Jesus Died for the Sake of God

Let’s start with a multiple-choice question. What do believe about the nature of God?

A. Do you believe God is violent?
B. Do you believe God is love?
C. Do you believe God is both?
D. Do you believe God is neither?
E. You don’t know?
F. You don’t care?

Why is this question important? What you believe about the nature of God should impact what you eat (the environment), how you spend your money (the economy), and how you vote (politics). What you think about the nature of God should influence every aspect of your life.

Many of you are doing the hard work of thinking about the nature of God. There are at least 50 people in our congregation that are reading Richard Rohr’s Immortal Diamond. I’m not going to apologize for the difficult and controversial nature of the book. I do commend you for your courage to accept the challenge. I want to encourage you to hang in there and keep up this difficult and important work. I also want to encourage those of you who are not in one of our House Church groups to read the book. Rohr is challenging us to think differently about the nature of God and how that changes how we think about every aspect of our lives.

To better understand Rohr’s work, I’ve been reading two of the authors that have influenced his ideas. Those of you who read Rohr’s daily meditations know that he continues to mine the writings of twentieth century psychiatrist Carl Jung. Jung considered Jesus Christ to be the archetypal Self, as Rohr puts it, the True Self. Jung and Rohr believe we should model our exploration of our True Self after Jesus’s personal process. (See Jung’s Aion, especially Chapter 5, “Christ the Symbol of the Self)

Rohr has also spent a lot of time with the integral philosopher Ken Wilber, particularly his books The Theory of Everything and Integral Spirituality. Wilber’s ideas integrate spiral dynamics with ancient/future thought and practice. Wilber is attempting to create a philosophy that includes the complexity of our world in our efforts to evolve in every aspect, of mind, body, and soul.

When I’m doing this kind of difficult work, I also like to balance my non-fiction reading with good fiction, which can amplify my thinking. I’m re-reading one of my favorite novels Cloud Atlas by Irishman David Mitchell. His book was a New York Times bestseller for quite some time. A film based on Mitchell’s book starring Tom Hanks and Hallie Berry quickly gained a cult following. I think Mitchell is a contemporary blend of W.B. Yeats and Charles Williams. Cloud Atlas is a post-postmodern epic about the transmigration of souls. He has nested six stories in his complex novel—a story within a story within a story within a story within a story within a story within a story—a story about souls traveling across time. Mitchell has crafted a novel that dares to engage the philosophy of the spiral evolution of the soul.

Together, Rohr, Wilber, and Mitchell have provided me with an integrated way of re-engaging the stories of the Bible—stories like Job.

Today we’ve heard a portion of the story of Job—an ancient myth that typically makes us cringe. Job is a metaphor about the suffering of humanity and God’s complicity in that suffering. (See Carl Jung’s Answer to Job.)

In case you don’t know the story of Job, it goes like this—God and Lucifer are sitting in heaven admiring Job’s wonderful life. Lucifer wagers God that if Job had to suffer, Job would deny his love of God. The Divine One takes the bet. In the next scene, Job tragically loses everything—his wealth, his family, his health. He’s left homeless, his children are dead, and he suffers from an incurable disease. To make matters worse, Job’s friends tell him his suffering is due to his sin. Even Job’s wife tells him to curse God and die. But Job would have none of it—he had done nothing wrong. He would not accept blame. Nor would he turn against God. Finally, given the opportunity, Job, like Jesus, cries out to God, “Why have you abandoned me?”

This is when we hear the terrible words coming from the mouth God, violent, vengeful, immature, irascible words. These words make us look away. How can The Divine One stomp his feet and act like an abusive father? Then, in a weird twist, the story ends with Job gaining new wealth and a new family. But, really nothing was fixed. Job, like Jesus, still bore the scars of feeling abandoned by God, the grief of losing his children, and the physical pain he endured. Job still suffered. Jesus still suffered.

Unfortunately, throughout the history of Christian theology, the story of Jesus has not been nested within the story of Job. By reading Job in isolation, God has been left in the unfortunate position of being a blood thirsty God. Christianity has not allowed its view of God to grow up, mature or evolve from the irascible God of Job to the God of Jesus who is an unconditional lover. Christians have been left with a God who willingly sacrificed his only son as a ransom for the soul of humanity. The majority of Christianity still believes that God needed to sacrifice Jesus for their personal sins—and that, most unfortunately, leaves God trapped in the story of Job, a blood thirsty, violent, angry God. It also allows Christians to justify their own acts of anger, vengeance, and violence.

However, if we read the story of Jesus nested within the story of Job, where God is God and Job is Jesus, the story of Jesus redeems the irascible God of Job. Rohr says that Jesus did not come to change God’s mind about humanity, but instead to change humanity’s belief about God. If we nest Jesus’s story within Job’s story, we realize that Job and Jesus’s stories are about humanity’s evolution in their thinking of God—Job’s God of violence, matures into Jesus’s loving Abba, daddy.

So why did Jesus have to die a horrible death on the Cross? So that God could experience Job’s pain, Jesus’s pain, humanity’s pain. God came into this world at the moment Jesus became vulnerable enough to become One with his heavenly Abba. At that moment, God, the Lover, began to experience, through Jesus Christ, human fear, suffering, pain, and death. Jesus suffered so that God could suffer. Jesus did not die for our sake. Jesus died for the sake of God.

So what does this mean? It means that through God’s suffering, God became One with us. It means, we don’t have to worry about whether we are going to heaven or not. That decision was already made through God’s desire to be One with us—to suffer as Job suffered, to suffer as Jesus suffered, to suffer as we suffer.

What Richard Rohr is trying to teach us is that in order to bring love to earth, we must realize that we are One with God the Lover. Like Jesus, we must contemplate on God’s love for us. Like Jesus, we must love God like God loves us. Like Jesus we must love our neighbors like God loves them. Like Jesus we must love our enemies like God loves them. We must love like the Jesus we follow. Love is the answer, radical love, evolved love, a God matured love.

Jesus did not die so that we would have it easy. Jesus came to show us how to live in this complex and painful world. Jesus came to help us see that we are One with God, The Undivided Trinity, The Lover, The Beloved, The Spiritual Wisdom of Sophia. I know, this is all weird—but this will change everything.

Soul Conversation: Another Word for Theology?

What is another word for theology, incarnation, resurrection, salvation, sacrament, and every other theological word that the most people in the pew can’t define much less the person in line at Starbucks?

Several years ago, a good friend of mine, the Reverend Daniel Richards and I would regularly meet for coffee. Somehow the conversation always turned towards the theological end of the table. We talked about life among young adults. We asked big questions. We talked about God. We were doing theology. We carried those conversations into our Thursday night gathering with young adults; something we called Peregrini. The topics for those caffeine stoked nights were always built on a question; “God?” “Life after Death?” “Resurrection?” You know. Those small topics. What Daniel and I were discovering was that theology is best done out of the context of a conversation. The problem is, no one knew what the word ‘theology’ meant—much less words like Eucharist, incarnation, resurrection, salvation, or sacrament. Most of all, they didn’t care. They did have some reactions—mostly adverse feelings towards words like baptism, conversion, and sin. While words like grace and forgiveness felt better, few had little experience with those words when it comes to the church. But, having conversation, that was another matter. Young adults, and truthfully, most people, want to have a conversation, even about God. A conversation between two souls wrestling with God, questions can be helpful, even hopeful.

The word theology is typically a turnoff to anyone but certain clergy and academic types. Theology, simply put, is the study of religious faith, practice and experience. Words, especially religious words, are so loaded with negative baggage that most everyone, including those in church, has lost interest. I’ve begun to wonder if we could find ways to re-ensoul these ancient words with new life? Or do we have to find new words, or forgotten words without baggage in order to have soul conversations about God?

At times our Peregrini group got close to re-ensouling words. Peregrini reminded me of a more famous gathering who struggled with faith and words. I can imagine the Inklings gathered around a pint in Oxford. C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien, Owen Barfield, and Charles Williams working at changing the course of art, thought, and theology. Instigating a revolution by evolution. They were doing theology through conversation. They were using old words in new ways—creating a fresh look at language to express their musings, fears, wonderings about the divine. They took bold risks. They made up words. Used ancient words in new ways. They didn’t think outside the box. They created a new box.

Barfield said that words have souls—souls that contain the souls of the ancients of the past; as such, they tell the story of consciousness; the souls of the words carry the consciousness of the ancients into the future. (Fellowship of the Inkling, 107) Something like what Saint John the Divine was imagining when he wrote, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” God is a verb, not a noun. That changes everything. I think Saint John was struggling just like we do to find a poetic artistry in order to describe our evolutionary experience of the divine. The Anglican poets John Donne, George Herbert, W.B. Yeats, T.S. Eliot, R.S. Thomas were also crafting alchemical artistry through the words of life to tell us about their spiritual experience. They had a soul-centric worldview. A word-centric worldview. They had mystical experiences. They crafted their words. Their work was bathed in soul conversations with others who dared the same experiment.

Con-versation is the idea of creating a living poem—of verse flowing from one soul to another soul, through time. Having a vulnerable soul conversation in a public setting, a coffee shop, a pub, on a sidewalk, on Facebook can invites others and the holy to listen in. These soul conversations can create the possibility for words to evolve. We can explore how to use language to describe our experience with the divine. This public action of doing soul conversation about God with others, which includes God, is similar to what the Zohar teaches—rabbi’s interpreting scripture (doing Midrash) in community. They were practicing a personally felt spirituality of the soul that was steeped in the murky milieu of conversation. (Meditations on the Tarot, 267)

Words matter. The words we use in conversation matter. The words in soul conversation can matter the most. Philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein, Old Testament theologian Walter Bruggemann, Franciscan monk and Roman Catholic priest Richard Rohr, and post-postmodern philosopher Ken Wilber agree on one at least one thing—words matter, a lot, more than that, words are the I, the She/He, the IT, the We in human understanding. I suggest that we must be willing to have public conversations about God. Now is the time to have these public conversations using words of the “World Come of Age.”

We must search for words that are devoid of Renaissance, Reformational, Enlightened, Modern, and even Postmodern baggage. We may have to reach back for those words to a time even before Jesus. Or we may need to strain forward to find new words. We definitely will have to re-ensoul heavy theological words. Old words and new words, words that are open to new meanings and new interpretations. We must do this work for a time in the future we can only imagine but may never experience. We are compelled to do this work in order to have vital conversations about God—today—so that we may have conversations about these soul experiences, today, and tomorrow. If words like “theology” have lost their souls, then we have to either re-ensoul them or bury them. I wonder, what words do you imagine we could use to describe our conversations about God, with God?

God is Weird and that Changes Everything

I’m writer. I do a lot of research and some I do on the Internet. In researching for this series of sermons on the Beatitudes I got a pop up add for this T-shirt I bought. Which reads, “Blessed are the weird people, the writers, the artists, the dreamers, the outsiders, for they force us to see the world differently.”

Twelve years ago, as part of my training to become a priest, I worked as a hospital chaplain. I worked nights and weekends. One night, sometime after mid-night, I received a page from the psychiatric ward. Actually, because I worked nights, I spent most of my time between ER, ICU, and the psychiatric ward. When I arrived at the front desk to the unit, the nurse told me the room number. She also asked me not turn on the lights in the room. She said the lights really upset the patient.

I taped on the door. There was no answer. I eased into the room without opening the door very wide. I taped on the inside of the door. “Hello. I’m the chaplain. My name is Gil.” A voice from the dark said, “Sit down.”

I slid down the wall and sat on the floor. The only light in the room was from the smoke alarm in the center of the ceiling. I had hoped my eyes would eventually adjust to the darkness. “Is there something you would like to talk about?” I asked. I sat in silence for quiet a long time.

Then the person sitting somewhere in the room said, “God is weird.”

I said, “Yeah, I know.” We sat in silence. And that changes everything.

I’ve thought about that exchange so much my head hurts. God is weird and that changes everything.

I was created in the image of God. I was created to be a unique and authentic person. That means no one is like me. Therefore, I am weird. You were created in the image of God. You were created to be a unique and authentic person. That means no one is like you. Therefore, you are weird. God created us in God’s image. No one is like God, but everyone is like God. That’s weird. That changes everything.

My sister is mentally and physically handicapped. She’s the most spiritual person I know. That’s weird. That changes everything.

My grandson is three and half years old. He was outside with my wife a few months ago. He and my wife were sitting on lawn chair swing for two people. He was lying on the seat with his head in Cathy’s lap. She asked him if he wanted a snack. “No, Gaga. I just want to lay here and look up at God’s beautiful world.” That’s weird. That changes everything.

Did you know that ravens can talk? I met one in Ireland who talked to me. That’s weird. That changes everything.

You have atoms in you that are13 million years old? That’s weird. That changes everything.

We’re breathing the same molecules of air that the dinosaurs, Abraham, Moses, and Jesus breathed. That’s weird. That changes everything.

There was a recent discovery in a cave in southern Africa. Fifteen remains of a human-like creature, part ape/part man. Scientist believe because of the way the remains were placed in the cave that those people, who lived 3 million years ago, were capable of ritual behavior. That’s weird. That changes everything.

The Book of Ezekiel in the Hebrew bible was written over 2,500 years ago. The book is about Ezekiel’s vision of a chariot coming down out of the sky. The chariot held four creatures, each with four faces, one a human, one a lion, one an ox, one an eagle. Some scholar’s think Ezekiel might have been mentally ill or at least taking some psychedelic drugs. That’s weird. That changes everything.

Owen Barfield (one of the Inklings) said that words have souls—those words carry the consciousness of the ancients from the past into the future. The writer of the Gospel of John wrote, “In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God, and Word was God.” Someone told me that in the Spanish translation of this verse it reads, “In the beginning was the Verb and the Verb was with God, and the Verb was God.” That’s weird. That changes everything.

Jesus told people to love God. Jesus told his followers to love each other. Religious people said he was a heretic. Political people said he was dangerous. So, they killed him. That’s weird. That changes everything.

Matthew Bellamy, lead singer for the band Muse wrote, “Love is our resistance.” That sounds like Jesus. That’s weird. That changes everything.

Jesus said, “Follow me.” He never said worship me. That’s weird. That changes everything.

If you want to follow Jesus, then you’ll have to love God with same intensity Jesus loved God. And you’ll have to love other people with the intensity that Jesus loves us. When you do that, people will think you’re weird. And that will change everything.

The More I Experience, the Less I Believe

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.

I’ve walked four pilgrimages in Ireland—once I walked across Ireland almost 400 miles. The mountains of Ireland can be daunting; at times the weather can be harsh. I’ve walked alone. I’ve walked with groups of twelve. I’ve walked a twenty-three mile day. I’ve fasted during eight-hour walks. My pilgrimages have built on one another. I’ve encountered the mystical and the magical.

Before going on a walking pilgrimage I had to spend significant time preparing. I bought good boots. I took the time and walked the miles to break in my boots properly. For every 100 miles of pilgrimage, I walked 400 to get ready; that’s twenty-five miles a week for four months.

Still, after all this walking, I have a constant ache to walk another pilgrimage. I hunger to be on a perpetual pilgrimage. I’ve come to realize my life has been a series of one pilgrimage after another. Life is a spiral of what is above and what is below. Every event is connected, becoming integrated—mind, body, soul interwoven with nature and the Divine.

Jesus’ teaching in the Beatitudes is about a spiritual pilgrimage; a hunger for righteousness and purity. The English definitions of righteousness and purity can make us feel that Jesus’ goals are impossible to achieve. I feel that I can never be righteous and pure.

But in the Greek, the word righteousness, in this context, means we hunger and thirst for a ‘second chance.’ And the word purity is a chemical term, meaning a ‘heart of gold.’ Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for a second chance for they will be filled with a heart of gold and they will see God.

The point of Jesus’ teaching is that if we make the best of our second chance the process will lead to heart of gold. The second chance is walking another pilgrimage with God in order to create a heart of gold within us.

So, what does walking a pilgrimage with God look like? In our Book of Common Prayer, on page 236, there is this beautiful prayer of how to live a life walking with God. “Blessed Lord, who caused all holy scripture to be written for our learning; Grant us so to hear them, read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest them, that we may embrace and ever hold fast the blessed hope of everlasting life…” To spend our time immersed in the scripture is to walk with God.

In 1960 I was seven-years-old. My parents gave me this bible as a Christmas gift. As a child I made notes in the bible. Then, in 1967, my grandmother gave me this bible as a Christmas gift. There’s lot of underlining in this bible and more notes. At some point I had to tape the back on the bible to hold it together. In 1974, my sister-in-law gave me this bible for Christmas. (There seems to be a pattern forming.) This bible is filled with notes, underlining and colored highlights. In 1993, I bought a Harper Study Bible. I used this bible so much I had to tape the cover on it—the back broke and the pages started falling out. Then, ten years ago, at my ordination, the bishop presented me with this bible. It is also filled with notes and marking and the cover has fallen off this bible as well.

These bibles mark the progression of my spiritual pilgrimage with God; they are the symbols of the process of the spiral of my spiritual work. The first bible, I was a child—I thought like a child, talked like a child, and acted like a child. The second bible was during my teenage years. It was a period of stretching, testing, rebelling, and growing. The third bible was my young adult years. I was conforming to the way of world in which I lived. Cathy and I had young children. It was the first half of my life and I needed boundaries and guidelines. The Harper’s Bible is the symbol of moving from the first half of life to the second half—leaving the answers behind, to instead search for the questions that lead to more questions. The bible I’ve carried for the last ten years is a symbol of the pilgrimage of life. This bible is a symbol of the great paradox I’m experiencing. For the more liberal my theology becomes, the more mystically deep it goes. Honestly, I don’t believe anything anymore—however I continually have deep mystical magical knowledge filled experiences with the Divine. The less I know and believe, the more I experience. I’m starting to wonder if it’s time for a new bible?

A dear friend of mine told me a story about her dad. At the beginning of every year he would buy a new bible. He read, marked, learned, and inwardly digested that bible throughout the year. At the end of the year he would look back over the previous year’s bible to see if he’d changed his thinking in any way, which he often did. Even in retirement he kept up the practice of buying a new bible at the beginning of every year. Finally, near the end of his life, he couldn’t see very well nor hold his bible. It was then my friend would go see her dad everyday. And everyday she would read his bible to him. And regularly, he would stop her and say, “Ruth, underline that, make a note in the margin.”

This experience of spiritual pilgrimage is not unique. Everyone can walk this path with God—it never too late in life to begin spiraling above and below. You only need three things, a bible, a prayer book, and a pencil. In the back of the BCP are the daily readings. Ten minutes a day is all it takes to go on this mystical, knowledge filled, magical pilgrimage. Listen, read, mark, learn, inwardly digest—start walking.

Ode to William Rhodes

The Reverend Canon William Rhodes has slipped through the veil that shadows the world of the unseen from our eyes. His presence has moved beyond our vision but not from our hearts. His enchanting smile, though missed, will remain. His words, though not heard, will still remind. His beckoning of the saints to the Table will now be ours to fetch him to come.

Bill Rhodes was a living poem; he was wise, encouraging, an exact enigma. He was the master of the Table, keeper of the High Way. His theology was precise. His ethics made the margins as wide as the love of Christ he followed and as narrow as the path He walked.

Many of us have our favorite Father Bill story. Those remembrances will inspire us towards his path of courage and endurance. Bill Rhodes walked that dusty road, which was often filled with pain, pointing us to look at the redeemer and healer, God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We when hear those words, we will also hear the Sanctus Bells, smell the incense, see the fine vestments, taste the transmuted bread and wine, but we will only touch the priest in our souls. Grief can be as heavy as the aroma of years of frankincense. Let our tears mingle in the wine.

As was typical of Bill, just last week he gathered with his colleagues to discuss the challenging works of Franciscan Richard Rohr. The opinions in the room were as wide as the Anglican Communion. Some quoted scripture in defense of their position. Others referred to their experience of the Divine as the basis for their understanding. Bill Rhodes recited lines from the Eucharistic Prayer. His life of service to others was enmeshed in the liturgy he enveloped at the Table. Bill Rhodes had become the liturgy.

W.B. Yeats wrote, “Have not poetry and music arisen out of the sounds the enchanters made to help their imagination, to enchant, to charm, to bind with a spell themselves and the passers by? And just as the musicians or the poet enchants and charms and binds with a spell his own mind when he would enchant the mind of others, so did the enchanter create or reveal for himself as well as for others the supernatural artist or genius.”

William Rhodes was a living poem, the genius artist of the supernatural. He was an enchanter who invited us into the mystery of the Table. William Rhodes intimately knew the Triune God he so passionately celebrated as he opened the window for us to share a glimpse.

The poet may be hidden from our eyes, but his charm lingers in our hearts.

This is the famous stone
That turneth all to gold;
For that which God doth touch and own
Cannot for less be told.
“The Elixir,” George Herbert

Blessed are the Depressed

My sister has Prader-Willi Syndrome (PWS), a disorder of chromosome-15. Dinah is mentally and physically handicapped. While the life expectancy of someone with PWS continues to increase, many die in adolescence. Dinah just celebrated her sixtieth birthday as the oldest person with PWS in Arizona.

When our mother died in 2012, I drove the 150 desert miles from Phoenix to Tucson to give her the terrible news. When I told her our mom died, I thought her wailing would shatter the windows of heaven. I prayed her screams would drive God to cower in the corner. A few hours later we drove home together in silence. Within three days, Dinah and I would stand at the foot of mom’s grave and throw dirt on her casket.

Three months after the funeral, Dinah and I were having lunch. Despite her low IQ and difficultly speaking, she has the wisdom of a crone. She also has the connection with God of that of a mystical saint. A few people have dared ask if she really understands that our mother has died. I try not to bite back in anger when I’m thrown that ridiculous question.

Admittedly, though, even after our sixty years together, my conversations with Dinah can appear like a combination of playing 50 questions and charades. She starts by naming our children. I tell her every obscure detail I can think of. She’s always most interested in our grandchildren and our dog, Jesus. On the day of our lunch she worked her best to tell her stories, stringing three or four words together, followed by silence. Then she would say another word or two. I ask a question. More silence. Often, no matter how hard I try I don’t understand what she’s trying to tell me. At those times she usually says, “You no hear me.” Then she ponders her next words. She usually gives me a couple of attempts before she gets frustrated and says, “No mind.” She moves on. I miss my mom the most then because she understood Dinah the best.

Lunch finally arrived at our table. Dinah is always very intent on eating, part of being PWS. There is very little conversation during the meal. That day I idly offered a few rambling stories. When the plates were taken away. She resumed her questions about the family and the dog. Somewhere in the little strands of conversation she told me she had washed her hair that day.

“Do you wash your hair every day,” I asked.
She nodded an affirmative yes, as if to say, “You idiot, don’t you?”
I smiled the sheepish grin of an older brother who has just stepped into a little sister storm. I tried to recover. “Do you blow dry and style your own hair. It looks nice.”
“No, Joey,” she said making reference to her beloved caregiver.
“You have beautiful silver hair Dinah,” I said in truth.
She said without hesitation, “My momma’s hair.”
I wanted to cry, but I held my emotions below the surface. Silence was the best I could afford.
After a few minutes she said, “Momma no more.”

We sat there for five minutes in pristine silence. It was at if the entire restaurant, the outside world, and God herself had stopped breathing in communal grief waiting to hear what Dinah would say next. Then she shook her head as if to drive the thought of her dead mother out of mind. She looked at me and changed the subject back to the dog.
Driving away from her apartment hours later, I wondered why she said momma no more instead of my momma gone, or bye-bye momma, which she said at the viewing before the funeral. I have heard a few people tell her mom is with God in heaven, but she didn’t say any of those things. No. Just, “Momma no more.”

Was she giving testimony to the cold hard existential reality of death? Or was she making a comment about the loneliness we experience as sister and brother without our mom? Or does she know something about the afterlife? Can she see the other side, or the lack of it?

Listening to my sister is like doing dream work. The conversation is full of odd images, strange messages, and unfamiliar characters. What did that word mean? Did her lifted eyebrow have a hidden meaning? I couldn’t figure out exactly what she was saying. Was that about her friend at work or a neighbor? Maybe she was making a connection to some larger meaning about life? Listening to Dinah is like hearing the collective unconscious deliver some hidden message of archetypal importance.

I can’t always understand what she is trying to tell me. I can only do the hard work of listening and continuing to process and reflect, hoping I will uncover some koan. It’s impossible to know what she knows or feel what she feels. I can only know what I feel when I listen to her. The silence between her words has been transformative in my life.
“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.”

The divorce rate for parents with a PWS child is eighty-percent. Siblings of a PWS person are most likely to be estranged from their brother or sister. People with Prader-Willi Syndrome, their parents, and their siblings are all usual candidates for chronic and severe depression. My family beat the odds on two-out-of-three of those statistics. My parents maintained a loving relationship for sixty-four years. My sister and I are extremely close. But, my sister, my mother, and I have suffered from life-long chronic and at times severe depression. It took me fifty years to admit that, seek help, and then have the courage to say that publically. My family has been poor in spirit. And we have suffered grief.

Grief results from loss. Typically we think of grief being associated with loss from the death of a loved one. My mom, however, suffered depression from the loss of “what she had hoped for and what might have been.” She suffered as well from the simple and complex daily life of living with a mentally and physically handicapped child. Depression can be the result of grief, though not always. Sometimes depression just is—there is no cause—it just exists in someone’s life. Depression is not cured—it is only managed.

One of the tragedies that exist in our world today is that depression and all other forms of mental illness are typically hidden and rarely talked about. It’s okay to admit that I have some physical illness. People even offer to pray for us.

But what about mental illness—it’s not something we are typically willing to share with others. And usually if we do, people feel awkward around us when we talk about it. So what do we do when our family or friend tells us they are suffering from depression or some other form of mental illness?

First, be present by listening to them. Truly listen. And don’t offer any advice, like, “Just turn it over to God and everything will be okay.” That is not helpful. The most frustrating thing in the world for me is when my sister says, “You no hear me.” But, honestly, I feel equally as frustrated when I’m trying to explain to someone what it feels like to be depressed and I know they just can’t or won’t listen. I probably should start saying to them, “You no hear me.”

The second thing you do is to take their illness seriously. People who are depressed or suffer from other mental illness need support and care. Tell them you will pray that they will find the help they need so that they will have relief from their suffering.

It’s strange to think that Jesus said, blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Being poor in spirit doesn’t feel very heaven-like. But, when someone really listens and is present—that person feels like they are being God for me. I feel blessed when they listen. Maybe that’s what Jesus meant?

Does the Church have Evolutionary Purpose?

I started my career in professional baseball player as a catcher. Wasn’t too long though I became a utility player. Over the five years I played I logged at least an inning at every position. Being a “Jack-of-all-trades” also made me a “Master-of-none.” Labels are hard to shake.

When I started my new job a few weeks ago, someone from the diocese office sent me an email asking me to proof my new business cards. I’m not accustomed to having business cards—haven’t used one in ten years. When I saw my title on the card as “Canon” I laughed. I know I’m the Canon Theologian, I just didn’t expect it to show up on a business card. I had to look up what the title “Canon” meant on the Episcopal Church website. Fortunately, the title is honorary. I was afraid it was going to say, “Someone who shoots off their mouth very loudly.” I promise I’ll do my best to stay away from such a thing.

I’m uncomfortable with labels. I know my Myers-Briggs type and my Enneagram number. The type and number is important—I just don’t want to be pigeon holed. I think I’m more interested in the shadow side of the Myers-Briggs and wing and stress number of the Enneagram for reasons that make my type and number too obvious. While these types of labels can be valuable for self-reflection, they can also be dangerous.

James Fowler’s faith stage development and Ken Wilbur’s integral spirituality (spiral dynamics) are helpful when thinking about personal progression. However, it does seem rather presumptive to self-identify as being at the highest level in either model. Ten years ago, I wondered though, if an organization could be identified with a label using Fowler or Wilbur’s model. Recently, I read Frederic Laloux’s excellent book Reinventing Organizations where he has adopted spiral dynamics as a way of identifying the evolution of an organization.

Laloux has borrowed the color scheme of spiral dynamics as a means of measuring the higher consciousness development of for-profit businesses and non-profit organizations. Red is a tribal organization where the leader’s power is absolute. In Amber organizations there are more formal roles, but the power of leadership is still held at the top of the pyramid. At the Orange level the business or group is after growth and innovation, management by objectives; still leadership is pretty much top down. Green organizations follow the classic pyramid structure as well but use culture and empowerment to motivate the employees. They typically call themselves a family and their employees partners. At the height of the spiral are Teal organizations. These highly evolved businesses and non-profits are guided by three principles—self-management, wholeness, and evolutionary purpose.

In Teal organizations, 1) the employees have real decision-making power, self-management. The owners and CEO are no more powerful than the employees. 2) Everyone is encouraged to bring his or her whole self to work, wholeness. And 3) the purpose of the company will be expected to change over time, evolutionary purpose. The company must be agile (to use another business term) in management, operation, and vision. Teal organizations have self-management, wholeness, and evolutionary purpose.

Laloux is a researcher, not a businessman. I think his work could be important for the church for three reasons. 1) He included non-profits in his examination of sixteen companies. 2) In his work he included the Roman Catholic Church as an example. 3) In Teal organizations, he recognized that employees who were allowed to bring all of them selves (wholeness) including their spirituality to work, contributed more fully at work, home, and in the community.

So where did Laloux place the Church on the spiral? He included the Church, the military, most governmental agencies, and public schools in the Amber level. That’s top down command and control where stability is valued as the most important commodity in order to preserve the past so that it may be repeated in the future.

So what does all this color stuff really mean? The Rev. Gae Chalker, rector of St. Peter’s Episcopal Church, recommended I check out Laloux on YouTube. She has hopes that Laloux might be offering something very powerful for the church. I watched the YouTube for ninety-minutes. Laloux is an excellent speaker who described his research using understandable examples. I bought the book because in it he gave the recipe for taking an existing organization, like a church, to the Teal level.

Not surprisingly, the ingredients needed to take an organization to the Teal level are simple—yet rare to find. First, the leader must him or herself be at the Teal level in their personal life and then must be willing to take the risk to lead their organization to the next level. Second, the owners of the organization (board, vestry) must be willing to step back and let the CEO and the employees (church members) lead through self-management; while bringing their whole self to work (church), and allowing for an evolving purpose (something not imagined yet). In other words, the CEO and owners must let go of their control and power.

Is this possible? Laloux is hopeful because he believes that Teal is the next stage of human consciousness. He believes the old ways will naturally die and a new model will evolve. He suggests this is already happening and sites the global economy as an example.

Are all these labels useful? Could be, as long I, we, and the church are not checking our navels for labels. Self-reflection is valuable if it produces action. When the synthesis of contemplation and action are achieved we might recognize a resurrection happening in our midst. I pray I will live long enough to see the church with the beginnings of a teal hue.

The Words are the Same but the Meaning Keeps Changing

My granddad was a great storyteller. Most of his life he was a truck driver, often hauling cattle from Elk City, Oklahoma to Cozad, Nebraska. During the summers our family would visit my granddad and I’d get to ride along with him on his 24-hour turn around trips. On those trips he would tell me stories about his dad, his brother, my grandmother, who died before I was born, and my mom—story after story. He repeated those stories over and over again. While he died twenty-five years ago, I can still repeat almost every one of those stories word for word.

My granddad used to tell me, “With age comes freedom.” When I was nine, I thought that meant that I was old enough to have the freedom to ride along with him in his eighteen-wheeler. Then when I was a teenager I thought it meant that soon enough I would be old enough to drive his truck. Later I thought he was telling me I was old enough to get married. With every transition in life, I thought, the phrase, “With age comes freedom,” was about that particular place in my life. Now at sixty-one, with age comes freedom, is taking on a whole new meaning. The phrase changes meaning with time.

There’s a sentence in the bible that has had that same long-term resonance in my life. In John 3:30, John the Baptist says, “Jesus must increase and I must decrease.” I’ve been using that sentence as a prayer for thirty-seven years. For the last ten years as an Episcopal priest, I’ve prayed that prayer before I preach every sermon.

The sentence found me in 1978. I had taken a youth group to a Baptist camp in New Mexico. A young seminarian was the preacher for the week. He was very dynamic and he quoted that verse before every sermon. Southern Baptist’ rarely open their sermons with a sentence of prayer. So this young man was doing something very unique. Shortly after that camp I became the interim pastor for our church. I was twenty-five years old. I started using that sentence to open my sermons. I used the prayer so much that a friend of ours made a crossstitch of the verse as a gift. It has been hanging in every office I’ve had since.

But, what that verse meant to me thirty-seven years ago is much different than today. Then, it meant that I needed to be a better Christian. What I knew about being a Christian then really didn’t have much connection to who Jesus really was. Being a Christian was learning and following the rules and knowing all the right answers according to the church. It was, however, the Jesus I had grown up with—and that’s all okay. That’s just where I was 40 years ago.

My journey of trying to live into John the Baptist’ statement, “Jesus must increase and I must decrease,” has taken me down many roads. Over the years I’ve prayed that prayer, so many times, it’s been like placing a rough stone in a river. Rushing water smoothing the jagged stone of my soul in the river of prayer. My soul stone is still in that river. A lot more work needs to be done.

What’s happened over the years is that I have been shaped by the rushing water of prayer, scripture, and writer’s like Marcus Borg, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Walter Brueggemann, Stanley Hauerwas, Miguel Da Le Torre, Barbara Brown Taylor, Mary Oliver, Carl Jung, and a host of others. I’ve also been shaped by the ministry of presence of Tom Wiles, Glenn Hinson, Rebecca McClain, Veronica Ritson, and scores of others. In every one of these people I could recognize that they saw themselves as moving to the backstage while Jesus was moving front and center in their life. The Jesus they saw was a Jesus I had not imagined existed—a living Jesus Christ who was no longer trapped in the confines of the New Testament. They sought a Jesus Christ who is bigger than the bible, the church, and Christianity itself.

Fifteen years ago I went to a retreat led by one of the great Baptist’s of our time, Glenn Hinson. In my opinion he’s great because the fundamentalist fired him and he survived to teach again. He had been terminated from his professorship at a Baptist seminary because he was too liberal. One of his mistakes had been befriending Thomas Merton. Hinson took his young Baptist seminarians to meet Merton. Yep, that’ll get you fired. Anyway, Hinson introduced me to the idea of walking and praying every morning. When he first suggested it to me, I asked him what in the world I could talk to Jesus about for an hour. Hinson said to just tell Jesus what was going on in my life. He must have seen the horror on my face so he suggested I simply repeat a prayer as I walked. “You mean like, Jesus must increase and I must decrease.” Absolutely, he said. And that’s where the idea began that pilgrimage is a shaping force in the formation of soul. Pilgrimage as a way of life.
I’ve walked across Ireland, almost 400 miles of soul shaping, one step at a time. I’ve taken several walking pilgrimages in Ireland—this past summer with a singing choir group. Each journey has had a profound impact on my life. I have gone on pilgrimage to find wisdom, to have a mystical experience, to embrace the dangers of the four elements, to understand the fullest experience of the world, to have a total experience of the mystical, to gain spiritual knowledge, and engage in the sacred magic of Jesus. I want to not only be a follower of Jesus I want to be like Jesus. Jesus must increase and I must decrease.

That sounds so simple—but the meaning keeps changing with age.

In the Gospel of Thomas Jesus said, “Divine Reality exists inside and all around you. Only when you have come to know your true Self will you be fully known—realizing at last that you are a child of the Living One.”

What I think Jesus meant was that I have to know my Self fully in order to be fully like Jesus. If I want Jesus to increase in my life I need the 360-degree of self-awareness. Jesus went through the process of discovering his true Self. He was laying out a mystical pilgrimage so that we could follow him and know our true Self as well. For Jesus to increase, and for me to decrease, I must be more like him and less like me—but to be more like him, I must be my true Self and more like me. That statement is so paradoxical it has to be true.

Jesus must increase and I must decrease. To be more like Jesus, I must decrease so much so that my true self will emerge from the realm of the union of the conscious and the unconscious. That’s what I’ll be working on the rest of my life.

When I walked the Wicklow Way this summer I prayed the prayer, “Jesus must increase, and I must decrease, keep vigil with the mystery. That phrase has been shaping my soul for the last two months, like it has for the last forty years—and the meaning keeps changing, even over the last two months. The phrase continues to trouble my soul. The more trouble it causes in my soul the more likelihood I will experience the mystery, the knowledge, and the sacred magic of Jesus. The more likely Jesus will increase and I will decrease.

Strange Glory - A New Book with Fresh Revelations about Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Strange Glory: A Life of Dietrich Bonhoeffer by Charles Marsh
A Book Review by Gil Stafford

Twenty years ago Ray Anderson introduced me to the enigmatic Dietrich Bonhoeffer. My seminary professor taught me that to understand Bonhoeffer I had to read across the span of his short life and compact theological career. To read Bonhoeffer’s Cost of Discipleship outside the context of Life Together is to see someone who is, yes disciplined in the faith, but without community. But, to read either without daring to wade into the challenging waters of his Ethics is to miss the opportunity to be witness to his evolutionary theology. Still, to read Letters and Papers in Prison, as did the “God is Dead” contingent of the 60’s without the backdrop of Bonhoeffer’s entire work is to give it a disservice that would lead one to unsound theological conclusions.

Anderson’s enthusiasm and guidance led me to write a dissertation five years later using Bonhoefferian Christocentric theology. Bonhoeffer’s post-modern, post-church, post-Christian theology has much to say to our world. In him, I found Christ in the face of the other. This was, as still is, my model for leadership. My interest in the life and work of Dietrich Bonhoeffer has continued. Admittedly, however, after writing a dissertation, I had little interest in reading yet another biography of Bonhoeffer, especially after having consumed the thousand pages of Eberhard Bethge’s definitive Dietrich Bonhoeffer: A Biography; Theologian, Christian, Man for His Times. Bethge was after all, Bonhoeffer’s best friend and confidant. Who could add anything to Bethge’s twenty-year commitment to the biography? Actually, no one really dared until five years ago. But upon a quick glance, I surmised those two authors had little new to offer.

What then, enticed me to read Charles Marsh’s Strange Glory: A Life of Dietrich Bonhoeffer? The reviews said Marsh had access to primary documents that few scholars had seen before. Marsh also had committed to writing his book without the use of any secondary reference material. The lure of something new was too much to resist.

Marsh’s non-fiction narrative reads like a novel. His access to new information, creative style, and provocative insights make Marsh’s book worth the investment of time to read. Whether you are interested in Bonhoeffer, the life of a provocative Christian, a theology for a new age, World War II, or biographies, I recommend this very approachable, yet erudite and extensively referenced work.

Marsh is Director of The Project on Lived Theology, which “explores the social consequences of theological commitment.” The website http://www.livedtheology.org/ is intriguing. Marsh calls “lived theology,” unleashed theology—a theology that is removed from academic restraints, grounded in the life of community, translated into the world, messy. The effects of Bonhoeffer on Marsh are obvious. I look forward to Marsh’s work with more in depth, especially with its implications on my own new endeavor as Canon Theologian for the Diocese of Arizona.

Given all that, however, I wonder if Marsh didn’t overreached his felt importance of theology in his book on Bonhoeffer. In his analysis of the German Christian Church’s theological impact on Adolf Hitler and Nazism, he states that “Theology has always mattered: the heretical turn of the German Christians can be directly connected with the catastrophe that followed.” This causes me to pause. Even Marsh’s later analysis of Hitler seems to contradict his provocative statement on the power of theology in the German modern world. What importance does theology play with those who do not have ears to hear? While I agree that theology matters, the question is to whom? And if not to everyone, does theology that is misguided then, drive an entire national scheme into evil? What does Marsh think that has to say about the pluralistic world in which we now live?

Regarding Bonhoeffer as a man, Marsh presents him stripped of the “mythology” and “hagiography” that has built up around the theologian. The author paints Bonhoeffer as spoiled, privileged, pretentious, yet artistic, athletic, and brilliant—a young man who seems to be in constant search of a meaningful relationship with God, community, and the other. Aside from his twin sister, Marsh says Dietrich was a lonely man. Bonhoffer’s longing for a personal intimate relationship, Marsh concludes, was eventually realized in his “soul mate,” Eberhard Bethge. Was Bonhoeffer gay? Marsh never uses the word. He leaves what he considers to be the obvious conclusion up to the reader.

Marsh’s “new” revelation that Bonhoeffer might have been gay will probably throw Dietrich under the conservative’s bus. For years, however, in Bonhoeffer circles, the thought that he was queer was readily accepted. But, I must give Marsh the credit for having the courage to print such a likely notion. I think, though, with the access Marsh had to fresh primary documents, letter, and papers, he missed a real opportunity to explore Bonhoeffer’s inner world. For Dietrich, this realm of self-discovery was where he would connect in an intimate relationship with the divine, nature, humanity, and his own personhood. Regardless of Bonhoeffer or Bethge’s sexuality (which Marsh assures the reader Bethge was not gay and the two never sexually consummated their relationship)—I am interested in what might be learned from the “soul mate” relationship between these two men. A model of an intimate soul mate relationship between two men seems to be absent in the twenty-first century. Marsh could have explored Bonhoeffer’s thoughts and ideas in order to develop a theology for intimate love between two men that might not include sex.

Instead of looking into the soul of Bonhoeffer, Marsh seems to be annoyed by his apparent “immaturity.” At twenty-one, with two doctorates, Marsh expected Bonhoeffer to be a wise old soul. Dietrich’s father, who was a neurologist and empirical psychiatrist, disdained Freudian and Jungian psychoanalysis. This, Marsh says, influenced Bonhoeffer’s apparent unwillingness to do any interior self-reflection. Interestingly though, while Marsh constantly cites Bethge’s biography, he decided not to mention Eberhard’s statement that Bonhoeffer had a copy of C.G. Jung’s Modern Man in Search of a Soul. Given Jung’s last chapter of that book, I have to wonder what effect it might have had on Dietrich. I also wonder if Marsh missed an opportunity to explore Bonhoeffer’s psyche in deeper light. In Modern Man, Jung is clear to point out that anyone in the first half of life (Bonhoeffer was executed at thirty-nine) is not ready to make non-individuated life choices. Then, as conflict arises, individuation begins. At those many moments of tremendous stress we see Bonhoeffer making dramatic shifts in his worldview and maturation. Being that Marsh is so willing to make constant analysis of Bonhoeffer’s personality, I wish he had used Jung’s book to provide a well-informed reference point for a look into Bonhoeffer’s psyche.

All that said, the proof of Marsh’s work for my own life is found in my desire to sit down with him and have a long conversation about Bonhoeffer. The author has opened a new page in a fresh journal for my return to Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a man who has had a profound impact in my own theological work in this “world come of age,” a world that is still moving towards, “a religionless Christianity.”

In this new era in which we live, Bonhoeffer has much to say about the Christian life, theological education, and the church. Each must be agile (to use a new business term), pragmatic (in the world), and relevant (for the world). And finally, the Christian who dares to live a radical life in our murky era must always ask him and her self Bonhoeffer’s most relevant question, “Who is Jesus Christ for us, today?” Marsh did an excellent work in confronting us once again with that profound and haunting question.

Sacred Cauldron - The Wisdom of Ritual

Wisdom's Way has gathered seven pilgrims at the Tearmann Spirituality Center in Glendalough, Ireland for a five day retreat; Sacred Cauldron: The Wisdom of Ritual.

Cathy and I have just completed a ten day pilgrimage with Vox Peregrini, a pilgrimage choir. The choir walked the hundred miles of the Wicklow Way and then performed two concerts in Dublin. Hard work. Magical experience. Cathy and I symbolically represent the transitional constancy of life. We live life as pilgrims. Embracing the transformational process of pilgrimage. Knowing pilgrimage as a way of life. Moving from one pilgrimage experience to another; all intertwined, all built upon one another.

Daily transition is the substance of a pilgrimage. Transitioning out of the routines of our life into an unfamiliar setting; leaving home to come to Ireland. Walking a hundred miles in eight days pushes my body through several transitions of soreness to discomfort to pain. Every night settling into a different hostel. In the morning, rising from a strange bed, packing once again, walking another unfamiliar trail. To pilgrimage is to embrace the dailiness of transitions.

Cathy and I, making the transition from one form of pilgrimage to another. Accepting the transitory nature of life. Making friends, if you will, with the human condition of change.

Transitions have challenged humankind from the first moments of self-realization. Humans watched the sun rise in the east. Travel across the sky. Then settle into the darkness. Humankind wondered if the great ball of fire would return. The transition of the Sun created the daily transitions of human life. Creating rhythms, cycles, and seasons. All transitions. With the realization of the human self came the questions: Who am I? Who is the Other?

To know who I am is to realize that I was born, grew into an adult, and face the reality of all humans, death. To experience the Other is to imagine I might be a part of the great cycle of life. Maybe when I return to soil I become a part of the Earth. To rise into the life of the plants. To bath once again if the light of the Sun.

Humankind has pondered the questions of life's transitions and created rituals to mark the greatest moments of life. Transition and how to memorialize life changes has been the genesis of ritual. Naming ceremonies at birth. Vision quests to mark adulthood. Union rituals brought adults together. Counsel circles sharing a pipe to make communal decisions. Burial rites at the transition from life to death.

Here is Ireland, where the Tuatha Da Danaan, the people of Danu, built the remarkable burial mound and tomb, Newgrange, 5,000 years ago, the ideas of ritual have been considered before the pyramids and stonehenge. In the land of gods and goddess', faeries and wee people, where the myths of ancient religions morph, we gather to consider our own transitions and rituals to mark and honor them.

For five days we will study the rituals of the ancient peoples of Ireland. We will examine our lives through the art of mandala. We will create a personal ritual for the transitions in our lives. Cathy is working on a Croning ceremony. And I am creating a ritual for the transition from one pilgrimage to another. Each person at our retreat is processing the work of their own ritual. Creativity. Art. Birth. New life. I am excited and deeply curious.

Vox Peregrini A Final Reflection

The night before walking the Wicklow Way with Vox Peregrini, we gathered at the Most Holy Trinity Catholic Church in Bonclody. There we met each other for the first time. There they had their first rehearsal. The first time they had sang together as a group. I have never been privileged to be present at that genesis moment of art. But to my amateur ear, they sounded as if they had been companions for years. No piano. No reading through the music. They just opened their mouths and this most holy sound reverberated through the room and my soul. We had not taken one step and these thirteen people had already implanted their spirits in my heart.

That night I had a very unusual dream. I cannot remember having a dream about flying. I have dreamt of falling, but never flying through the air. Unaided, untethered, self-directed flying. But that night I had a dream I was flying twenty feet above the ground. I was enjoy the freedom of traveling where I wanted and seeing far below in all directions. It was a joyous dream and I felt good when I woke up that the first morning of our walk.

I have walked with groups before. In many ways, this group was no different. The dream did not foretell a problem free pilgrimage, where everything went flyingly well. It did not. One person had to drop out from walking after the first day. They came unprepared and the walk was more difficult than they had expected. Several packs were too heavy and weight was off-loaded into bags that were transferred each morning to the next hostel. Many of the thirteen suffered blisters. An unusual number experienced multiple blisters on both feet. By the third morning I was spending an hour tending to their battered feet. Three had knee problems. One a bad ankle. Fortunately, we had enough braces to go around. I thought I had brought plenty of bandages, but we had to restock three times. I had brought naturopathic remedies along that I distributed freely for sore muscles and aching joints, as well as one sore throat. Cathy also packed essential oils and we used them quite extensively. Including the purification oil every morning on my own hands. While I tended their feet, I prayed for their healing. I also used Charles Williams' ideas on the exchange of love. I counted on the purification oil to keep me from transferring blisters and joint issues to my own body. In retrospect, I think most of their problems were due to poor boots and not enough hill climbing before we started. But, I wasn't surprised. Hill climbing is a difficult task in Ireland. Not to be taken lightly. Experience is most helpful. I wondered along the way if they had read my posts to assist in their preparations. Most admitted they had. Still, it's kind of one of those things you have to see to believe, like the Irish landscape.

In Ireland, seeing can have more to do with the third eye. I think that's where the flying dream came to bear. Vox Peregrini's music and their spirit opened my soul a bit further than even I could imagine. As I pulled back the layers of each of my souls, the sauve of their musical spirits plied the widening of the sacred circle ensouling my nature. I walked. The concentric mandalas of souls breathed out ahead, behind, above, below me. Looking, seeking, searching, discovering. Finding new elements to pour into my alchemical cauldron, that which I pray over to bring forth soul gold. The psychic imagination of a new possibility.

The light faeries appeared. The dragon-raven revealed herself. The Divine opened a new place deep within the regions of my inner world where light had not flickered before. What does it all mean? The answer will take days, months, years to unpack.

What seems most meaningful at this moment in time? My most profound memories? Morgan K's incredible positive attitude when his bag didn't arrive the first night and he had to borrow boots, pants, a shirt, a pack, and a stick from fellow pilgrims. The group, I believe, breathed in his spirit and shone with it the remainder of the trip. In the face of countless opportunities to complain, I never heard one second of grumbling. Morgan H's courage to stop walking after the first day, reminded me that we are all on our own pilgrimage. Pastor Amy's blessing midway through a most difficult day poured sauve on my soul. Jonathan's bass ohm shook my imagination free on Glendalough's mountain side. John whispering to the choir, "Listen to the wind. Match your voice to the rhythm of the trees," opened my ears. Ian's ability to be everywhere to take the best "money-shot" pictures widened my eyes. Samantha's innocent curiosity about faeries and her deep desire to see one, caused me to giggle with glee and I prayed she would see one too. Allie's steady pace, as she quipped, "We're a heard of turtles," made me slow down to her wisdom. Richard's Eagle Scout confidence steadied my own insecurities in map reading. Michael's open heart of spiritual theology buoyed my hope for Christianity's future. Briar's fierce questions reminded me daily the value of the question far outweighs the necessity of any answer. Arlie's servanthood presence kept me focused on the One I follow. Melissa's bold face courage to confront her fears and overcome them filled my eyes with the fresh tears of the Spirit of God when she crossed the finish line - encouraging me to take up yet another pilgrimage, another day, for another fellow pilgrim. And Cathy, you were always present. Both Mary and Martha, words of wisdom and ministry of presence. You have kept me alive for forty-three years and counting. With Vox Peregrini you shared that grace as well. I am thankful for each of these marvelous pilgrims—the communal soul of Vox Peregrini.

When life challenges your being, presses against your soul, beats down your spirit, takes away your breath—remember the Iron Bridge and S-F hill. Remember you made it. All the way to the top. On your own. Such is the power gained by walking your own pilgrimage. But, there is also a great paradox, the pair of opposites found within pilgrimage. As John said that first night, "Just because they show up to the concert, doesn't mean they get to understand everything." Such is the hidden wisdom of pilgrimage.The wisdom is found in the reflection. Without it, you simply walked 100 miles.

I have learned much from you. I pray much more is to come. I am much better for walking by your side. Blessed Be dearest friends. Till we meet again.

Vox Peregrini Concert Time

Eighteen hours after finishing the Wicklow Way, Vox Peregrini stood in Christ Church Cathedral, which sits in the city center of bustling Dublin. The ensemble was dressed in professional concert attire. Their hair was in its place. Make-up on. Shaven and trimmed beards.

"This is who we are. This is our comfort zone," one pilgrim told me. "Out there on the trail, all we felt was discomfort."

We met nine days ago. Today was the first time I had seen them in anything but hiking gear, ponytails, sans cosmetics. For me, seeing them in performance mode, was the reality of returning to the normal world. A world in which I feel less comfortable with every pilgrimage. The mask of "normality" fills me with dis-ease. The group seems a bit unsettled as they began the performance.

After the concert one pilgrim recommended that for the next Vox Peregrini group it would be best to give them a day of recovery before the first performance. However, as a sort of anthropologist of pilgrimage, I wanted to see them in performance mode as soon as possible after they finished walking. My desire was to see a raw pilgrim try and perform to an audience.

Their self-reflective critique of that first concert was harsh.
"I coudn't hear anyone so I was afraid to sing out for fear of being too loud."
"I felt like I was trying to sing for the audience. It didn't feel right."
"We made some serious mistakes."

They had just finished walking 100 miles a few hours before. Their bodies were aching. Feet still blistered. Knee and ankle braces still worn. The jarring effect of returning to the bustle of life after eight days of almost pure nature filled silence was still rattling their souls. They preformed out of what described as their pre-pilgrimage paradigm. And it "didn't feel right," to them.

Twenty-four hours later, at St. Patrick's Cathedral, just a few blocks down the street, Vox Peregrini stood in place to sing their second concert. Before they could begin, however, their director had to ask a tour guide, and her loud voice, to move her tourists off center stage. I wondered about the irony.

The Vox Peregrini choir seemed be standing closer together than yesterday. John had rearranged who stood where in the now tighter half-circle. As they performed, it was apparent he had also changed the order of the pieces of music.Their voices were much stronger. They appeared less inhibited by the noisy wandering tourists. They swayed, more at ease with themselves and one another. They smiled at one another. They seemed to have found a new voice.

After the concert I asked John to compare the first performance with the second. "Yesterday was like watching TV. Today was like making out with your girlfriend."

A member of Vox Peregrini told me that just before they walked out to sing, John encouraged them to sing for themselves. Sing like you sang on the Way. "Listen to wind," he said, "Sing in rhythm with the trees."

Vox Peregrini completed the Wicklow Way. Up some extremely difficult hills. Down into some steep valleys. They walked through the deep dark forest. They trekked across the bald White Hill. They sang in the forest. They sang for themselves. They sang for Frank from Germany on the side of a hill. They sang for Mark and Roz from Australia high in the Wicklow forest. At St. Patrick's Cathedral they sang in tune with the natural world. I wept.

I can't say how the pilgrimage has affected the members of Vox Peregrini. They haven't had time to process. I have asked them to share some reflections with me during the next few days, weeks, and months. How, if at all, has the pilgrimage changed their solo and ensemble perspective of performance as well their creative craft of music? There will be much to learn from them. As for me, I too am processing. I will write one more blog for Vox. One more reflection. One more in the line of a life time of memories and reflections they have sang into my soul.

Vox Peregrini The Final Walk into Dublin

The first day of every pilgrimage is filled with adrenaline. Hikers often start off with a pace they cannot sustain. The final day is similiar. To finish is to accomplish. So we imagine the end of pilgrimage. But pilgrimage is never finished. Vox is ready to start the end of walking. Imaginational paradox. Yet, there is sadness in a successful completion of the Way. The task will be done. The work will be over. And the community will come to an abrupt end.

The final day into Dublin is three miles up, three miles down, then three miles up, and three miles down again. Two 1200 foot ascents. Not easy. Especially at the end of a 100 mile hike. Our group started out too quickly on that first steep 500 yard climb. The first of many. Not enough rest at the top. A bad cocktail. Potentially producing a wicked hangover.

A mile and half into the hike, we met a very large brilliant white ball of fur. I'm not good with dog breeds. His feet were huge, he was strong and tall, like a husky. He was incredibly friendly. He greeted everyone with his inviting eyes and a lick. Unconditional love is so irresistible. Someone checked his tag. His name was Cado and he decided to follow us. Actually, he led us up the mountain. Clearly, he had been this way before. I had hoped he would get tired and turn around. At the half way point I feared he would follow us all the way to Dublin.

We stopped at a bridge for lunch. Hikers going in both directions of the Wicklow Way found the bridge a great place to rest. Without surprise, Mark and Roz met us there as well. A few of our group had left their lunch at the Knocree hostel. Mark carried them in his pack, knowing he would catch up with us.

As we ate, I was troubled by Cado's fate, I saw a young man, walking alone, down the hill ahead of us. He moved at a quick pace as he came down the hill. Something in me said this guy could help us with Cado. I stopped him and asked where he was headed. "Enniskerry." Perfect. I told him about Cado and asked if he could help us. He obliged. We offered him half a sandwich to entice Cado. The dog was hungry and the chap was a pro at baiting Cado with just a tidbit here and there. Off the two went for what we hoped was a lovely return home.

Meanwhile, Ian, the Vox videographer, set up his camera. He had been interviewing our pilgrims along the way. Now that Mark and Roz had become so dear to the group, Ian asked if they would mind answering a few questions on camera. He asked one question and they filled up twenty minutes of film about the power of walkabouts and Vox's influence on their Wicklow experience. I doubt Ian could have written a better script.

After a long break, the final ascent was difficult. Tired legs. Burning lungs. The thrill to finish. The sadness to leave this newly formed community of pilgrims. The climb to the top of Dublin Mountain was extremely slow. No one got too far ahead. In fact, for the first time we reached the top together. Lots of pictures. Some sat down to get a long look at Dublin Bay. There seemed a reluctance to head down the mountain. The end was just a few miles away.

We entered Marley Park together. Crossing the finish line one by one. Of course, to the applause of Mark and Roz.

Cathy, who has been our support team all along the trip, distributed Wicklow Way completion certificates. More pictures. Full pack pushups. Lots of hugs. Plenty of tears. Celebration.

While the walking may be completed, a pilgrimage is never over. For Vox Peregrini tomorrow and Friday the work continues at Christ Church Cathedral and St. Patrick's. Will their concerts simply be just another performance? Or will the pilgrimage appear in their voice?

Vox Peregrini Day Seven - White Hill

This morning, like every morning since day two, the wounded gather to have their feet, ankles, and sore knees tended. Blisters on heels, toes, and the bottom of feet. Already one hiker backed off the trail due to an open wound on a heel. I wondered each morning how others kept going. Today, though, I heard a few odd comments as they sleepily stumbled into the tiny hallway for bandages.

One voice said, "My blisters are getting better."

Another said, "I think mine are too."

Once blisters form, they don't get better as you walk a 100 mile hike. At best, they are managed and hopefully don't get worse. But better? No. Curiously, though, as I bandaged each blister and taped a few ankles, indeed, there was some healing. I began to wonder about that as I walked the day.

The sixteen mile hike over White Hill, the highest point in Western Ireland, taunted Vox like a playground bully Dangerous enough fear. But not enough to keep them from their destination.

A prayer was said each morning before the hike. This morning's words were a humble plea for Father Sky and Mother Earth to be gentle with us. I've hiked over White Hill three previous times. Twice in a bone soaking, wind whipping rain. Last year the group I hiked with was embraced by quick moving mist filled clouds. In all the times I have walked Ireland, I had yet to experience a cloudless day. Today would be the first.

After walking six miles to get to the base of White Hill, the cloud cover blew passed us and we were left, fully exposed to Brother Sun and the Irish wind as we climbed. A paradoxical pair, sun and wind. Unprotected by friendly clouds, the sun can bring a blistering sweltering summer heat in Ireland. The strong wind, however, on this day, kept the temperature bearable. We climbed to the point where we could see the water rippling across Guinness Lake far below. Indeed, the shape of the lake, its black surface and white beach looks exactly like a perfectly poured pint of the famous Irish beer. From our vantage point, we could see the huts left behind from the filming of the History Channel's "The Vikings." A reminder of some of the darker days of Ireland's history.

We pushed long past our normal lunch time in order to reach a perfect resting place at the peak of the Hill. There, hiding from the wind behind a quartz outcrop, we dropped our packs and weary bodies on the grass. The cloudless sky delivered a brilliant view far into the sea. I could see a ship floating on the horizon. I wondered if Vox would try to sing against the wind and their exhaustion.

Our Australian friends, Mark and Roz, wandered by as we ate lunch. They dropped their packs to join us. I took the opportunity to ask them about their walkabouts. England, Portugal, and of course their home land Australia. Retired teachers, they had enjoyed a lifetime filled with hiking. Amidst all their travels though, they were smitten with this singing group like no other experience.

Lunch came and went. No lunchtime song. John was planning a long rehearsal that night at the Knocree Hostel. We had many miles ahead of us. As we headed down the backside of White HIll, one our group suffered what I thought to be a serious knee injury. A sharp pain on the outside of her knee. At one point she appeared to have buckled and sat down a large stone. I was worried she might not be able to finish the hike. It was three miles to the bottom and six to any crossroad. There are only two ways off the Hill. Walk under your own power. Or call Mountain Rescue. It would take them as long to reach us as it did for us to climb to that point. Long ago, I had made peace with myself that if I had a heart attack or life threatening injury on that hill, I would most likely die there. There are posted warnings about the dangers of hill walking in Ireland and this could have been one of those moments I knew was a possibility.

Fortunately, one of our guys produced a knee brace he had been carrying. The brace fit her knee perfectly. Slowly, gingerly she moved down the hill. I called ahead to find some possible pick up points at the bottom. But, by the time we reached the bridge over Powerscourt waterfall, she was committed to finish the day's final five miles. Her will and the group's support carried her.

Just before reaching the Knocree Hostel is my favorite tree in all of Ireland. Not the tallest tree. Surely not the oldest. Maybe not the most unique in shape and form. But truly the most inviting. Over at least the last century, the tree has grown around a trapezoid shape stone six feet long, over three feet high. The rests at an angle inside the tree. Growing around the stone has created a womb like opening at the base of the tree. Standing on the stone, a person can almost disappear from view inside the tree. There I have left mementos as tributes to past lives. A few sat on the stone in the tree for a picture. But as I took a picture of our pilgrim with the wounded knee, I could feel the tree offering her some healing grace. She finished the day. Tomorrow she would re-evaluate the possibility for the final hike.

After dinner that night, Vox Peregrini would rehearse for the final time before their concert at Christ Church Cathedral in two days. John encouraged them, challenged them, pushed them, and thanked them. They responded each time to his subtle changes with a beautiful sound.

Our Australian friends, Mark and Roz, were also staying at the hostel. Other guests and employees of the hostel listened in for the 90 minute session. Some even hung around after to chat. Mark said the music felt like it was shaping his soul. Vox Peregrini is gaining confidence and with it, power of voice. They have been together only eight days, yet it sounds as if they have spent years together honing their sound. I wondered if the pilgrimage itself was adding her voice and refining them into gold? At the very least, it appears the pilgrimage trail is providing some healing for Vox.

Vox Peregrini Day Six Glendalough to Roundwood

Glendalough has a deep mystery. Those who are open to the soul of the land, the lakes, and the ancient ruins find themselves in wonderment long after leaving the valley. Place has presence.

The climb out of Glendalough is steep and long. Plenty of time to stop, catch your breath, and look back over the resplendent scenery. The Wicklow Mountain is not shy this day with her sumptuous beauty. The heaviness of the previous day's reflection in Saint Mary's Chapel, the slow pace of the climb, and the stunning beauty of the landscape held our group in a hushed silence. The long days of pilgrimage were having their effect.

We found a three-sided hut at the mid-point in our hike. Some sat at a picnic table. A few sprawled out on the grass. Others leaned their tired backs against the inside of the tiny building built by Mountain Rescue. John found a traveler's journal placed in a water proof canister attached to the wall. Those who tended the hut had placed the book there for hikers like our selves to leave a comment. He read other's reflections while we ate our lunch. I could sense that Vox Peregrini was forming community.

A group of thirteen hikers in not a typical sight along the Way. Most hike in pairs or alone. To see so many people quietly eating lunch usually gets a surprised smile and a gentle hello from anyone who wanders by. Today, a couple in their early sixties stopped for a moment. The woman asked where we were from. We exchanged pleasantries and one of the young women in our group asked if the couple would like to hear them sing.

"In all my walkabouts, no one has ever sung for me," the man said.

Vox took their places quickly and sang, "That Lonesome Road." Our fellow pilgrims were obviously touched. I could see the man's lip trembling. I think Vox sensed something about the couple and asked if they would like to hear another.

"Why, yes of course," the woman said in a sweet Aussie accent.

The second song seemed almost overwhelming. The music swallowed the couple like a spirit rising from the soul of the earth. The man had to steady himself. The silence after the final note hung in the air like an Irish mist.

Finally the woman broke the stillness, "So who are you?" A question with so many layers.

As our new acquaintances, Mark and Roz, hiked on, John gathered the group in the hut for an unusual extended lunch time rehearsal. In the early stages of healthy community formation, each person can find their role. Johnny, an enigma of showmanship and deep water soul, suggested Vox begin this rehearsal with a moment of gathering. HIs base voice resonated against the walls of the tiny enclosure and my own body. Three times he let out an earthy and long "ohm." The group dropped into the moment.

The director whispered his instructions. "Hear the wind in the trees." The pines sung. Vox listened. "Match their rhythm." My skin tingled as Vox and the trees sang in harmony. Something more than community was emerging here. Human souls of an eon who has long dismissed the choir of nature had, in that moment, now bound themselves to the voice of Mother Earth. The pilgrimage was having her way on Vox Peregrini.

As we walked away from the hut, I noticed the group spread out a little more than usual over the next easy five miles. They walked mostly in single file. I didn't heard little of their usual light hearted chatter.

Late in the afternoon, in the corner of The Coachman Inn in Roundwood, the group rehearsed again. Sitting at tables, a pint of Guinness sitting here and there. A cup of tea. A glass of wine. Water bottles. All part of the support team that tends to the voices of Vox Peregrini. Long days filled with mountainous miles, weary bodies, tender souls. Nurtured with music of the spirit, something anew was stirring in the soul alchemy of Vox Peregrini.

Vox Peregrini Day Five - Glendalough's Sorrows

I called this a day of rest, but it seemed anything but. After breakfast, I wandered into the ancient ruins to journal. There I saw many of my fellow pilgrims doing the same. They sought solace to reflect before the work that lie ahead. By noon the choir was in rehearsal at St. Kevin's Catholic Parish a mile up the road from Glendalough. They sang through their most difficult piece. John pushed them. Challenged them. Sought their input. Gently guiding them into places some would have rather avoided. "You have lovely voices. Feel affirmed. But what we're missing in an expansiveness." He used metaphors from life to evoke the emotions intended by the song writer. He seemed to instinctively know how to gently nudge them from one place to another. John's body language, silence, pristine use of the professional musician's secret vernacular guided his choir to another level. While I am not a musician, with every new start, my ears tell me something beautiful is being born. Two and half hours felt like ten minutes to me. The choir continues to have boundless energy, but as they walked out the door I could sense their weariness.

An hour later we were making our pilgrimage to St. Mary's Chapel. A thousand year-old ruin. The hollowed ground where grieving mothers brought their dead children for burial. The tiny chapel sits outside the walls of the monastery as a reminder the church has built more barriers than paths to the divine. To get to the hideaway we had to pass through three sheep gates and knee high grass. Our trail through the grass followed the footprints of centuries of pain in a journey to the house of tears. And the final entrances to the confines of St. Mary's we had to climb over a four foot stone wall. Only those willing to confront death would dare crawl over those stones. Once inside the grounds, we were confronted with dozens of ancient tiny crosses. Graves of unbaptized children. The Mother of Sorrows, a universal archetype from which we often cower to avoid our own grief. But there we stood around a humble piece of bread and sour wine, reciting our meager prayers.

Somber, reflective, tentative. Who could dare know what to expect of our souls? We could simply hold the space for one another's experiences. Withhold judgment. Honor one another. Cherish one another. Present to one another. Maybe we were pushing at the edge of the expansiveness we were so shy to consider?

Vox Peregrini Day Four (for reals) Glenmalure to Glendalough

The Glenmalure lodge was built in 1801 as a hunting lodge. Though, the legend goes it was a hideout for those who needed refuge from the English law. If you can be still enough within your soul, the faeries and ghosts of those rebellious folk might appear. The lodge and the woods themselves hold the stories of lives long forgotten by the world of the seen—but always to be told in the realm of the unseen.

Before leaving the lodge to hike into the Wicklow Natural Forest, Vox Peregrini sang just outside the front door. Their rich voices attracted several guests and hosts as well. I'm always fascinated to watch the faces of those who listen; their faces relax into the presence of being blessed by the holy, gentle smiles, their bodies often sway in rhythm with the a capella flow. Immediately after Vox Peregrini finished the first piece, "Another please," quickly arose. And the musical pilgrims responded in kind with another few minutes of blissful sounds.

Packs on, day four, on to the ancient monastic ruins in the Valley of the Two Lakes, Glendalough. After singing, I've noticed our pilgrims have high spirits and energy in their weary legs. This morning even more so. The promise of only walking 10 miles and then a day off seemed to add to their good feeling.

Slowly we climbed the mountains of Wicklow. Through the dark dense forests. Higher past the tree line where we were to cross the bald bog. To get to that point we had to climb several natural stone stairways. Only Mother Earth could create such perfect placed souls of stones to aid our path so safely. Yet one slip and injury was for sure. Finally to the summit and the scenic payoff was spectacular. Looking back over the mountains and valleys where we had climbed were the rolling mountains of emerald green, spotted with outcrops of glistening quartz. The mountains were so green they were black. The haunting purple clouds rolled across the peaks of the mountains and darted down into the low places. Mother Earth provided us with a full display of her best work. No picture can capture what the eye and soul will witness at the moment of having struggled to reach that point, in time and life.

We carefully negotiated the railroad ties graciously placed by Mountain Rescue and Hill Walkers, so that we might safely cross the deep black bog covered with slick tufts of lime green grass. The wind pushed against us, hoping for a laugh if we fell. I would imagine the wind was more than 30 mph. Strong enough I paid careful attention to my own footing. No falls from the pilgrims of Vox Peregrini.

By the fourth day of a pilgrimage, while exhausted like never before, a strength emerges. Pilgrims seem to tap into a new found wellspring. They drink, not from a reserve, but from a dark place they never knew existed. In that place of shadows, where only the pilgrimage can shine a light of discovery—there in moments of the fear of failure, there in the darkness is found the water that renews like none other. I have witnessed the pilgrims of Vox Peregrini begin to drop their cups into that well.

In a simpler world and time, we might say from here it's downhill. Pastor Amy, however, pointed out that she had a new understanding of that American phrase. The difference being she said, is that she would now rather walk uphill. The downhill slopes are painfully troubling. I wonder now. How will we take our new insights into a world that may never be able to fully understand our journey? Where language is lost on those who have not walked our way. Or care to hear our stories. I do wonder about those who seem to be casual tourists in life.

As we approached Glendalough on this pleasant Saturday, we met those looking for a scenic view of the valley and her upper lake. We passed families as well as locals out for their daily exercise. We heard the sound of children laughing as they played in the luscious green park below. The closer we got to our destination the more people we encountered. Finally, as we dropped down onto the two mile stretch of Glendalough Valley, we were almost run over by large groups of well meaning tourists who had arrived via bus. Many languages, nationalities, and races. Joy, wonder, and laughter. Yet, in their pleasantness, there was an assault on our 50 miles of silent struggle through the Wicklow Mountains. For the first time our group huddled to protect ourselves from the noise slamming against our souls. Seeking solace from this onslaught of what others consider "normal." But now as pilgrims, our normal has shifted, if ever so slightly. Looking at the world through the lens of a pilgrim, the world appears slightly askew. Now we must re-negotiate with our mind, body, and soul how we will walk through this life of strangers slightly leaning to one side or the other.

Vox Peregrini Day Four - Moyne to Glenmalure

Day Four Vox Peregrini - Moyne to Glenmalure

The Irish often refer to what we are doing as hill walking. They have organized clubs and major events built around walking the hills of Ireland. Hill walking is a big deal. Walking the hills from Moyne to Glenmalure is so strenuous our host at Kyle Farm House reminded me that when we reach the halfway point at Iron Bridge it is would be the last point at which I could call if anyone in our group couldn't finish today's 16 miles. Such a reminder in an ominous beginning to a long days hike.

The seven miles to the Iron Bridge is a long slow climb that starts with three miles of feet pounding pavement. Several members of Vox Peregrini are suffering from blisters, sore knees, and hip related issues to carrying a pack. This morning it took almost an hour to bandage all the blisters and tend to their needs. But this is the most positive group I can imagine. They support one another. Tell the funniest stories. Sing to lift one another's spirits. And I have yet to hear one word of grumbling.

When we reached the Iron Bridge I pointed up the hill that lie ahead. Like a taunting demon, the stretch we were about to embark in the Wicklows seemed foreboding. No one flinched. They all said they were ready for the challenge. Their optimism made me nervous. I knew what the next eight grueling miles were going to be like. I had walked them in reverse three times, having met others strugglling from the direction we were now walking. The singing rehearsal sounded good, but weary. I couldn't tell if it was my projections onto them, fearing the climb, or truly their exhaustion.

The first hill to climb after lunch is unforgiving. The trees along the path had been harvested leaving the steep incline unprotected. The Irish sun, beautiful as it can be, is no friend to the hill climbers. A sharp hill carrying a pack under an altitude sun makes the climb challenging for the experienced hill walker. The group stretched out. We had a good leader who set a reasonable pace. Even the strongest were stopping regularly to catch their breath. I could hear their prayers as we climbed. I was near the middle of the group. One by one I saw them disappear at the top, out of sight, where I knew they had made the climb. Looking back I could I see the struggles of those with the most physical issues. The group behind me walked two by two. Supporting one another. Their strength brought tears to my eyes. Those would not be the only tears I would shed today.

As the last pair made it to the top there were cheers and high fives. I wanted to warn them we had a few more hills that were equal to the challenge, but I thought better of it and we kept moving. We continued to move slow and steady. They have taken to calling themselves a herd of turtles.

Along the Wicklow Way at random and rare locations there are three sided sheds built by the Mountain Rescue that can be used for those who need a break from the weather or want to camp the night. Camping is not something people typically do on the Wicklow Way. At about our three quarter mark we came to one of the wooden huts just before another daunting climb. There we met Frank, a young man from Germany. We stood and sat in small clusters, resting, catching our wind.

Pastor Amy Wiles reached in her back pack and pulled out one of the Pilgrim's Prayers for strength and offered the prayer we all needed. Her husband then asked her to bless us as she does pour out such grace over her congregation every Sunday.

"May the Lord bless you and keep you.
May the Lord's face shine upon you and give you grace.
Grace not to sell yourself short.
But grace to risk something big for something good.
Grace enough to see that the world is now too dangerous for anything but truth.
And too small for anything but love.
So may God take your minds and think through them.
May God take your words and speak through them.
May God take your hands and work through them.
And may God your hearts and set them on fire."

I wept. I have never been so blessed. All of the divine's creation rose from the Irish landscape and bowed their heads to receive Pastor Amy's blessing. All said Amen. I felt inspired to live out her spirit graced words.

Then John Wiles, the director, asked the group to sing for Frank. The young man from German seemed so genuinely pleased and excited. He pulled out his camera to record and sat in expectation. As the sound rolled over him like a gentle Irish mist, I could see his soul settle. In the midst of a harsh day, gentleness and power visited us within the span of three minutes.

We moved on to finish the challenge of the longest day so far. Vox Peregrini took a picture at the halfway marker of the Wicklow Way. It was the perfect end to a blessed day. One more day lie ahead on our way into Glendalough for a Sabbath day of rest.

Vox Peregini Day Two Shilaleagh to Moyne

Day Two of Vox Peregrini - Shilaleagh to Moyne

The walk from Shilaleagh to Kyle's Farm house in Moyne is 14 miles. We are walking the Wicklow Way from south to north, towards Dublin. I've walked the Way three previous times from Dublin to the south. This new perspective has already revealed some fresh insights. What was the final day of the Wicklow Way was now the first, the we walked yesterday. I had not realized how mundane that stretch was—it was always the last day and I simply wanted to finish. I have realized because I simply wanted to finish, I couldn't remember anything about the trail now. That's the reason I missed the pickup point yesterday. This became so clear to me on day two of the walk. I could remember all the landmarks, though walking in the opposite direction, much of the walk felt so familiar. Except for one point.

At the halfway point of the walk, instead of the yellow marker of the Wicklow Way, there was a red marker. There was a sign marking a Loop Trail. We decided to stop there for lunch. It was noon. And I wanted to check my maps carefully, especially after missing our pick up point yesterday. I did not want to make a mistake today. The red arrow was marking a starting point for a local loop trail with a sign and a large map detailing the trail. Using my map and the help of two of our pilgrims, we determined, between the three of us, with some certainty that we should not take the loop trail, which was tempting, but continue on the more mundane trail we were walking. The group had lunch and rehearsed some music. I nervously searched up the loop trail and the trail we were on for a familiar yellow Wicklow marker. I couldn't one.

So we set on our road we had been walking. I took the lead with one of my trusted pilgrims who knows how to read maps much better than I - he is an Eagle Scout. A half mile down the road, my anxiety was relieved. There was a yellow hiking man. I couldn't help myself, I stopped and kissed that marker.

The loop arrow and sign had been there before the last time I walked the way, just walking the opposite direction I hadn't seen it. Had I been walking alone today I may have made the wrong decision. My fellow pilgrims brought their skills and confidence to the moment. Yeah for the Eagle Scouts! Thank you Richard.

The great joy of the day was when we left the mundane trail and walked for seven miles through the rolling sheep land of this region. The trail took us through the tree lined boreans, up over the side of the mountains where the sheep roam. There we had a glorious view of the farmlands below and the bald mountain above. This was our groups first look at the beauty of the Irish farming region. Their excitement brought a renewed energy to my step.

Later in the afternoon, near the end of walk, heading into a very wooded and dark section of the trail, John, the music director, chose an off the trail place within the woods for the group to rehearse. There, against an abandoned wall of green moss covered stones, they sang the song of Healing Light. The stones and the trees joined the choir. The dark forest glowed with a warm light. At the end of the final piece, the world sat in silence for a minute, listening to the vibrations of communion of all the divine's creation. I felt a positive energy. And as our group got back on the trail, I noticed some healing had taken place. Steps were stronger, spirits were higher, more laughter rose from their souls.

Vox Peregrini has nestled themselves into the hands of Mother Earth and sang their prayers for healing. Creation added their voice and a new harmony was created, a healing harmony.