Belief and Experience Intersecting

My stay at Terrace Beach over Easter was one of wonder, excitement, wrestling with God and all the emotions that come with uncovering more layers of the heart. All good but certainly not easy.

I had read about this place on the Internet and the manager had explained what it was like to me. Arriving there on Wednesday evening I could hear the roar of the sea, I could smell it but I had not yet seen the beach that had been described.

Early Thursday morning I made my soy latte, put it in my thermos, took my folding red chair, my green down throw, pen and a journal, threw my old hand knit turquoise cross country ski sweater on, grabbed my 26 year old Canon AE-1 camera and headed out. I wound my way past the 3 rows of cabins and down the steep steps to the beach. Now I saw it! Terrace Beach is a little cove of tranquility and the wild beauty of the sea is obvious just beyond the cove. Eagles shouted from their nest overhead, a seal came to see who was on his beach, gulls lollygagged on the water surface and ravens came looking for scraps.

In this moment all my senses were alive. The body, mind and heart were fully connected to that moment, a healing moment. I was experiencing the sea I had heard of, read of and known about. My belief and my experience were connecting in that holy intersection that is known as “love in action”.

Is that how Job felt when his belief and experience intersected and he said I have heard of you before, but now I have seen you with my own eyes.

What does love in action look like for you?

Being Loosed

As the painfully slow agonizing process continues for Terri Schaivo (and not matter what your opinion is on her living or dying it is an agonizingly slow death), I think about the powerful words that have been written over at In The Tent.

Woman Thou Art Loosed

Those words are spoken by the Spirit to many woman all over the world today. Read them for yourself.

What value, human life?

This is a letter to the editor in the National Post, Monday March 28/05
Terri Schiavo, as tragic as her last hours are, illustrates the incredible strength of political will when rallied around a compelling cause. In her case, legislators attempted to make the withdrawal of life-support unlawful, speaking passionately to the value of human life.
Contract this with the chronic withholding of lifesaving drugs and treatment that the world's poor endure every single day. In their case, under-funding is endemic and international guidelines on support - such as spending 0.7% GDP on development aid - are perpetually ignorned. And while political will to combat poverty soared a few short months ago during the tsunami crisis in Southeast Asia, the sober second-thought of Western politicians has decreed that the lives of the poorest still aren't worth saving normally.

A question I have in this case is that it has been said over and over that Terri Schiavo is in a permanent vegetative state and feels no pain. Why then, tell me please, have the medical caregivers begun a morphine drip for pain? If she feels no pain, as they have been saying, why give her morphine?

Just things I pondered as I read the paper waiting for my two ferry ride home today.

Solitude

I love Jesus words when things got busy: "Come off by yourselves; let's take a break and get a little rest." For there was constant coming and going. They didn't even have time to eat.

These words that Jeremiah wrote are a beacon of light for me:12"When you call on me, when you come and pray to me, I'll listen. 13"When you come looking for me, you'll find me. "Yes, when you get serious about finding me and want it more than anything else, 14I'll make sure you won't be disappointed." GOD's Decree.
It's a steel clad promise for me.

I am off to a small place at the edge of the sea, on the wild west coast of Vancouver Island. I am going for some solitude where I will spend some time holding Abba to this promise. I am serious about finding more of Him.

Marking places and events holds great significance for me. Last Easter, alone in a small town north of where I live Abba took the grave clothes off of my love of writing and breathed new life into it. Much has been revived since but there are still things that remain in the ashes and the Spirit whispers "it is time". Time to move, time to be breathed on in a new way.

I look forward to long walks at the edge of the sea, listening to the sea breathe upon the shore. I look forward to taking my fish, bread and wine to some place on the sand in the early morning of Easter Sunday. I will go to greet the Almighty knowing He already waits there for me.

However you choose to mark Easter this year I pray that you will feel the breath of God upon you, breathing life into dark places, into the ashes. In that moment when you know the breathing from the Spirit, may you know it deep within you, feel yourself inhaling more of Them in the Light and exhale the darkness to make room for more Light. Breath in LIFE as your heart removes some grave clothes.

Once our hearts get broken...

Once our hearts get broken, they never fully heal. They always ache. But perhaps a broken heart is a more loving instrument. Perhaps only after our hearts have cracked wide open, have finally and totally unclenched, can we truly know love without boundaries.

— Fred Epstein

Via CowPi Quotes

Make Me A Prayer - Invite Me to Dance

For a number of weeks I have been reading about prayer, wholeness that comes with complete connections between the body and mind, and about dancing. I have watched several movies that focus on dance and the consequential release of the heart, thereby allowing it to become fully and passionately alive. If the disconnect between heart and mind is removed, the body begins to work and move in harmony. I have also been considering the question of speaking without words – how is that possible. Often there isn’t the opportunity or space for words and communication must be created through different means. How can the whole body speak a language that can be heard?

Those of you who have stopped by here before will know I have spoken of the divided heart. My own divided heart is being embroidered together again in the desert of detachment: a Divine destination for reattachment of the whole body – mind, soul and spirit. My hunger for inner connection is also a request to the Desert Lover of my soul to be invited to dance. In the place of dancing can I allow my breathing to become a continual prayer to Yeshua, a continual conversation that does not need to be words? I long to be totally and completely connected within to Yahweh. Where the dark places are held open to the Light, a wide-open heart leans into the dance, hope-FULL, and abandoned into that Love.

Celeste Snowber a dancer, educator and writer at Simon Fraser University, has written a book Embodied Prayer. Anj referred to it in her blog today. She speaks of embodiment as how we are connected to and communicating with God. Honoring our bodies is the foundation of embodied prayer. If we live in deep gratitude with our bodies, we can see that simple acts of physically engaging in the world can be a way to honoring the holy in our bodies. Our lives then become a constant prayer listening, speaking and honoring God by being fully connected and alive. Celeste is co-leading a workshop, The Dance, in June and I plan to attend.

If this is so, in order to dance I must posture myself in prayer and allow the Spirit to become the music that will lift my limbs, my eyes, become my voice and allow connection, deep intense connection to living that is filled by the Almighty. I have become aware of how often I fold my arms tightly across my chest. An unconscious act of protecting my heart and keeping it closed up. Posturing the body to open the heart I take a deep breath, drop my shoulders, let my rib cage expand, my arms hang relax at my sides, hands are relaxed and ready to receive and I whisper “Abba, I open my heart yet a little more.” Dancing freely (moving ones limbs however you are lead to) in the early morning becomes a posturing, motioning of prayer that opens the heart to hear God speak.

Catherine de Hueck Doherty says:
Prayer is that hunger for union, which never lets go of us. It beats into our blood with the very beat of our hearts. It is a thirst that can be quenched by nothing except God. It’s as if one’s whole body is poised on tiptoe, our hands stretching upward as if to touch the cosmos. The act of prayer, like the act of love, involves movement and effort. You don’t pray like a robot anymore than you make love like one? Prayer is movement, stretching, seeking, holding, finding…

Our bodies are a holy gift that the Spirit of God breathes into. Moses was told, be careful not to treat the holy gifts of the people of Israel as though they were common. The Apostle Paul writes God has made our bodies with many parts, and he has put each part just where he wants it …If one part suffers, all the parts suffer with it, and if one part is honored, all the parts are glad. Hence if pain or suffering has caused us to close off parts of our heart, the whole body reacts to that silencing. The body clearly speaks to us when it is tired, fragile, broken or hungry. What does that speaking sound/feel like? When the mind, body and soul are connected we will hear not only this voice, but also the voice of the Spirit that lives within us. We will be unafraid to dance with the heart and mind fully participating.

Snowber writes, Part of recovering our bodies is accepting our in-between states, our imperfections, and acknowledging that we are clay. Many of us have become estranged from our bodies; it is time to make them friends. They are part of us, and we must invite them back. If we don’t, we will become increasingly alienated from ourselves. For me, it has been my heart that has become estranged from my body. This intensely personal desert of detachment is where Yeshua is reuniting the body, mind and soul. The exploration of prayer and breathing also comes with His invitation to dance.

Yeshua make me a prayer
Invite me to dance
My answer is YES.

Epicurean Odyssey - the simple feast

A little fish, some loaves of bread, fruit of the vine, candlelight and conversation. The simple life.

Tonight as I sauté eggplant, onions, garlic and sun dried tomatoes and sip my glass of Stump Jump red wine, I wonder. What is it that makes sitting at one’s own table, with friends, such a sacred experience? It must relate somehow to simplicity.

It doesn’t have to be fancy, take a lot of planning and hours of work. For instance, on a week night it is great to sit down to a simple meal with good friends, enter into excellent conversation and end the day feeling so refreshed and content and marvelously alive. Living in a small community where 10-15 minutes of travel time brings friends to your door is an advantage that is not taken for granted. City life seems long ago, although 4 years is a small space of time in the grand scheme of ones life. Small community living, away from traffic, hustle and bustle and a ferry being the only way to arrive, limits those who are willing to make the trek and insulates those who wish to remain more reclusive.

A friend came into town and so a gathering of German, Swiss, Canadian – westerners and easterners, were seated round my antique oak dining room table. A quick stop at the grocery store the night before had some snapper, basa, new potatoes, asparagus, arugola, grape tomatoes and Zinfandel waiting in the fridge. One guest brought home made Pinot Grigio wine and a lovely fresh baguette, another brought Italian red wine and the last brought some Swiss chocolate pudding from her homeland.

It is a dance, always a dance, to work alone in the kitchen. Creating, taking the fresh produce and ingredients in my hands letting their raw texture tell me a story. Soon the final product will be displayed on the table. The table was set with colourful placemats, brass punch cups hold tea lights and are scattered around the center placemat. Wine glasses that were wedding presents of my Grandmothers’ are delicate and elegant while the silver cutlery has been collected over many years. White plates are Portuguese and are the canvas upon which the epicurean art will be placed – although not for long!

My mind wonders back to Castellammare di Stabia, the ship building town south of Naples where life is raw and colourful. Nothing in North America can duplicate the narrow streets, motorcycles whizzing by, laundry waving from the balcony above you, voices echoing between the cement apartment buildings and the fragrance of fresh fish and fresh bread mingling together. Rather like the bitter and sweet – one is repelling, the other inviting and both will always be in the fragrance of life. My year of life there is deeply etched within, always coming to mind.

Back to the kitchen in the small community, soft music plays, Sebastian the cat lounges by the window wondering what will come next and the little galley kitchen is full of activity. I sauté the shallots in a touch of olive oil, and then place the basa and snapper fillets into the pan. Home brewed Zinfandel is poured over them, grape tomato halves and sun dried black olives, a touch of salt and white pepper and it is ready to go into the oven. The small scrubbed new potatoes are steaming and the asparagus is ready to be sautéed quickly in olive oil and garlic.

I remember Signora Giulia’s kitchen where she was queen and I a bystander only participating in the eating and the washing of the dishes. She may never know how much I learned as I brought home the fresh produce and she began the process of preparing the meal of the day. Castellammare di Stabia seems so far away.

Simplicity - all in one. The large oval Italian platter is warmed and ready to receive the fish, the potatoes and asparagus. Fresh lemon and olive oil is drizzled over the vegetables and some capers are tossed over the fish. The steaming platter is placed in the center of the table, the bread is sliced, the arugola and tomato insalata is ready, wine glasses are topped up and we sit down together. Conversation is not broken between the easy chairs of the living room and the antique oak chairs round the table. After the first course has been consumed Swiss chocolate pudding is served in deep purple glass dishes that were also my Grandmother’s wedding presents. Some St.Agur and Brie cheese along with crackers is enjoyed along with coffee or herbal tea. Earthy – it is all so earthy and simple.

It is so rich yet it costs so little monetarily. It is so simple – yet holds such depth. It is the point at which I realize relationships and food will always be intertwined. Slow food and relationships are a gift I learned to treasure in my year in Sud Italia. It is impossible not to bring Italia to my table now because the lessons there are woven into the fabric of my thinking and breathing. I am in an attitude of gratitude for this sacred love of the epicurean odyssey.

Let's Get Jesus Back

Here is an excellent article from Daily Dig that speaks more about the subject of anger - Jesus and anger to be specific.

…On an impulse I reached for the Bible in the pew in front of me. It fell open to the Gospel of Matthew where the life of Jesus unfolds chapter by chapter. Glancing at the headings I was reminded of the central events of that brief but intense life and of the great themes of his ministry: There was Jesus being baptized; Jesus tempted in the Wilderness; Jesus delivering the Sermon on the Mount; speaking in parables; healing the leper, the blind, the cripple; feeding the hungry; choosing his disciples; turning his face to Jerusalem to be greeted by a cheering multitude.

And then—in the 21st chapter—a change. Something I had missed in my many early readings of this story, even in my seminary studies. Jesus becomes angry. We are told that he “went into the temple and drove out all who were buying and selling in the temple precincts; he upset the tables of the money-changers…and said to them, ‘Scripture says—My house shall be called a house of prayer, but you are making it a den of robbers.’”

Jesus—angry!

Take a minute to read it all here.

Anger, Injustice and Pain

The word ANGER has been in my thoughts this week.

Last Monday someone I met with challenged me about anger. I was angry that she felt I was angry! What was I angry about? Is anger an emotion I am comfortable with? Yes. No. What was it all about? Admittedly there were some things on my mind that I was wrestling with. I didn’t want to acknowledge how angry I was about them.

On Tuesday at “the whatever” which Mike Todd leads, his wife Sue spoke about anger and how God feels about anger, how God gets angry, and the fact that God’s anger is related to injustice.

I chewed on these thoughts for the evening and they were there as I went to sleep. Why had this subject of anger been in my thoughts, and why was I fighting them?

Mike has an article about an amazing young woman in Pakistan who has survived against all odds. Culturally she should have killed herself after being gang raped, to protect her family honor. I read this article When Rapists Walk Free. Anger – I feel angry at the injustice of those who hold the power, and sorrow, as well as admiration, for this woman who has fought back, in spite of her pain.

A nine-year old girl Rumanian was brought to Canada by a Canadian Dr and his wife. As she left Rumania her citizenship in that country was revoked. After spending 6 months in Canada, for some reason that no one can explain to this day, this nine-year old Rumanian girl was put on a plane, alone and like a package, shipped back to Rumania, her birth country. Her citizenship in that country was revoked when she left 6 months earlier and as she never applied for citizenship in Canada (she was only 9!) she is not a Canadian citizen. She is now 21, has a child of her own and is a woman with no identity. Rumania denies she was ever there, Canada denies any responcibility in assisting her. She cannot apply for work, for medical care and had no voice to fight her cause. Only recently has an Irish journalist brought her case to the attention of those who can fight on her behalf. The rejection first by her birth family and then by her adoptive family, acerbated by poverty and neglect have left this woman deeply emotionally damaged. Anger – I feel anger at the injustice of those who hold power and sorrow for this young woman who is desperate for an identity.

W-FIVE had a program this weekend on European women arriving in Canada, with a propery entry visa granted by our Government, allowing them to work as exotic dancers. After much pressure and publicity on this subject this visa entry program has been resinded. A blind eye is simply turned on these women who are white slaves in our country. These women are smuggled illegally into many countries. They arrive in Canada legally but are still forced to surrender their documents and be held hostage in this “free” world. At the end of the road they are forced into various forms of prostitution. Anger – I feel angry at the injustice of those who hold power and sorrow over the pain of this exploitation.

Every day there will be more cases that trigger God’s anger because injustice has taken place.

As I have looked into my own heart this week I have realized that often our anger is connected to pain. Pain that we carry as a result of injustice. For so long I have felt that God was angry with me with the events that have caused deep pain in my life. As I awoke last Wednesday morning, the shalom of His presence was in the room. A weight had been lifted from my soul. For the first time I actually knew, in my head and in my heart, that God was not angry with me for the events that have caused such pain. He was angry at the injustice, and I felt the compassion and tenderness of unconditional love.

Anger, injustice and pain. God feels them all. So do we.

Windstorms of Life

To love means never to be afraid of the windstorms of life: should you shield the canyons from the windstorms you would never see the true beauty of their carvings.

— Elisabeth Kubler-Ross

Thanks to CowPi Quotes for this sage advise I found today.