“Help!” is the shortest, most primal prayer. It acknowledges our insufficiency for whatever is in front of us. It’s humble. I’ve been spending a lot of time with my young grandchildren lately, and they need a lot of help. They need a boost to get to high places, their shoes tied and their coats zipped,…
Ubuntu speaks about our interconnectedness. You can’t be human all by yourself.–Desmond Tutu Sin has been defined as separation – from God, from others, from the earth, from our very selves. God built us for interconnection, not separation. I’ve been thinking lately about white supremacy. And it occurs to me that, at its root, white…
“It was what I was born for – to look, to listen, to lose myself inside this soft world – to instruct myself over and over in joy…..how can you help but grow wise with such teachings as these….” –Mary Oliver I need to relearn how to pay attention. Babies are masters at this. They…
Walking through the grocery store a while ago I saw a man wearing a t-shirt that said, “Comfort is a slow death.” It’s true. Comfort amounts to self-imposed and culturally imposed guardrails limiting what we think we can do. It’s seductive: warm and well-fed we are so easily tamed. I’m reminded of the scene in…
The Christian tradition of Advent transforms the days leading up to Christmas into a journey, a pilgrimage of sorts filled with sacred encounters. A quietness, like the snow muffling sound, settles into our souls. Many of us begin early in December with confession, a cleaning out and purging of our souls. For me, this is…
He who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead; his eyes are closed. Albert Einstein Awe is a state of wonder in which we feel a part of something larger than ourselves. It can happen during mundane moments like a sunrise or sunset or…
On one of my rest days on pilgrimage, I took a short walk away from my camp in Medanales, New Mexico. As I returned, I saw barefoot tracks in the fine dust heading toward the camp. It startled me more than a little bit. I was immediately suspicious of a barefoot person. Why? A short…
Riding out a hurricane this week taught me a thing or two. That sometimes, instead of making our way somewhere else, pilgrimage is a matter of standing still and waiting out whatever storm has made its way to you. It’s being trapped by rising water and winds beyond your control. It’s the inability to take…
Cheryl Strayed didn’t realize she was on a pilgrimage when she began hiking the Pacific Crest Trail. She wasn’t a person of faith and had no thought of God when she began. But her journey as described in her book Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail had all the elements of…
I recently returned from a two-week pilgrimage to Chimayo, New Mexico, and to Monastery of Christ in the Desert. I’m still processing the deeper lessons, but for now I can share some of the nuts-and-bolts. Every pilgrimage is different, but details help with planning. Use mine as a template for your own holy hike. Physical…