June 4: Trinity Sunday: Psalm 8

 This is the First Sunday in the Season of Pentecost, the long church season which lasts until Advent. This year Advent begins November 26, so we have six months of the Season of Pentecost. Often called “Ordinary Time,” the Season of Pentecost gives us time to catch our breath after the big church seasons of Christmas, Lent, and Easter. It is a time to let our roots sink deeper into our faith and listen for the whisper of God in our lives. During all the “High Holy Days,” we can get caught up in the drama and miss seeing God in the everyday, normal activities. It can be easy to expect God to show up with angels and earth-shattering announcements. And we may be disappointed if God doesn’t do so. We may forget God is just as much present in the daily routine.

To start off the Season of Pentecost, we return to the very beginning of the Bible and hear the Creation Story. God sings every part of creation into being when the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters. Light and Dark, waters and vegetation, land creatures and fishes are all formed and pronounced Good. Finally, God created humankind in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them. At the end of the sixth day of creation, God saw everything that [God] had made, and indeed, it was very good.

Hildegard of Bingen, one of my favorite mystics, said, “Through this world God encircles and strengthens humankind. Through and through, great power is ours, such that all creation, in all things stands by us.” We are one with creation and all creation is one with and in us. Amazing!

The First Sunday of Pentecost is also Trinity Sunday. The Gospel and Epistle mention the three Persons of the Trinity. In the Gospel (Matthew 28:16-20), Jesus reiterates humanity’s charge for creation saying, all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Second Corinthians (2 Corinthians 13:11-13) notes that it is through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit that we carry out our calling to be stewards of all creation—from the least atom to the most giant whale and furthest star.

The mandate to ‘make disciples’ and the stewardship of all creation are both ways humanity is a co-creator with God. Hildegard defines the Trinity beautifully. “Who is the Trinity? You are music. You are life. Source of everything, creator of everything, angelic hosts sing your praise. Wonderfully radiant, deep, mysterious. You are alive in everything, and yet you are unknown to us.” God, alive in everything, invites us to work with God to return to the goodness of the original creation.

Psalm 8 notes that although humanity is little lower than the angels; you adorn him with glory and honor; You give him mastery over the works of your hands; you put all things under his feet. We have God-given stewardship from the earliest creation, yet it is God whose name is wonderful everywhere on earth! As new scientific discoveries take us further into deep space, like this image from the James Webb Telescope of galaxies unfathomable light years away; and into inner space of atoms, we find ourselves amazed and humbled by the diversity of God’s creation. Our lives are interlinked with all of it, which is totally amazing and ought to leave us speechless in awe. God intersects our lives on the most minute levels and on the grandest levels.

How can we respond to this revelation as we enter the long season of Pentecost? Where is God in your life at this moment?

How can we be more aware of God who, as Hildegard says, is “source and creator of everything,” and who “encircles and strengthens humankind”?  

Psalm 8 1 O Lord our Governor, how exalted is your Name in all the world! 2 Out of the mouths of infants and children your majesty is praised above the heavens. 3 You have set up a stronghold against your adversaries, to quell the enemy and the avenger. 4 When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars you have set in their courses, 5 What is man that you should be mindful of him? The son of man that you should seek him out? 6 You have made him but little lower than the angels; you adorn him with glory and honor; 7 You give him mastery over the works of your hands; you put all things under his feet: 8 All sheep and oxen, even the wild beasts of the field, 9 The birds of the air, the fish of the sea, and whatsoever walks in the paths of the sea. 10 O Lord our Governor, how exalted is your Name in all the world! (Book of Common Prayer)

Our Lord and Ruler, your name is wonderful everywhere on earth! You let your glory be seen in the heavens above. With praises from children and from tiny infants, you have built a fortress. It makes your enemies silent, and all who turn against you are left speechless. I often think of the heavens your hands have made, and of the moon and stars you put in place. Then I ask, “Why do you care about us humans? Why are you concerned for us weaklings?” You made us a little lower than you yourself, and you have crowned us with glory and honor. You let us rule everything your hands have made. And you put all of it under our power— The sheep and the cattle, and every wild animal, The birds in the sky, the fish in the sea, and all ocean creatures. Our Lord and Ruler, your name is wonderful everywhere on earth! (Contemporary English Version)

Gratitude Journey: Nature

It’s the end of October! How many other feel like it can’t be possible that the year is nearly over? Over this year, we have journeyed together on this blog through many topics. During Epiphany we considered more deeply the seven practices of the Way of Love introduced by Episcopal Presiding Bishop Michael Curry. Then for Lent, we continued looking at the Way of Love disciplines by studying how they are applied in the Book of Ruth. In the Easter season we looked at ways we might respond to God’s call on our lives. Since the beginning of June, we’ve met several women whose lives are evidence of what happens when we live out the Great Commandment to “love our neighbor as ourselves”. These women changed their world for the better. Whether through teaching, or nursing, or advocating, or writing they impacted their communities.

The world and our lives are always changing. The world of James of Jerusalem, Florence Nightingale, Sojourner Truth, or Teresa of Avila isn’t the world we live in. They each lived in a time and culture that was filled with change and turmoil. (Has there ever been a time when that isn’t true?) In our time, we are made aware of all the changes and challenges because media of many sorts keeps us informed, or perhaps over-informed. It can be unsettling.

We need to be reminded Who is really in control. One way to do that is to pause, look for God, and then to say ‘thank you’. This simple action empowers us to move beyond the negatives and focus on what God is doing in our lives, and around us. Despite the headlines, we can be grateful for the small and large miracles in our daily lives.

I invite you to start now and spend the month of November on a Gratitude Journey. On this blog, I’ll offer a theme for the week, which you can use, or ignore.

You can make a journal, or you can just travel along with the blog (and Facebook). A journal doesn’t have to be anything fancy. You can just staple a few pages together. Or you can go all out and find an actual journal to record your thoughts, images, or scriptures about what you are grateful for. As you make your entries, they can be one line that says, “I am grateful today for (or because)…” It could be a scripture verse or even a picture that reminds you to be thankful.
This week’s theme is: Nature. As the seasons change you may find many things to ponder on your Gratitude Journey, or mention in your Gratitude Journal.
The Old Testament reading for the Twentieth Sunday after Pentecost, is from Joel. This hymn of joy for the harvest is my first entry on my Journey. Joel call on the people to “be glad and rejoice in the Lord your God; for he has given the early rain for your vindication, he has poured down for you abundant rain, the early and the later rain, as before. The threshing-floors shall be full of grain, the vats shall overflow with wine and oil….You shall know that I am in the midst of Israel, and that I, the Lord, am your God…I will pour out my spirit on all flesh…” (Joel 2:23-32)

This citation is praise to the one who reminds Israel, “I, the Lord, am your God.” As we look around us, Nature can inspire us to remember that God is the One who Creates and fills all things. What do you see as you look at Nature this week? Follow me on Facebook where I’ll post something I am grateful for every day (or try to!). Feel free to respond with your own posts of things you are thankful for.

You might want to take a walk outside to see what God is doing in Nature, or look up some of the writings of Hildegard of Bingen. If you need more Biblical inspiration, consider some of these Bible verses: Genesis 1, Psalm 19, Psalm 95, Psalm 104, and many others.

Extraordinary Women: Hildegard of Bingen

This week we meet Hildegard of Bingen, whose feast day is September 16.  In the past, I've explored other aspects of her life and work. In 2015, I did a series of posts about Hildegard that you can find by entering 'Hildegard' in the search box of the blog. This time, I’ve made a video of some of her writings and mandalas.

The video has ideas for using mandalas as prayer aids, and even making your own mandala. Mandalas of many forms can be found online. A mandala is simply a round or oval form with things that are spiritually meaningful or symbolic to you.

Hildegard based her mandalas on visions she had. In the video you’ll see one I made several years ago as a lectio divino activity based on a grain of seed falling to the ground. There is also one made of pictures cut from magazines that a group created at a retreat on being co-creators with God.

There is no one way to ‘properly’ do a Mandala. The hints in the video, which are downloadable here, are starting points for your own use of mandalas as prayer aids. 
And watch for the Advent Mandala series in December! We'll explore ways to use the Advent wreath as a mandala for our Advent meditations and Christmas preparations. 

Easter 5: Our Story Meets God's Story

We continue to look at how God calls us to be deeper in God and be transformed throughout the Easter season, and beyond. We’ve seen that our past is integral to who we are at this moment, and important to becoming the beloved child of God we are. God uses every part of our story to love us into more and more perfect union. We may think that we have nothing of use, or that our life has been too ‘terrible’ or ‘bad’ to be redeemed. That is not the story of Easter. All creation is resurrected in God’s love.

In the readings for this Sunday, we discover Peter defending himself to the other leaders after a visit to the Roman centurion at Caesarea. Talk about being out of your comfort zone! Peter, as a good and law-abiding Jew, was at first appalled at the idea presented in his vision in Joppa. ”There was something like a large sheet coming down from heaven, being lowered by its four corners; and it came close to me. As I looked at it closely I saw four-footed animals, beasts of prey, reptiles, and birds of the air. I also heard a voice saying to me, ‘Get up, Peter; kill and eat.’ But I replied, ‘By no means, Lord; for nothing profane or unclean has ever entered my mouth.’”  (Acts 11:5-8) God responds “What God has made clean, you must not call profane.” (Acts 11:9)

Peter relates that as he is still figuring out what this vision means, “At that very moment three men, sent to me from Caesarea, arrived at the house.”(Acts 11:11) They have been sent by Cornelius, a Roman and a centurion, living in Caesarea. Cornelius, as both a Roman and a soldier, would have been the last person Peter would willingly have visited. However, “the Spirit told me to go with them and not to make a distinction between them and us.” (Acts 11:12)

Peter realizes the vision isn’t about animals to eat. It is about people. Perhaps he remembered Jesus’ long ago call when he promised, ‘you shall fish for people.’ (Matthew 4:19) He goes with the visitors. Caesarea is about 30 miles north of Joppa on the coast of the Mediterranean Sea, so it was not just a quick trip around the corner.

Peter’s story was changed at that moment. His story took a new direction. God’s story of Love for all creation met Peter’s preconceived ideas about who was in and who was out of God’s family. The story of Cornelius and his household changed.

The vision of early church’s mission expanded when Peter explained the vision and visit to the leaders in Jerusalem. He states, “If then God gave [the Gentiles] the same gift that he gave us when we believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I that I could hinder God?” (Acts 11:17) His testimony convinces the other leaders who “were silenced. And they praised God, saying, ‘Then God has given even to the Gentiles the repentance that leads to life.’” (Acts 11:18)

As the number of those following ‘the Way’ grows, Jewish and Gentile followers sprout up in “Phoenicia, Cyprus, and Antioch…a great number became believers and turned to the Lord.” (Acts 11:19) Barnabas goes “to Tarsus to look for Saul, and when he had found him, he brought him to Antioch…and it was in Antioch that the disciples were first called ‘Christians’.” (Acts 11:25-26) Paul and Barnabas have become involved in a new chapter of God’s story of love and inclusion.

Rather than creating more divisions, God seeks to bring unity to all creation. Psalm 148 calls for every part of creation to praise God. The concluding stanzas exclaim, “Let them praise the Name of the Lord, for his Name only is exalted, his splendor is over earth and heaven. He has raised up strength for his people and praise for all his loyal servants, the children of Israel, a people who are near him.” (Psalm 148:13-14)

Last week we were reminded that “a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages” (Revelation 7:9) will form the Kingdom of God. The reading from Revelation this week tells us God is creating “a new heaven and a new earth…[and] making all things new.” (Revelation 21:1, 5) This mandala by Hildegard of Bingen shows all of creation celebrating God. 

As Easter people, we are part of that new creation. Our story, the one we thought was entirely our own, is suddenly revealed as being part of God’s total Story! That Story is based very simply on Jesus’ words in the Gospel “I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” (John 13:34-35)

Love is the new mandate. Love for all. We don’t have to ‘do’ anything, except Love. God is love and that is the new creation we are to live into. It may challenge our ideas about what our story is and what part we play in the new creation. It’s easy to overthink the details, when all we really need to do is accept God’s love and be God’s love to those in our homes, work places, and elsewhere.

Where can my story be God’s story of love today?

What ‘new creation’ is God creating in my life?

Take time to read Psalm 148 and think about all of creation praising God. How can I join into that chorus?

Pentecost: Ordinary Women: Hildegard of Bingen

This week we look back to the Middle Ages to a woman who stood up to popes and kings 400 years before Teresa of Avila. Hildegard of Bingen was influential in her time. She was the youngest child of Mechtild of Merxheim-Nahet and Hildebert of Bermersheim, born around 1098. Nobility, the family was in the service of Count Meginhard of Sponheim.

Hildegard’s life might be summed up in James 3:13-18. “Who is wise and understanding among you? Show by your good life that your works are done with gentleness born of wisdom. But if you have bitter envy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not be boastful and false to the truth. Such wisdom does not come down from above, but is earthly, unspiritual, devilish. For where there is envy and selfish ambition, there will also be disorder and wickedness of every kind. But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without a trace of partiality or hypocrisy. And a harvest of righteousness is sown in peace for those who make peace.”

Throughout her life, Hildegard had health problems. Like Teresa, it was during these episodes that she experienced visions. As often happened with younger children, she was sent to the Benedictine monastery at Disibodenberg in the Palatinate Forest of Germany. She took her profession with Jutta, daughter of Count Stephan II of Sponheim around 1112. The pair was the core for a community of women who joined the monastery. Jutta taught Hildegard to read and write. Hildegard also learned to play the 10-stringed psaltery and started creating music around that time.

When Jutta died in 1136, Hildegard was elected magistra of the community. Although Abbot Kuno of the Disinbodenberg monastery asked Hildegard to take the position of Prioress, she declined. Preferring independence for her community, she requested a move to Rupertsberg to establish a separate community. Despite the Abbot’s refusal, she persevered and received approval from Archbishop Henry I of Mainz. However, it was not until 1150 that the nuns moved to St. Rupertsberg monastery. Fifteen years later Hildegard founded a second monastery at Eibingen.

Hildegard knew that her visio, her visions, were a gift from God that helped her see all things in the light of God through her senses. She shared them with only a few trusted friends, like Jutta and her confessor. Then in 1141, she received the instruction to “write down that which you see and hear”. She didn’t want to obey and became physically ill as she tells in Scivias (Know the Ways), “But I, though I saw and heard these things, refused to write for a long time through doubt and bad opinion and the diversity of human words, not with stubbornness but in the exercise of humility, until, laid low by the scourge of God, I fell upon a bed of sickness; then, compelled at last by many illnesses, and by the witness of a certain noble maiden of good conduct [the nun Richardis von Stade] and of that man whom I had secretly sought and found, as mentioned above, I set my hand to the writing. While I was doing it, I sensed, as I mentioned before, the deep profundity of scriptural exposition; and, raising myself from illness by the strength I received, I brought this work to a close – though just barely – in ten years. (...) And I spoke and wrote these things not by the invention of my heart or that of any other person, but as by the secret mysteries of God I heard and received them in the heavenly places. And again I heard a voice from Heaven saying to me, 'Cry out therefore, and write thus’.”

As James 3:17 notes, “But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits.” Hildegard’s works of writing, music, and art came from her devotion to God. Pope Eugenius learned of Hildegard’s work and gave Papal approval in 1148. This gave her credence and fame. She went on to author 3 books of her visions, 2 books on natural medicine, music for liturgy and a musical morality play (Ordo Virtutum). She was an avid correspondent and nearly 400 of her letters survive. Her recipients ranged from popes and emperors to abbots and abbesses. Hildegard drew many of her visions as mandalas and these remain popular today.

Hildegard died September 17, 1179. Although she was one of the first persons to be put forward for canonization as a saint, the process was never completed. However, in 2012, she received “equivalent canonization” and she was the 4^th woman named a Doctor of the Church. The Church of England lists her as a saint with the feast day of September 17.

Hildegard was a multi-talented woman. Her leadership of the nuns, and her correspondence with the rich and powerful had wide ranging effects. She did not see herself as important, though.

What can we learn from Hildegard’s life?

Look up some of Hildegard’s mandalas and make one of your own.

Next week there will be no post. The following week we’ll conclude this series with a look at Mary of Nazareth, mother of Jesus. 

Christ is Compassion

Today we conclude our study of Hildegard of Bingen’s words and spirituality. Hildegard was a woman ahead of her time in her vision of health and science. Her theology, like that of her medieval contemporaries, saw God at the center of the universe. She taught that humanity, in cooperation with God’s love and creativity, could become fully alive and whole in union with God. This expressed itself most fully in a life of compassion.

In a letter to some monks, she wrote, “Love streams down with the outpouring water of the Holy Spirit, and in this love is the peace of God’s goodness…compassion…drips balsam for all the needs that adhere to the human condition. This sound of love rings in harmony with every hymn…this love calls out in compassion with a pleading yet lovely voice.”*

The word ‘compassion’ means ‘to suffer with’. When we truly have compassion for someone’s need, we are more than sympathetic, more than sorry for them. We enter into their grief or homelessness or hunger or other need. This makes us very vulnerable and often we don’t want to be that open to one another.

Stop. When was the last time you last truly ‘suffered with’ or had compassion for someone’s problem?

For Hildegard, the act of entering into another’s suffering was a way of becoming closer to God. In the acts of justice, virtue, and compassion we are God’s hands and feet. Teresa of Avila, writing 400 years after Hildegard agreed:

Let nothing disturb you. Let nothing frighten you. All things pass. God does not change. Patience achieves everything. Whoever has God lacks nothing. God alone suffices. Christ has no body now on earth but yours; no hands but yours; no feet but yours. Yours are the eyes through which the compassion of Christ must look out on the world. Yours are the feet with which He is to go about doing good. Yours are the hands with which He is to bless His people

Stop. Look at your hands. What does it mean to see them as the hands of Christ? Look at your feet. What does it mean to be Christ’s feet?

Hildegard noted

We are dressed in the scaffold of creation:
in seeing—to recognize all the world,
in hearing—to understand,
in smelling—to discern,
in tasting—to nurture,
in touching—to govern.
In this way humankind comes to know God,
for God is the author of all creation.

And so, humankind
full of creative possibilities,
is God’s work.

Humankind alone,
is called to assist God.
Humankind is called to co-create.*

Hildegard herself believed that in creating as the hands and feet of God in the world she was in partnership with God to bring beauty into the world. By creating justice and compassion, whether through her art, music, cooking, gardening, or writing, she felt that she was in union with God. By living as the hands and feet of God we too are bringing God’s beauty, love, and healing into the world.

Ephesians 2:7-10 tells us, “God has us where he wants us, with all the time in this world and the next to shower grace and kindness upon us in Christ Jesus. Saving is all his idea, and all his work. All we do is trust him enough to let him do it. It’s God’s gift from start to finish! We don’t play the major role. If we did, we’d probably go around bragging that we’d done the whole thing! No, we neither make nor save ourselves. God does both the making and saving. He creates each of us by Christ Jesus to join him in the work he does, the good work he has gotten ready for us to do, work we had better be doing.” (the Message translation)

Stop. Ask yourself if you are willing to be a co-creator for good and compassion and beauty in the world.

Next week is Advent I. During Advent, I’ll have daily posts with an image and brief meditation, which can be used to create an Advent chain or collage.

*Praying with Hildegard of Bingen by Gloria Durka

God is in All

We are continuing to meditate on some of the works and words of Hildegard of Bingen. This mystic, abbess, writer, healer, and counselor of the 12^th Century had a worldview similar to that of the Celtic monks and nuns. For her and for them, all of creation is filled with God’s creative Spirit, from the rocks to humanity. In Celtic spirituality, you will find prayers for every aspect of the day. There are Celtic prayers for rising, for lighting the fire, for doing each task, for new life and for death.

In our busy, modern world we often can forget the basic rhythms of life, much less remember to pray for each action. In the Episcopal Book of Common Prayer, Eucharistic Prayer C reminds us that God is in charge of everything. “At your command all things came to be: the vast expanse of interstellar space, galaxies, suns, the planets in their courses, and this fragile earth, our island home….From the primal elements you brought forth the human race, and blessed us with memory, reason, and skill. You made us the rulers of creation.” This would be a familiar sort of prayer for Hildegard who stated, “no creature, whether visible or invisible, lacks a spiritual life…all creatures have something visible and invisible.”*

Interestingly, in her thoughts about creation, like in her dietary practices, Hildegard was ahead of the science of her time. She understood that there were parts of creation too small to be seen and included them in having a spiritual life. Scientists now know that there is much matter that is to minute even for the most powerful microscopes and galaxies so far away that we cannot see them. All of that is imbued with God, just as Hildegard stated. She saw all of creation as glowing with God’s presence and wrote down a vision in which God told her “I am the supreme and fiery force who kindled every living spark…the air is alive in the verdure and the flowers, the waters flow as if they lived; the sun too lives in its light..”*

Her mandala shows all of life flowing from and surrounded by God. 

Stop. Do you see God as alive in all creation-even the rocks and water?

Psalm 24 is a hymn to all of creation, beginning with “The earth is the LORD'S, and all it contains, The world, and those who dwell in it. For He has founded it upon the seas And established it upon the rivers…” There is no doubt that we have, and continue to, damage the earth. Even if you doubt global warming, there are islands of trash in our oceans, pollutants ruining our rivers, hazy skies from smog in many places. This impacts us whether we realize it or not. Our relationships with one another are stressful and strained, perhaps because we are less connected to the cycles of the living earth than we used to be. Eucharistic Prayer C continues, “We turned against you, and betrayed your trust; and we turned against one another.”

The technology that is supposed to make our lives easier sometimes seems instead to be taking over our lives and all our time. We can laugh at videos of texting people walking into fountains or even running into bears (!), but the truth is most of us do, at least from time to time, use our phones while walking somewhere-or worse yet, driving. If we are so immersed in the next posting on Facebook that we miss the splendid sunrise or the blooming of a rose, we are separating ourselves from the source of life. If we think we have to be ‘on call’ every second so that we cannot even put our phones down to eat, are we are alienating ourselves from our families, friends, nature, and God? 

Stop and think about how the stresses of modern life are different than a generation or 2 ago. How can you become more literally grounded in the cycles of the earth?

Ephesians 1: 22-23 reminds us that “[God] put all things in subjection under Christ’s feet, and gave Him as head over all things to the church, which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills all in all.” Hildegard would not have doubted the truth of this citation. The God she knew intimately was intimately entwined with all of life, both natural and human and in relationships.

Eucharistic Prayer C concludes by affirming, “Again and again, you called us to return. Through prophets and sages you revealed your righteous Law. And in the fullness of time you sent your only Son, born of a woman, to fulfill your Law, to open for us the way of freedom and peace…And so, Father, we who have been redeemed by him, and made a new people by water and the Spirit, now bring before you these gifts. Sanctify them by your Holy Spirit to be the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ our Lord.”

Hildegard believed, like Isaiah, “[God] will not be disheartened or crushed until He has established justice in the earth; and the coastlands will wait expectantly for His law. Thus says God the LORD, Who created the heavens and stretched them out, Who spread out the earth and its offspring, Who gives breath to the people on it And spirit to those who walk in it, ‘I am the LORD, I have called you in righteousness, I will also hold you by the hand and watch over you, And I will appoint you as a covenant to the people, As a light to the nations’…” (Isaiah 42:5-6) For her, the greening power of God’s Spirit was filling and renewing all life. The “supreme and fiery force” Hildegard spoke of is “the true Light which, coming into the world, enlightens every man. He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him…” (John 1:9-10)

Stop to ask if your appreciation of God’s work in salvation would change if you fully believed God was working in and through all creation all the time?

Next week we’ll conclude this series with a look at Hildegard’s words about compassion and beauty.

*Praying with Hildegard of Bingen by Gloria Durka

God is Creating

For Hildegard of Bingen, creation was not secondary to spirituality. In fact, for her, all creation works together and glorifies God. “All creatures should see that God has neither beginning nor end, and for this reason they will never have enough of looking at God…there is no creature without some kind of radiance-whether it be greenness, seeds, buds, or another kind of beauty. Otherwise, it would not be a creature at all. But if God did not have the power to make all things, where would God’s creative power be?”* Everything has some of the Light of God  in it. It is that very Light that makes the creature what it is. This is true of animate and inanimate creation.

Hildegard saw humans as somewhat superior to other creations, because the human mind has intellect and in that intelligence we are linked to the Creator. Madeline L’Engle, in her book Walking on Water, notes “unless we are creators we are not fully alive…Creativity is a way of living life, no matter our vocation or how we earn our living. Creativity is not limited to the arts, or having some kind of important career.” For L’Engle, like Hildegard, it is our ability to create that sets us apart from the other creatures.

Recently I stumbled across a blog by Mark Altrogge that noted, we sometimes think creating isn’t what Christians should be doing. Aren’t we supposed to be praying and preaching, instead of ‘wasting our time’ on creative things? This blog author says “Christians should play banjo and decorate cakes, knit sweaters and make movies, do photography and write poems” Just like Hildegard and Madeline L’Engle, Mark Altrogge says “when we create we act as those the Creator made in his own image…God didn’t make a strictly utilitarian world. He decorated it with weeping willows and tiger lilies….arts are a way to bless others…[and] bring joy to us.” Altrogge notes that “when we see a cool painting or hear a moving symphony it points us to the author of all beauty. When I hear the theme from Jurassic Park I don’t simply think of John Williams’ talent, I think of God.” In using our gifts and talents as unto the Lord it “reminds us of the Giver of every good and perfect gift.” 

Stop to think about whether you think that what you do on a day-to-day basis is creative. Why or why not?

Even if humanity had a special relationship with God because we are co-creators, Hildegard still saw that all of “Creation is allowed in intimate love, to speak to the Creator as if to a lover. Creation is allowed to ask for a pasture, a homeland. Out of the Creator’s fullness, this request is granted to creation.” (From Hildegard of Bingen by Gabriele Uhlein)

If all creation is alive with the Spirit and Light of God, and if we are co-creators with God in and through creation—then we must have a unique responsibility to honor creation as a part of God. This might mean that we begin to live more intentionally conscious of what our actions can do to the world around us. Does my buying pre-packaged dinners create extra trash? Do I really need another pair of shoes? What about global warming?

Stop and ask yourself if you see all creation as filled with God. What could you do to care for creation?

Even though Hildegard’s times were very different from ours, people had the same needs and wants and feelings. For her, it is our creative actions that link us to God. “From [God] human beings have the ability to be active in the world…human beings love the things they make because from their recognition they see that they gain reality.”* Madeline L’Engle notes that we should remember “the root word of humble and human is the same: humus: earth. We are dust. We are created; it is God who made us and not we ourselves. But we were made to be co-creators with our maker.” (Walking on Water)

Even though we are ‘dust and to dust shall return’ as the Ash Wednesday prayer reminds us, we are gifted to be, in fact we are required to be, co-creators in making the world and in re-making the world. Like little painted stones, we are unique in how that happens and it is an amazing responsibility that God has given to us. Wouldn't it be a fun activity to take a rock and paint on it what your creative image is?

Stop and think about how you create and co-create. Is it in art, music, writing, games, or something else entirely? 

Next time we’ll take a look at what Hildegard says about the Earth itself.

*Praying with Hildegard of Bingen by Gloria Durka

God is in Eating Holistically

Hildegard was known as a healer throughout Europe. In fact, her monastery at Rupertsberg had a huge herb garden and was well known as a place to get healing herbs. As abbess, she encouraged nuns who were ill to rest well and care for themselves. Despite having health problems of her own, Hildegard ministered to those who came to the monastery for healing. It is said she accepted her own physical sufferings and ailments as a sharing in the passion of Jesus. In this she was like many other mystics such as Teresa of Avila.

Hildegard wrote about diet and healing. Like many today and through the ages, Hildegard preached moderation as “the mother of all the virtues for everything heavenly and earthly…through moderation…the body is nourished with the proper discipline…[like a field that] has not been plowed, you do not find good grain springing up; instead there are only useless weeds. It’s the same with a person who lays on herself more strain than her body can endure.”*

It is interesting that Hildegard identified stress (‘more strain than her body can endure’) as something that is bad for health. Discipline in life, on the other hand, is how to be fruitful like a plowed and planted field.

Stop to think about your life. Do you think you are like a plowed or unplowed field in your habits?

In 1 Corinthians we are reminded “your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you and whom you received from God? You are not your own property, then; you have been bought with a price. So use your body for the glory of God.” Hildegard emphasized balance in life and diet as a way to physical and spiritual health.

This mandala by Hildegard could make you think of da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man, although she lived 2 centuries before da Vinci. For her, the mandala is more about humanity’s balance in God than the proportions of a perfect human being. The figure is surrounded by God. In God is found all creation, and all seasons. At the center of that is humanity-or perhaps Christ, the perfection of humanity. 

Hildegard suggested 4 rules for healthy living so that you are in balance:

1. Strengthening the soul through prayer and meditation, by encouraging talents, and working against evil. 
2. Detoxification by bloodletting(!), fasting, and other therapies.
3. Keeping the soul, body, and mind equally strong so that you are balanced.
4. Sharpening the senses by having purpose, optimism, and personal responsibility.

Stop, are there parts of Hildegard’s 4 rules you might add to your routine?

Hildegard, as we saw at the beginning of October, wrote recipes. We often do not think of the diet of 12^th century Germany as being varied. Hildegard, however, used numerous healthy foods including meats like poultry, lamb, beef, venison, and goat; fish, fruits (apples, cooked pears, blackberries, raspberries, red currants, cornels, cherries, mulberries, medlar, quinces, sloe berries, grapes, citrus, dates), and even spices in her recipes. She believed these foods were good for you. Other foods she called ‘kitchen poison’: “eel, duck, peas, strawberries, fatty meat, cucumbers, domestic goose, blueberries, elderberries, cabbage, crabs, leeks, lentils, nightshades (like potatoes), olive oil, mushrooms, peaches, plums, refined sugar, millet, raw food, tench (a fish), plaice (a fish), pork, white wheat flour, sausage.”

The drinks she suggested may seem odd to us as they include spelt coffee (spelt is a grain), beer, fruit juice thinned with mountain spring water, wine, goat milk, and teas from fennel, rose hip or sage. Spelt, in fact, was one of her favorite ingredients. She used it in porridge, coffee, and baking. “Spelt creates healthy body, good blood and a happy outlook on life,” she noted. You can read more about her food ideas here.

Many of the foods she considered healthy have been proven to have benefit, like beans, almonds, honey, beets, berries, lavender, clove, cinnamon, and garlic. It is interesting to note that things like refined sugar and fatty meat are now considered to be less healthy by modern dieticians, too.

Stop to consider what you eat. Is it in line with what Hildegard, and modern nutritionists consider healthy?

Next time we will look at God in creation, and our part in that, as seen by Hildegard

*Praying with Hildegard of Bingen by Gloria Durka

God of Justice and Virtue

As we walk with Hildegard of Bingen in the last weeks of Pentecost this year, we discover that she sees God within all of creation. “The blowing wind, the mild, moist air, the exquisite greening…in their beginning, in their ending, they give God their praise” (From Hildegard of Bingen by Gabriele Uhlein)

God is our lover and we are beloved of God, and so is everyone else. Because we are all part of one another, we need to be filled with God’s justice and virtue. We must be “thirsting for God’s justice…[and we] will be forever refreshed by the vision of God…surrender to it, taste virtue, and drink…be strengthened by it,” as Hildegard states.*

The prophet Amos spoke about justice many centuries before Hildegard. Like her, he used water as a metaphor for the work of justice. He said that we should “let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream”. (Amos 5:24) The life-giving flowing water of God’s justice can wash away injustice when we allow it to work.

Stop to ponder whether you have ever thirsted for justice and virtue. When was that?

What exactly does Hildegard mean by justice and virtue?

For Hildegard, living as she did, in the midst of turmoil of church and state, justice involved making holy that which was not right. For her, wisdom “pours into…the human spirit the justice of true faith through which God alone is known.” Because, as we saw last time, spirituality and humanity are both communal, the balance of contemplation and work is needed. Our inter-relatedness means that we see not just the good, but also the evil of the world as being transformable by God. We sink into God in contemplation and prayer which inspires and empowers us to work for change.

Stop and consider the words of St. Basil the Great in the 4^th Century below. Are there changes you might make in your lifestyle to bring the equality of justice?

The bread which you do not use-is the bread of the hungry.
The garment hanging in your wardrobe-is the garment of one who is naked.
The shoes that you do not wear-Are the shoes of one who is barefoot.
The money you keep locked away-is the money of the poor.
The acts of charity you do not perform-are so many injustices that you commit.

Virtue, for Hildegard, was the fruit of justice. She noted, “those of us who do good are like an orchard filled with the fruit of good works….”* In Scivias she stated, “the brightness of God shines in the good works of just people, so that God can be known, adored, and worshiped…by doing good works with the help of god, people worship god with their countless and wonderful actions.”

It is true that sometimes events happen that make it difficult to see our connection with some other human spirits. School shootings and other senseless gun violence, such as the recent road rage incident resulting in the death of a 4 year old, make us ask God 'why?' and 'how can this be transformed into good?' It is often very hard, in these cases, to remember (or believe) that God loves the victim and the perpetrator just as much. What we, perhaps, need to do is work toward a world where such things do not happen. Maybe that is how we bring about virtue and justice...

Stop and ask yourself if you agree with Hildegard’s definition of ‘virtue’. How would you define it?

Jesus warned his disciples about false prophets, saying “You will be able to tell them by their fruits…a good tree produces good fruit…” (Matthew 7:15-20) It is easy to get caught up in the advertising and the need to have the ‘newest and best’. For me, that can distract me from walking in the way of justice and virtue that Hildegard describes.

Hildegard drew many images, often in the form of mandalas. This simple one seems to encapsulate the simplicity of bearing fruit in all seasons. The seasons of nature mirror the seasons of our lives. God is in the center of all, and when we are rooted in God, we ‘bear fruit in due season’. The fruit of justice and virtue.

*Praying with Hildegard of Bingen by Gloria Durka

God is Anamchara

Hildegard, the 12^th Century mystic whose work we are exploring until Advent, was deeply convinced that we needed close friends, esp. someone who can be a soul friend, an anamchara, to affirm us in our gifts and help us grow into our truest self in God. 

Stop to consider who you would consider a soul friend, someone who always encourages and pushes you to greater things. You might want to thank that person.

Once Hildegard wrote, “no creature, whether visible or invisible, lacks a spiritual life…those who long to brings God’s words to completion must always remember that, because they are human, they are vessels of clay, and so should continually focus on what they are and what they will be…may God make you a mirror of life.”* Her words remind us that although all creation is part of God, we as humans have the greater responsibility. We are formed by God "of dust from the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being.” (Genesis 2) In Romans, Paul notes, “For we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now. And not only this, but also we ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body.” (Romans 8:22-23) We are formed from clay, in the image of God and with God’s breath, but until we are fully redeemed, we are not complete.

Part of that completion and growth can only happen when we work together with one another. Even if we are not ‘soul friends’ with everyone, we need to recall that we are still part of the created whole. Ann Voskamp in her blog recently talked about our desperate need to remember that “Being enemies is not an option. Being human beings who belong to each other is the only option.”  

Each one of us is called Beloved by God. Yet we often withhold our fellowship because of hurt feelings or disagreements. When we don’t get along, we are not the ‘mirror of life’ that Hildegard suggests we should be.

Stop and think about someone you might need to forgive. Is there anything you can do to start the process of reconciliation?

Casting Crowns has a song, Who Am I (see below) that captures the frailty of humanity, and yet our Beloved-ness. God calls each of us “Mine” and knows our name. Jesus told his disciples, and us, “I call you friends, because I have made known to you everything…love one another.” (John 15:14-17)

Stop to thank God for calling you Beloved and Friend. How can you and I work to see each other as beloved fellow children of God?

Next time, we’ll look at Hildegard’s views on Justice and Virtue.

Who am I by Casting Crowns 

Who am I, that the Lord of all the earth

Would care to know my name,

Would care to feel my hurt?

Who am I, that the Bright and Morning Star

Would choose to light the way

For my ever wandering heart?

Not because of who I am

But because of what You've done.

Not because of what I've done

But because of who You are.

I am a flower quickly fading,

Here today and gone tomorrow.

A wave tossed in the ocean.

A vapor in the wind.

Still You hear me when I'm calling.

Lord, You catch me when I'm falling.

And You've told me who I am.

I am Yours, I am Yours.

Who am I, that the eyes that see my sin

Would look on me with love and watch me rise again?

Who am I, that the voice that calmed the sea

Would call out through the rain

And calm the storm in me?...

I am a flower quickly fading,

Here today and gone tomorrow.

A wave tossed in the ocean.

A vapor in the wind.

Still You hear me when I'm calling.

Lord, You catch me when I'm falling.

And You've told me who I am.

I am Yours….

Whom shall I fear?

Whom shall I fear?

'Cause I am Yours, I am Yours.

*Praying with Hildegard of Bingen by Gloria Durka

Introducing Hildegard

During October and November, I’m returning to one of my favorite mystics. Her world view has been an inspiration to me since the 1980’s. Hildegard of Bingen was born in 1098 into a world of Popes and anti-popes, Crusades, and feudalism. She lived in Germany and was sent (dedicated) to a monastery as a young girl. The prioress, Jutta, was very influential in encouraging Hildegard’s spiritual growth.

In 1136, Hildegard took over as prioress when Jutta died. By 1148, she had founded a new community and 1 year later moved to a second abbey at Rupertsberg. Her nuns, like all monastics, observed times of work, sleep, prayer, and study. (8 hours of sleep, 6 of work, 6 of prayer, and 4 of study or meditation) 

Hildegard had visions throughout her life, but did not start writing them down until she was 43. Her works were endorsed first by Bernard of Clairvaux and then by Pope Eugenius III. Even though she was a woman, Hildegard was highly regarded by church leaders of her time. In fact she counseled popes, kings, and queens around Europe.

Hildegard’s theology encompasses our relationship to God, to one another, and to the earth. She teaches that we are meant to be in harmony through justice and compassion, which is holiness. She sees everything as being holistically related and mystically connected to God and God’s creation.

Along with her writings, Hildegard is known for the art she created. Many of her mandalas depicting her spiritual view of the world and relationship with God are well known. She also wrote music, used herbs to heal, and wrote recipes (see below to try out some-I made the Spice Cookies, which are very good. A bit sweet for my taste, so I might cut back on the sugar a bit if I make them again. Also you could add nuts or raisins to the batter for a nice change.)

As abbess and counselor to the high and mighty, Hildegard can serve as a role model to women of all times. She proves that you don’t have to be powerful to have an impact. Over the next few weeks, we’ll explore some of her works and see how her words are still valid over 900 years after she was born.

Spice Cookies

3/4 cup butter or margarine (1 1/2 sticks)
1 cup brown sugar
1 egg
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
2 cups flour
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp ground nutmeg
1/2 tsp ground cloves

Cream butter with brown sugar. Beat in the egg. Sift dry ingredients together. Mix dry ingredients into butter mixture. Heat oven to 350^o. Form walnut sized balls of dough, place on greased and floured (or parchment lined) cookie sheet. Bake 12-15 minutes (till edges of are golden brown.) Cool for 5 minutes, remove from cookie sheet and finish cooling on racks. Makes 24-30. 

(https://recipes.sparkpeople.com/recipe-detail.asp?recipe=459415 Recipe reconstructed and adapted from Hildegard's circa 1157 treatise Physica: Liber Simplicis Medicinia) She said that these cookies should be taken at regular intervals to increase joy and positivity!)

Breakfast porridge

1 c. grain (oats, spelt, barley, etc.)
2 c. water
Boil 5 minutes, add your choice of nuts, spices, fruit such as:
Almond slivers, coconut flakes
Cinnamon, cloves
Apples, cranberries
Brown sugar or honey

Some other fun recipes like Hildegard’s are at http://divineyoudivine.blogspot.com/p/hildegards-recipes.html

Next time, we’ll start looking at Hildegard’s view of God as light and breath! 

Rushing Water-Cleansing Spirit

This month we have been looking at nature as a metaphor for God’s presence. God’s love is obvious in the diversity of mountains, in the new life sprouting on seemingly barren cliffs, and in the grace that is like water seeping through rocks.

In both Colorado and at Christ in the Desert Monastery rushing water played an important part in my thoughts. When I went to Durango, CO, I wondered how bad the remnants of the toxic spill would be and was pleasantly surprised that the river was cleaning itself, or being cleaned by the rushing water. At the monastery, the powerfully running river itself was a reminder of the ever moving power of God.

In early August, a mistake by an EPA crew released millions of gallons of toxic orange mine waste into the Animas River from an abandoned gold mine. Two weeks later, when my husband and I were in the area, you could still see the orange stained rocks and there was orange water still in the eddies along the sides of the river. However, the actual movement of the water had flushed most of the orange waste down the river.

To me that was an image for the work of the Spirit of God moving to wash out the toxic influences in our lives, when we allow God in. It doesn’t matter what bad habits, actions, or influences we’ve been harboring and cultivating. When we say ‘here I am’ to God, the Spirit of the Living God will begin to transform our lives and souls until we are clean.  “Come now, let us settle the matter," says the LORD. "Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red as crimson, they shall be like wool.” (Isaiah 1:18)

It doesn’t matter how ‘bad’ we have been. God’s promise is sure. “None of the sins that person has committed will be remembered against them. They have done what is just and right; they will surely live.” (Ezekiel 33:16) God’s Spirit washes and renews us, just like the Animas River is being cleaned and renewed by the action of the water flowing downstream.

The Chama River runs right through Christ in the Desert Monastery. I always make time to walk down to sit by the river when I am there. Near the river it is green and lush, exactly the opposite of the limestone cliffs towering over the valley. When we stay close to the river of the Spirit, we’ll find that we, too, are as Hildegard of Bingen says ‘greening’. God's Spirit brings blessing and revives our wilting souls. This quote from a d365.org meditation reminds us that God is with us in everything:

Being in partnership with God is no lonely calling, because we can trust God to hear our anger, our fatigue, our sadness. We can trust God to help us carry our heaviest struggles. And we can trust God to provide for us in surprising ways. 

I invite you to consider what the rivers are in your life that refresh you. 

Is it Bible reading? Is it prayer? Is it sitting quietly and letting God sit with you? Is being with family and friends where you find God’s Spirit? Or do you feel closest to God when you are serving others?

Hildegard says we are lush and green because of our relationship with God, whatever form that takes. In the next few weeks, we’ll look at some of Hildegard’s words.

Greening Time

Having just returned from a week in WI, I am stepping aside from Acts to ponder for just a moment the meditations of Hildegard of Bingen who speaks a lot about the ‘greening’ of God’s people. Being in the lush green-ness of WI, so different from the Southwest, I was again and again reminded of Hildegard’s meditations.

Hildegard was a nun in the 12th century. She was honored by Popes at a time in history when women’s work was normally ignored. Her homeland of Bavaria was lush and green like the hills and dells of Wisconsin. I can now more deeply understand her metaphors of greening and verdancy than before. I want to share just a few of her sayings with you this week, instead of Paul's work as found in Acts.

Sometimes it is necessary and important to get out of your normal routine and even out of your familiar home territory. God meets us when we take the time to get away. One of my favorite of Hildegard's sayings is this:

Good People, most royal greening verdancy, rooted in the sun, you shine with radiant light. In this circle of earthly existence you shine so finely, it surpasses understanding. God hugs you. You are encircled by the arms of the mystery of God.

Nearly all Hildegard’s writings talk of God and our life in God as growing, greening, blossoming in rich variety and abundance. In the previous saying, she reminds us that we are God’s beloved and the ‘most royal greening verdancy’.

God is seen, by Hildegard as ALL and always working, yet always full and complete: I am life complete unto itself, whole, sound, not needing stones to be sculpted, not needing branches to blossom, not rooted in human potency. Rather, all life has its root in me. Understanding is the root. The resounding WORD blossoms forth from it. How then, is it possible for God not to be at work? God is Understanding.

“The WORD blossoms forth from [the root of all life, all understanding].” Seeing the richness of the woods of Wisconsin, where even the trails are covered with ferns and the fallen trunks are covered with moss, I was impressed with this verse at the life and greening springing forth seemingly effortlessly from even what seems dead and useless.

Hildegard also notes that all creation celebrates God. The beautiful variety of fall colors in Wisconsin seemed to testify to the truth of her saying: “The blowing wind, the mild, moist air, the exquisite greening of trees and grasses-in their beginning, in their ending, they give God their praise.”

Most of all during the week of retreat and vacation I was reminded that “In serving God, humankind is much loved by him. God is delighted by humankind. Indeed, God himself has created humankind and given it all worth. God allows himself to be disturbed by it!”

"God is delighted by humankind!" Too often we forget that, until we get away and have time to just 'be' in the midst of God's creation.

The retreat I assisted with was about being willing to have faith and dive into the water of God’s love. Being surrounded by the water and green-ness of Wisconsin I was acutely aware of the richness of God’s love and greening power. Wherever you are on the continuum of desert time or vivid growing time in the Lord, I pray you are blessed by these meditations of Hildegard. If you can, take some time, even an hour to drive into the country and enjoy the beauty of nature. Every part of the world has a part of God's beauty and so too, each of us is a part of God's delight.

Next week, we will return to Acts and see how Paul fared in Greece.

God in our Routine Images

Our lives are filled with images. TV, billboards, magazines, internet, books, and street signage are just a few of the things we see every day. Many times we don’t even think about them. You know the hexagonal sign means stop so you don’t really LOOK at it. That billboard on that corner advertises a law office and has for years, so we don’t see it, really. We pass the same house day after day, but when we suddenly notice it’s a different color, we wonder “How long has it been like that?” It’s easy to get so lost in the same routine that we don’t really pay attention to what we see.

The third verse of Keble’s hymn suggests that if we pay attention, we may find God present everywhere:
If on our daily course our mind
be set to hallow all we find,
new treasures still, of countless price,
God will provide for sacrifice.

When our mind is willing to “hallow all we find,” each and every thing we see can become an icon showing us God.

Madeline L’Engle explains, “an icon is a symbol, rather than a sign…[it] contains within it some quality of what it represents…an icon of the Annunciation…contains, for us, some of Mary’s acceptance and obedience, and so affects our own ability to accept, to obey.” An icon is a representation of a piece of the Holy, something that opens our hearts and souls to see a bit more of God.

A traditional icon is a piece of wood painted with a holy image, but there are icons of God all around us, if we are just open to them. Stories, music, ‘secular’ art, a sunset can each be an icon. “There is nothing so secular that it cannot be sacred,” says L’Engle, “and that is one of the deepest messages of the Incarnation.”

Both L’Engle and Barbara Brown Taylor infer that the Incarnation is in fact the most holy of all icons. God in flesh is a very real symbol of the Divine, who loves our human-ness. Brown remarks, “I came late to the understanding that God loved all of me—not just my spirit but also my flesh…[and] God loved all bodies everywhere.”

Brown suggests taking on a “daily practice of incarnation—of being in the body with full confidence that God speaks the language of the flesh.” Jesus was God become Man, so he does know our fleshly needs. In the Middle Ages, Hildegard of Bingen named humanity as an icon—a symbol of divine work and love. She wrote, “God be praised in his handiwork: humankind. And so, humankind full of all creative possibilities, is God’s work. Humankind alone, is called to assist God, humankind is called to co-create.”

L’Engle notes that we are co-creators with God and with one another. Authors, artists, and musicians create, but as she notes, “The reader, viewer, listener, usually grossly underestimates his importance. If a reader cannot create a book along with the writer, the book will never come to life.”

Are there icons around you—symbols of the Holy One—that you haven’t paused long enough recently to notice? What if, for just one day, we tried to be aware of each thing we pass on our daily journey? We might just encounter God with “new treasures still, of countless price” as Keble says.

Next week, we will explore further what it means to be awake and aware of God in our routines.

* Quotations from Walking on Water, L’Engle and An Altar in the World, Barbara Brown Taylor, unless otherwise noted.