Early Quaker - Isaac Penington

After the mind is in some measure turned to the Lord – his quickenings felt, his seed beginning to arise and spring up in the heart – then the flesh is to be silent before him, and the soul to wait upon him (and for his further appearings) in that measure of life which is already revealed.

Now, this is a great thing: to know flesh silenced, to feel the reasoning thoughts and discourses of the fleshly mind stilled, and the wisdom, light, and guidance of God’s spirit waited for. For we are to come into the poverty of self, into the abasedness, into the nothingness, into the silence of our spirit before the Lord; into the putting off of all our knowledge, wisdom, understanding, abilities, all that we are, have done, or can do, out of this measure of life, into which we are to travel, that we may be clothed and filled with the nature, Spirit, and power of the Lord.

God is to be worshipped in spirit, in his own power and life, and this is at his own disposal. His church is a gathering in the Spirit. If any speak there, they must speak as the oracle of God, as the vessel out of which God speaks; as the trumpet out of which he gives the sound. Therefore there is to be a waiting in silence till the Spirit of the Lord move to speak, and also give words to speak. For we are not to speak our own words, or in our own wisdom or time; but the Spirit’s words, in the Spirit’s wisdom and time, which is when he moves and gives to speak.

Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath entered into the heart how and what things God reveals to his children by his Spirit, when they wait upon him in his pure fear, and worship and converse with him in spirit; for then the fountain of the great deep is unsealed, and the everlasting springs surely give up the pure and living water.

Source: “A brief account concerning silent meetings; the nature, use, intent, and benefit of them,” published 1680 (text lightly modernized)

The Unseen

This morning I've been contemplating the Unseen Among Us. I spent a lot of time with people that live outside, noticing how their life on the margins is often ignored, judged and ultimately not witnessed. I'm discovering that the chronically ill population and the dying are also among those that are often unseen, excluded, judged, and pushed to the margins. This must change.

Becoming Willing

7 sticks with out hitting a vein....I'm finally willing. Time for a port.

And this morning, I heard once again that what I'm going through with IVIG treatment is just as intense is going through chemotherapy, sometimes with even more side effects. Yeah, I suppose that's true.

I tend to make light of the things that I'm going through, as I'm used to doing things on my own.  But I'm increasingly learning that I don't need to do things alone.  Those that view me as a burden can simply take a hike!  That line of thinking is no longer welcome.

I'm very grateful to those of you who have helped to maintain normalcy for my daughter as I've walked this road, and to those who kept me company while I've received these difficult treatments which will continue for the foreseeable future... and to those of you who continue to reach out with loving support and kindness.

I was told by a doctor recently that this might be as good as it gets for me. I'm unwilling to accept that reality, as I continue fighting for healing! But I will say that I feel a depth of gratitude for how good I have felt this last few weeks, and I feel very hopeful for what lies ahead for me in the future!

God Breaks In

From Richard Rohr today....
And I'll add this commentary.....For the longest time I didn't realize that my art was ministry, meditation, contemplation and theooetics! I simply allowed my hands to do what felt right!

Yes...God breaks in and meets us where we are... one of these days soon I will write about how the Holy Spirit  showed me that she can even work through dating apps like Tinder! Now that's badass theology.

God Breaks In
Thursday, May 17, 2018

Today Barbara Holmes continues exploring the contemplative in surprising places:

Contemplation is not confined to designated and institutional sacred spaces. God breaks into nightclubs and Billie Holiday’s sultry torch songs; God tap dances with Bill Robinson and Savion Glover. And when Coltrane blew his horn, the angels paused to consider.

Some sacred spaces bear none of the expected characteristics. The fact that we prefer stained glass windows, pomp and circumstance . . . has nothing to do with the sacred. It may seem as if the mysteries of divine-human reunion erupt in our lives when, in fact, the otherness of spiritual abiding is integral to human interiority. On occasion, we turn our attention to this abiding presence and are startled. But it was always there.

. . . Art can amplify the sacred and challenge the status quo. The arts help us to hear above the cacophony and pause in the midst of our multitasking. The arts engage a sacred frequency that is perforated with pauses. Artists learned . . . that there were things too full for human tongues, too alive for articulation. You can dance and rhyme and sing it, you almost reach it in the high notes, but joy unspeakable is experience and sojourn, it is the ineffable within our reach.

When you least expect it, during the most mundane daily tasks, a shift of focus occurs. This shift bends us toward the universe, a cosmos of soul and spirit, bone and flesh, which constantly reaches toward divinity. Ecclesial organizations want to control access to this milieu but cannot. The only divisions between the sacred and the secular are in the minds of those who believe in and reinforce the split. . . .

You will lose everything - Jeff Foster

You will lose everything - Jeff Foster

You will lose everything. Your money, your power, your fame, your success, perhaps even your memories. Your looks will go. Loved ones will die. Your body will fall apart. Everything that seems permanent is impermanent and will be smashed. Experience will gradually, or not so gradually, strip away everything that it can strip away. Waking up means facing this reality with open eyes and no longer turning away.

But right now, we stand on sacred and holy ground, for that which will be lost has not yet been lost, and realizing this is the key to unspeakable joy. Whoever or whatever is in your life right now has not yet been taken away from you. This may sound trivial, obvious, like nothing, but really it is the key to everything, the why and how and wherefore of existence. Impermanence has already rendered everything and everyone around you so deeply holy and significant and worthy of your heartbreaking gratitude.

Loss has already transfigured your life into an altar.

Christianity BELONGS on the Margins

Oh my...how pretentious we Christians have become...time to remember what Christians are all about....walking with the outcasts and standing with those that are suffering. Instead we look away as a society, candy coat suffering, and blame the marginalized...going so far as to exclude people from the church! I say no.

"Jesus went directly to those who were outcasts. He much preferred to associate with the “sinners” than with those who proudly set themselves apart. Jesus shared the lot of the downtrodden because God himself loves those rejected by society, those the world deems unworthy. God wants to help all people, and raise the dignity they possess to the light."

Christoph Friedrich Blumhardt
Source: Everyone Belongs to God




Photo by Rex Holbein, Facing Homelessness
Image of me and some fellow humans living outside.