Contemplatives in Action

"I believe that the only really valid thing that can be accomplished in the direction of world peace and unity at the moment is the preparation of the way by the formation of people who, isolated, perhaps not accepted or understood by any “movement,” are able to unite in themselves and experience in their own lives all that is best and most true in the various great spiritual traditions. Such people can become as it were ‘sacraments’ or signs of peace, at least. They can do much to open up the minds of their contemporaries to receive, in the future, new seeds of thought. Our task is one of very remote preparation, a kind of arduous and unthanked pioneering."

~Thomas Merton

"Guiding Presence" Rt. Rev. Steven Charleston, Choctaw

"How often have I lost my way? More times than I can remember. Even when I thought the path ahead was clear, when I felt confident in all that I believed, still I would discover I had been sleepwalking into confusion, wandering in places far from the direction I thought I had chosen. And that may be the problem: the idea that I choose my own destiny. I make choices, but I am not the only source of options. We all inhabit histories, long histories, complex and layered. Our lives are not straight lines, but ant-like trails of starts and stops, encounters unexpected, impacts undeserved, emotions moving like currents deep beneath the surface of appearance. The surprise is not that we may lose our way, or that other forces push us like the winds at sea, but that when we are confused there is a presence that can guide us, a love that can sustain us, a vision of light that parts the mists and shows us how to navigate to safer shores. How often has this holy friend found me when I most needed it? More times than I can remember. "

~ Rt. Rev. Steven Charleston, Choctaw

"Close to the Ground II" Lao Tzu

"In dwelling, live close to the ground. In thinking, keep to the simple. In conflict, be fair and generous. In governing, don't try to control. In work, do what you enjoy. In family life, be completely present."

~ Lao Tzu

"Patience" Ralph Waldo Emerson

"Adopt the pace of nature: her secret is patience."

~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

"I Awaken Before Dawn"

I awaken before dawn, go into the kitchen and fix a cup of tea.
I light the candle and sit in its glow on the meditation cushion.
Taking my cup in both hands, I lift it to my Lord and give thanks.
The feel of the cup against my palms brings the potter to mind
and I offer a blessing for his hands.

I give thanks for the clay, the glaze and the kiln.

I take a sip and follow the warmth into my body.

I offer a blessing for those who brought electricity to my home,

who dug the ditches for the lines,

who built my home and put in the wires,

who made my tea kettle and brought me water to fill it.

I take a sip and bless the people in India or China who grew the tea,

cultivated it, picked and dried the leaves, took it to market,

handled it through the many transactions to bring it to my home.

I take a sip and bless those people in Florida, California or Central America

who grew the tree that blossomed into flowers.

I give thanks for the warmth of the sun and the rain which turned the blossoms into lemons,

and I bless the hands that picked the fruit, sorted it, touched it as it traveled from the orchard to my table.

I take another sip and bless the hands of those who provided the sugar

which sweetened the tea, harvested the cane, processed it,

bagged it and sent it on its way to me.

I take another sip and lift my cup in gratitude as I feel the interconnection of my body now with theirs,

my blood now with theirs,

my bones now with theirs,

and my heart fills with love for all of creation.

I give thanks.

~ Helen Moore, "I Awaken Before Dawn" 

"The Light of Invisible Bodies"

Day ends, and before sleep
when the sky dies down,
consider your altered state:
has this day changed you?
Are the corners sharper or rounded off? 
Did you live with death?
Make decisions that quieted?
Find one clear word that fit?
At the sun’s midpoint did you notice a pitch of absence,
bewilderment that invites the possible?
What did you learn from things you dropped
and picked up and dropped again?
Did you set a straw parallel to the river,
let the flow carry you downstream?

~ Jeanne Lohmann, “The Light of Invisible Bodies”

St. Francis And The Sow

The bud
stands for all things,
even for those things that don’t flower,
for everything flowers, from within, of self-blessing;
though sometimes it is necessary
to reteach a thing its loveliness,
to put a hand on its brow
of the flower
and retell it in words and in touch
it is lovely
until it flowers again from within, of self-blessing;
as Saint Francis
put his hand on the creased forehead
of the sow, and told her in words and in touch
blessings of earth on the sow, and the sow
began remembering all down her thick length,
from the earthen snout all the way
through the fodder and slops to the spiritual curl of the tail,
from the hard spininess spiked out from the spine
down through the great broken heart
to the sheer blue milken dreaminess spurting and shuddering
from the fourteen teats into the fourteen mouths sucking and blowing beneath them:
the long, perfect loveliness of sow.

~ Galway Kinnel, "St. Francis And The Sow"