Resurfacing

Do you ever have times when you lose God? I felt like that, the past couple of weeks. Not that I am so full of faith and belief at other times, but I lost motivation, the time to spend in spiritual pursuits, and a feeling of spiritual connectedness. Prosaically, my child-care situation has been very up in the air--speaking of the elements--and that is one place where it is no good to cast your coracle to the winds. As far as I'm concerned, when it comes to child care, everything should be very much down to earth!

So I'm scattered. I haven't been meditating or praying. As for my retreat, well. I kept up with the week of water, mostly. I thought about water, and experienced and noted several watery synchronicities and thoughts in my own life and the world at large that week. But I obviously haven't blogged them yet, and so I don't remember everything I planned to write. And I never did the meditation.

And earth--poor earth. I really got lost last week, didn't even finish reading the book chapter, didn't read the PDF handout or listen to the meditation. I barely thought about earth.

Now we are halfway through our "integration" week and it's the same. Haven't even cracked the book this time, or downloaded the PDF or meditation. And I have travel plans for Friday and the weekend that will make it difficult to focus. I'm saddened that I didn't maintain the retreat mentality; but I'm going to try to make use of what time I have left and do my best to come back to my thoughts.

It would have been much better if I'd set aside a specific time for the retreat work as Christine suggested, but it's not easy these days. However, I think I should be able to do a better job at setting aside spiritual time. One thing I want to think about is whether I can make an ongoing retreat "mentality" a daily, or at least every-other-daily, part of my life in the coming weeks. More on this later.

It certainly wasn't all down to physical logistics, I'm sure of that, except inasmuch as a day when I'm trying to accomplish home and work tasks without child care leaves me drained and stressed. I also think I (and probably most people) have cycles of engagement and detachment, just like the ebb and flow that was a theme during the week of water.

I'm also a little spiritually blocked because I am trying to sort out my daughter's baptism and, well. If it were just me planning the ceremony, it would be simple, but the celebrant would like me to get my husband to come to church and read the ceremony, and there's family to think about, and godparents, and... sigh. The "political" details are frustrating, and suck up a lot of mental time and energy, and in particular, getting my husband to talk about it all is like dragging a recalcitrant goat around on a rope. (I think. I've never actually dragged a goat around, I'm just imagining.)

But maybe that's all the more reason to return to the basics. Mindfulness meditation, prayer, Christian meditation, the things that are simple rocks in the midst of complexity.

I think it's no coincidence that the images and thoughts I drew out of the week of fire remain most clearly with me from day to day. I worked really hard that week on prayer and thought and consciousness because fire has always been my most challenging element, the one that felt most foreign. While I hesitate to assign a work ethic to spiritual matters, I do think that one has to devote time, thought, and energy to spirituality in order to be engaged.

But then I'm also reminded of grace. This is something new to me; pagan spirituality is very self-driven (more about that later, too). The idea that maybe it's God's choice to gift you, or not, with the grace of belief, of faith. That puts us back in the coracle on the turbulent seas, the shifting winds of the Spirit determining where we go, and when. It's a relief to remember that this dance does take two to tango. "God helps those who help themselves," and giving up total responsibility doesn't mean that one can just lie around marshmallow-like and wait for things to happen; but on the other hand one shouldn't put on the hair shirt for being imperfect. I always liked the thought that to strive for perfection is presumptuous: as Michael J. Fox said, "I am careful not to confuse excellence with perfection. Excellence, I can reach for; perfection is God's business." And, further, that even if I were so close to Godly as to be almost perfect, God still plays a part in this connection. I can only reach halfway across the abyss even on my most perfect day. God, in God's grace, must reach out to me too:

So here I am. I'm recommitting, coming back to the roost, back to the fold. Opening myself to grace again, as I will do again and again, throughout my life.

Making Space for the Sacred

It's the end of a long and very non-spiritual week. (I guess we're supposed to think of Sunday as the beginning of the new week, but I would dare say most of us probably pair them up together as the "weekend.") Really, the past three weeks have been very spiritually dry, crammed with work, chores, and errands, and not enough sleep.

Today I received the packet for my Easter e-course at Abbey of the Arts--I've been so excited about this--and perhaps the most emphasized suggestion for this week is that we schedule time in our lives during this virtual retreat for reflection and prayer.

I don't disagree in the least, but this is a very challenging thing for me. First and foremost, I'm naturally disorganized and am not good at scheduling personal time. I've always wanted to be the sort of person who does laundry on Monday, dusting on Tuesday, etc., but I have not been very successful. (I'm working on it. But very slowly.) Second, I have two very young children. Even if I were a Monday-laundry sort of person, I would probably be falling behind at this time in my life.

Third, we live in an era when personal time is very, very short, and often fragmented, and fraught with distractions. I don't think we should get too sunny about past times in this regard: people worked damn hard, and their lives were often filled with chores and long days of unrelenting drudgery. But I do think they had a certain amount of free time built into their lives due to seasons, poorer evening lighting, a lack of constant communication (e.g. no cell phones), etc. It may be much more challenging to resist spontaneous and insistent demands on our attention today.

Fourth, we also live in an era where spiritual practice, despite getting a lot of lip service, is often devalued in practice. I suspect that most people, if you were to tell them you're a regular church-goer or that you're setting aside time to pray, might put you down as a goody-goody. I still feel an echo of this myself. Weirdly, my experience of church and worship has been entirely separate from the reflexive connotations I attach those same words.

In my own life I prioritize social events as much as possible. We've spent the past dozen years moving around a good amount, and so we haven't had the chance to sink deep roots in any one area. I really want to form and maintain closer friendships. But when I didn't attend my usual service on Easter so that we could see friends, I regretted it. I enjoyed seeing our friends, but missing out on celebrating that high holy day with the church friends I'm coming to know was surprisingly hard.

So this past weekend, when a friend had to cancel Saturday plans and asked to reschedule at 11 a.m. on Sunday, I dithered. What should I do? Then I thought about Easter and Christine's request for us to set aside personal time for devotion and I thought, okay. I have to make this time sacred to me.

And that's when it hit me. Make this time sacred?! By its very definition, it is sacred time--or, at least, it should be. Yet somehow, along the line, the expression--to make a time sacred--has become secularized and made shallow.

I cannot be a monk right now, or even an oblate. I probably won't be able to set aside as much time as I would like during this course to really worship. But what I can do is try, as much as possible, to reconnect with true sacred time. Sacred cannot mean simply "set aside for some secular purpose" but a real attempt to take oneself out of secular time as much as possible, in order to attune to deeper concerns.

I think this attempt to reach sacred time is best attached to sacred space, in the literal sense. Christine talks about this as well. She mentions creating an altar with an object for each of the four directions. This interests me because most pagans have a very similar altar in their homes, and most pagan rituals involve the creation of sacred space (usually the drawing of a circle). The space is felt to offer protection and sanctuary, but it is also meant to create a space outside of normal time and place. To approach this from the Christian perspective makes it fresh and new for me. I think of this effort as somehow trying to create a cathedral or labyrinth in your home. The creation of this sacred space will have to spring mostly from the mind and emotions, as I haven't got the time, square footage, or money to put in fan vaults or pews. Will I be able to create sacredness even in the middle of piles of laundry, or will I find myself needing at least a clean room? How does one cultivate the ability to shift perspective to sacredness in the midst of everyday life?

Unfortunately, I don't know if I will be able to follow her other major recommendation, which is to honor the element of air by praying just after rising, facing the east. Mornings are one of our most rushed times of the day, when it's really not possible to get time to myself. It doesn't help that--I'll admit it--I am really really not a morning person, especially since I've been sleep-deprived for three years now. But I know that there is one simple and very secular thing I can do to try to make some morning space: prepare my son's lunch ahead of time. So I'll do this tonight and try to make this a regular habit. (I ought to anyway.)

By the way: I did tell that friend that I wasn't available during most of Sunday morning, though I didn't say why (mostly because it felt like a private matter). I can't tell if I've offended her, and I worry that I have--a bit of a long story, there. But I think I did the right thing, and I was so glad to be back at home in my regular 11 a.m. service today.

Making sacred time sacred: a radical concept--for me, anyway.

A Little About Background and Children

I've been following Isabela Granic's blog, Child of Mind, since she started it. Originally it was focused on developmental psychology as it pertained to young children and sleep training. Then she opened it up to a co-author and a much wider discussion of other developmental issues relevant to parenting young kids. Recent topics include discipline, how children affect family dynamics and the parents' relationship, developmental snapshots of certain ages, etc.; all of these seen through the lens of developmental psychology, and more often than not supported with lots of science. It's a great resource, so I encourage all parents to check it out! (And I came there through Ask Moxie, which for some time has served as a sort of virtual village hut where parents, okay, mostly moms, can huddle together and offer wisdom and reassurance to one another, and be honest about the difficult parenting times when one thinks "I can't do this" or "I'm going to throttle that child" or "I think I might die if I don't get some sleep" or whatever. Another wonderful resource.)

Given her science-based approach, I was delighted and surprised to see that she broached the topic of religion the other day, beginning here and continuing here. Scientists, like journalists, seem to often feel culturally obligated to maintain a myth of objectivity, as if they have no personal opinions or values. In the literature, I suppose that makes sense, but Granic breaks that "fourth wall" a lot in her blog. Although it's a blog that often mixes the personal with science, I think it still takes guts to do so; especially when, mixing my metaphors, she's touching the "third rail" of religion (and mixing it with parenting ... yikes!). But let me hasten to say I think everything she is saying is wonderful. She makes it clear where research stops (fairly early on, in religion) and where her personal thoughts start. And the more we talk about religion and hear what everyone else thinks, the better. From the scientific perspective, it is essential to identify gaps that need to be explored. From the personal perspective, I'm interested in the questions she raises about what our beliefs are and how they're transmitted to children. I also love that her commenters have remained so open and civil, despite ranging all over the board. There's even an Episcopalian who sounds just like me!

I wrote a comment on the first post and thought I would put it down here as well, since it encapsulates my background and that means I won't have to do it again. I'm lazy like that.

I said:

I love ritual and tradition, and also have a deep need for spiritual thought and experience. I don't what I think about God. I don't have that feeling like some people do, that I *know* God is out there or that a God loves me, but I also think science (ironically) and critical thinking lead me to believe in something Other. Especially asking, where did the universe come from, and why did it start at one time and not another? For me science and religion are not mutually exclusive. However I'm not sure there's any psychological science I'm dying to see regarding religion, because people will hold the beliefs they do, and act on them accordingly, regardless of what psychology says the consequences are.

Since my teens I'd identified as pagan, because my God, such as it is, is immanent (present in all things), and I find spirituality in nature. I spent a long time trying different Unitarian churches. I liked their politics but it drove me nuts that they wouldn't talk about God, or morality, or values. Just this past year I discovered the Episcopalian Church and it's been a revelation, so to speak, for me. I've been attending and participating regularly.

For me Christianity and its scripture are not at all literal beliefs but deeply metaphorical. I take a much more historical viewpoint--a la John Dominic Crossan and Marcus Borg. From that angle, I really value its lens on morality, radical inclusion, wisdom, etc. I believe that anything that's lasted so long has something valuable to say, take comfort in the traditions from so long ago, and enjoy its strong connection to our cultural history.

Until she got too wiggly, I took my now-10-mo-old daughter to church and enjoyed having her blessed each week. I've never taken my 3-y-o son. He's too rambunctious for services and my husband prefers to spend time with him at home on the weekends rather than have him in church school. But I'm also highly hesitant to have him exposed to religious teaching while he's at such a literal age. At the same time, I was raised very agnostic and I regret not being raised with some kind of faith in the Other; I think it's much easier to acquire at a young age than at an older age, bar some startling religious experience.

I am now approaching my personal deadline for baptizing my daughter and it's causing me a lot of internal debate. We held a pagan baptism at home for my son and I thought it was really special and individual--people gave him all kinds of wishes corresponding to the four elements. Now I'm thinking about a church baptism for my daughter, but I'd miss the at-home version; and if I do have her baptized, should I have my son done too? Lots of questions, and no answers yet.