Lent Retreat, Week 3, Day 1: Renewing

“One of the great disadvantages of hurry

is that it takes such a long time.”

-G. K. Chesterton-

There is a tale of an Englishman who travels to Africa, and hires some local men to help and guide him on his journey. It is a multiple day, arduous journey. After several strenuous days of travel, the guides resolutely stop, refusing to go any further. When the Englishman asks, through the translator, why the men are stopping, the translator replies that they are waiting for “their souls to catch up with their bodies.”

We all need times of rest, for our bodies and spirit to reconnect in common rhythm, and we can feel whole and united with who we most truly are.

Today, we are often living at a rapid pace, with an overwhelming array of options vying for our attention. Even in these days of pandemic and isolation, we might struggle to keep up -- forced to find alternative ways to work, go to school, shop, exercise, connect with loved ones, and worship. Life in this time of pandemic can feel even more challenging because the situation is constantly changing. Even if we do not leave our homes, we are still aware of a deep sense of the world's unease and grieving.

We need to pause... rest, renew and restore. A “holy pause” can help us notice the miracles of life and love, around us and within us. As we pause in the midst of our hurry and rushing, we can let go of what we are holding so tight, and open to Presence - our own presence in this moment, and God’s presence with us.

The following hymn was written by Katharina Amalia Dorothea von Schlegel (b. 1697) in 1752. The tune is attributed to Jean Sibelius and is sung by the a cappella group Libera. It seems people have always needed to be encouraged to rest, and be still.

Be Still My Soul: https://youtu.be/moSYq5KmwBM

“Be still, my soul: the waves and wind still know

His voice who ruled them while he dwelt below.”

~Catharina von Schlegel

In this season of Lent, how might you find a gentler, slower rhythm that helps you notice God's presence?

In her latest book, “Sacred Time: Embracing an Intentional Way of Life,” Christine Valters Paintner writes, "The monks and hermits of various spiritual traditions know this truth – that rushing does not bring the grace of the fullness of time, only slowing down can do that. This is the paradox at the heart of contemplative life. When we slow down, life and its possibilities seem to expand. When we rush everything feels constricted."

Sabbath Rest: One practice that might help us regularly tune into this place of rest, to help our lives expand when everything can feel so "constricted" is to set aside a time for Sabbath.

"Sabbath ceasing [means] to cease not only from work itself, but also from the need to accomplish and be productive, from the worry and tension that accompany our modern criterion of efficiency, from our efforts to be in control of our lives as if we were God, from our possessiveness and our enculturation, and finally from the humdrum and meaninglessness that result when life is pursued without (God) at the center of it all." (Marva Dawn)

How might you set aside a space and time for Sabbath rest? If not an entire day, perhaps a few hours? Or a small portion of each day? Can you stop, and allow time for your spirit to catch up with your body (which has been rushing through your days, trying so hard to take care of you and others)? Creating space for Sabbath rest is not only to fulfill a religious mandate, it is necessary for your physical, emotional, and spiritual survival. It is breath. It is life. We need to understand the great truth of this need for rest and slowing. Thomas Merton names our modern-day rushing "violence."

“The rush and pressure of modern life are a form, perhaps the most common form, of its innate violence. To allow oneself to be carried away by a multitude of conflicting concerns, to surrender to too many demands, to commit oneself to too many projects, to want to help everyone in everything, is to succumb to violence.”

Is there a place where you find rest? Rachel Naomi Remen writes about being among the redwood trees, and enveloped in their great silence:

The silence in the giant redwood forest near my home draws me. Many mornings I get up early and dress hurriedly to get to the woods before the tour buses… At eight in the morning, the great trees stand rooted in silence so absolute that one's inmost self comes to rest. An aged silence. The grandmother of silences. I find the silence even more remarkable than the trees.

Some people find Sabbath rest in baking, reading, napping, spending time with beloveds, listening to music. For me, nature is a trustworthy place for pausing, breathing deeply, and connecting into something larger than myself - a place of expanding.

There are countless ways to enter in...

Consider the liles of the field,

the blue banks of camas opening

into acres of sky along the road.

Would the longing to lie down

and be washed by that beauty

abate if you knew their usefulness,

how the natives ground their bulbs

for flour, how the settlers’ hogs

uprooted them, grunting in gleeful

oblivion as the flowers fell?

And you—what of your rushed

and useful life? Imagine setting it all down—

papers, plans, appointments, everything—

leaving only a note: “Gone

to the fields to be lovely. Be back

when I’m through with blooming.”

Even now, unneeded and uneaten,

the camas lilies gaze out above the grass

from their tender blue eyes.

Even in sleep your life will shine.

Make no mistake. Of course

your work will always matter.

Yet Solomon in all his glory

was not arrayed like one of these.

(Lynn Unger)

Questions for reflection: (please share in the comments below if you feel led)

1) What is the busyness in your life that gets in the way of being being aware of God's presence in you and around you? Can you name what makes you feel distracted and/or in a hurry?

2) Is there a word or phrase in the poem above that speaks to you, challenges you, encourages you?

3) What is your current practice of Sabbath? Like Rachel Naomi Remen seeking silence among the redwoods, where do you go (or what activities do you engage in) to experience Sabbath rest? What does your spirit long for in this season of your life?

Blessing:

Amid your wanting

Let there be stillness

And in your desiring

Let there be silence.

Let there be release

And the simple grace

Of breath,

Of peace,

Of rest.

(Jan Richardson)

Sources:

1. Christine Valters Paintner, Sacred Time, Embracing an Intentional Way of Life (Notre Dame, IN, Sorin Books, 2021)

2. Thomas Merton, The Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander (New York: Image Classic, 1968), 81.

3. Marva Dawn, Keeping the Sabbath Wholly: Ceasing, Resting, Embracing, Feasting, Grand Rapids, MI, Eerdmans, 1989, 3.