The Garden is Burning

 The Garden is Burning

For a long time now

a fire has been burning in my mind

a flood has rolled across my heart

an earthquake rumbles in my soul.

I am afraid it is breaking, 

this world of ours,

how could it not?

It bears so much weight

the weight of sadness,

the weight of fear,

the weight of pain.

Last week in Greece

a two thousand year old 

Olive Tree,

an elder, ancient and wise in ways we cannot even begin to know,

burned, 

as people fled the lands 

that fed them and us for ages untold.

The trees don’t get to leave.

Here in Ireland we smile 

and take pictures of a Walrus, 

a prince of the cold kingdom, 

now an exile, lost, wandering, alone,

iceless, friendless, bewildered by boats.

In Siberia, the tundra burns and mammoth bones have their slumbering rest disturbed

long thought safe and sleeping by the peoples who live and love upon the frosted lands.

In Afghanistan, a wordless groan erupts,

the pain of a tortured soul, 

the ache of a land so long in agony 

its voice is near a death rattle 

despair of a people fearing a veil being drawn over their faces, a stifling of song, an ending of hope, a blanket of hate, and loss, and loss, and loss, and betrayal.

In Haiti, earthquakes again.

In Lebanon, explosions again.

In America, fires again.

In Turkey, floods again.

My litany is nowhere near complete…

Lord have mercy.

The world is breaking.

How could it not?

What was meant as garden 

needs its gardeners,

needs us to be Adams, gardeners, again;

needs us to be Eves, mothers of life, again;

that was the original blessing after all;

to grow, to steward, to bring forth life, 

to bless, to give thanks, to guard and keep

all that lives, all that breathes, all that is.

So what must I do?

What can you do?

Be a gardener.

Now, 

right where you are.

Dig.

Dig deep within,

Dig over the hard soil of the heart 

that cannot bear to hear anymore 

and let it breathe again original blessing.

Plant seeds of kindness.

Plant seeds of compassion.

Plant seeds of love.

Water it with your tears for all beings who suffer.

Grow a harvest of tenderness for those who suffer

Grow flowers of welcome for the lost and the lonely

Grow the fruit of peace in yourself and offer it to all beings to eat.

Act with reverence for all that is, 

for all that is, is holy.

Allow that little plot of life 

and earth around you to heal.

It will spread. 

Remember we are all sons of Adam

Remember we are all daughters of Eve

Hear again the song of sister Mother Earth

Sing again the hymn of creation

Be again, blessing

Be again, the gardener,

Be at last the steward.

Be.

The Soul’s Garden

 An older one today as the gardens all around us come to life and bloom...

The Soul’s Garden

 

The Garden

of my Soul

is an old one.

Filled with the deep

chocolate smell of

rich worm-tilled earth

and fallen leaves.

 

A place of wild peace

and gentle fires,

with, here and there,

a secret corner;

warm old pavement,

damp fenny reeds,

cracked urns 

fountaining flowers;

descendents of 

ancient planting

by long forgotten hands.

 

Fireworks of blooms

of a sudden season’s turning

illumine thick wild hedges,

silent,

but for the rustle

of a Blackbird’s

wing.

 

From quiet meditation,

here, one can be startled

by an unexpected verse

of Robin-song;

or a Stormcock’s exultant

heralding of evening rain.

 

In deep tree-shadowed pools

The sudden ‘plash of a frog

causes circles

of eternity to spread

ruffling calm surfaces,

until reflection’s repose

is renewed.

 

Here the Bee drones and

the solid munching

of the Caterpillar is heard;

deep quiet belies

deep activity,

and even the stones

sing

if one has silence

enough to hear.

 

At the edge, a crumbling wall,

more ancient ivy than stone,

makes border where

the Woods begin,

dropping gifts of 

wildness within

from overhanging

forested fingers.

 

And here,

where Mice live,

in morterless walls,

in the Dawn Light

the web is seen.

 

Reflection of all Life,

spangled in dew-drop gold

it’s beauty, revealed

while Spider rests from

night’s toil

 

I stand

barefooted

In the Garden

of my Soul,

feet and toe deep,

in ancient soils

of a long time prepared

to yield such a

flower.

And from the Light

beyond all night

I hear the Gardener say

“Be and fulfil,

and you will

be fulfilled.”

Storm Fallen Cedar

Storm Fallen Cedar

It was the storm

that took her

at the last;

while we nestled

deeper in our beds,

unsleeping,

but grateful all the same

for the simple joy

of shelter.

In the smallest hours

Heaven opened

overhead

and poured upon us

an onslaught of

wild wind,

with rain so cold

it was almost snow

in its sharpness.

Just before the dawn

it peaked in power,

finally enough,

as it

whipped

like a scourge

against her long aged, grey,

elephantine skin

and, though her sisters

held their vigil nearby,

she gently gave way,

and fell,

prostrate upon the earth

from which she came,

embraced by the sacred soil

of our little

graveyard.

Was she tired

of her long watch upon the hill?

Holding her gaze

over the forest, the family

and now the friars,

for three hundred

of our human years

(Whatever kind of reckoning

Trees make of time

I do not know,

and they do not tell

in our tongue at least.)

So much had passed

beneath her branches

famines, feasts, families

and finally, friars, all played

their part

measuring her time,

each in their own way.

That morning,

emerging into light,

we heard the news

in shock;

the ripple of her passing

echoing

in awe and prayer both,

a sadness felt in brother, bird, and beast

for those still enough to hear.

Today,

I made my pilgrimage

to pay my respects

as she lies in state,

our sacred sister,

eldress of this land.

Finding her broken body

dissolving already,

her ancient green soul

flown.

Her long hidden heartwood

now exposed,

still raw and soft yet,

open to the breeze,

that touched her broken branches

with the sacred sprinkling

of the rain.

So often before

I had blessed her,

and given her my brother’s bow

in passing by,

and so been blessed in turn

by her simple stately

being.

My hands, resting upon her trunk,

felt the difference

today.

No pulse,

no inner warmth,

no great deep

breathing in her

root,

trunk,

branch,

bark.

It brought sadness too,

but also the joy of knowing

that in every death

something withdraws,

is freed,

leaves.

For all that live

sing their own soul song

arising from Divine love,

and in someway,

at the end will

return their essence

as gift borrowed for a while,

until the new creation

allows resurrection seed

to finally fully bloom

in all beings.

I was not the first

to grieve her though,

For all around the tracks

and trails of those she sheltered showed;

the fleet of foot, feathered, furred

they too had felt her passing,

and it seemed had held their funeral rites

ever before us.

And then,

I looked up from my troubled thoughts

and found my gaze held

by a Stag who watched,

wary and wonderful and wild,

from the forest’s edge.

Both of us, in our own way,

guardians of this land.

Both of us mourning

the passing of our eldress,

each in our own way.

Both of us simply there

in the brotherhood of all being.

And I think, in that moment

we were blessed,

and blessed each other too,

in our common grief and trust

that all that live upon this earth will die,

and all that dies will live again in Love.

Then, bowing gently, we withdrew

to forest and to friary each,

aware of other 

and of something

beyond other, 

I, for my part, call grace,

(Whatever kind of reckoning

Deer make of grace

I do not know,

and they do not tell

in our tongue at least.),

grace that had led us both

to be there

at that time, together,

in mourning,

for our storm fallen sister,

the great and ancient being

we simply call

Tree.

Our Lady of the Solstice

Lady of the Solstice

At the moment
of
the
deepest dark
and,
at
the sharp point
of the
longest night,
at such distance from
dawn
that we groan
beneath
the burden of
being,
and touch within
ourselves
only
the winds of winter
and the
wild longing
where
light
is only a memory
long lost
and left behind in
summer sun;
then we,
suddenly,
and just for
the merest of moments,
are hushed
into silence,
as the turning
of the
ancient
wheels of wonder
stop,
and sun and stars
all,
still their divinely
directed dance
and take their
yearly yearned for
deep remembering
rest,
like lovers suddenly
still,
when struck
by desire's reverie;
or dancers,
pulsing with passion,
awaiting the next
beat
of beauty's music
to liberate life within.
They,
our elder siblings
of the sky,
recall in
their
sacred stillness
that moment
when
once,
just once,
their fiery song,
sung since
first
divine kindling,
was
paused,
hushed,
stilled,
stopped;
just
once,
long ago,
so as
to
listen to
a new note
joined to
the
great hymn of gratitude
that all
offer
simply by their very being.
For in that
moment
of their listening
was revealed
she who is
our true solstice.

The Woman,
that moment of
perfect stillness
between
divine in-breathing
and creation's
exhalation of excelsis.
So they watched,
as she who is the
stillpoint
of
the dance of story,
and the sanctuary
where
myth becomes flesh,
then,
before angelic emissary,
dropped the pebble of her
yes,
in its utter simplicity,
longed for through the countless
ages of agony,
into the pool of our pain.

Behold the Solstice of the Lord…
Be it done unto me according to His Word…

Looking deep they
saw its
ripples now run to the
edges of existence
trembling them with
the promise
of a new
Spring.

And the Story became flesh…
And dwelt amongst us…

This young girl,
this Lady of light.
who is our solstice.
She,
the perfect place
of stillness,
so attuned
to the coming of the Light
that in her
all
creation stills,
the old cycle of sin
is broken
and,
even the deep dark
of despair
must yield
to glow of dawn.

She,
the light that glows before
the rising Sun,
heralded by Robin
and Wren
and fluting Blackbird,
She, like that blessed moment
when Sun and Moon
both
hang in the deep blue together
and bow as they pass
gentling our hearts
and
drawing us from dreams
to welcome
the advent of the One
who
IS
Love's Light
and eternal Word both,
spoken now into time’s renewed turning
by the Yes of one who
holds
within her heart
the perfect emptiness of Love.

Treasuring in
the holy dark of
her womb the hearth
where Spring's spark is
kindled
and brightens with beauty
as a
first place of
promised Easter exhalation
the cave of
rebirth;
in which
eternity and time
are married,
and infinity will wed itself
forever
to clay's embrace.

Here, in this
sacred solstice place,
Eve's aching
is healed,
and
here,
Adam's sin
undone,
as from the dry root
of the
sundering tree
a new shoot rises
at the word of
one
whose whole being
is Yes
whose whole being
is
Love,

And so,
yearly
we sit,
rooting ourselves
once again
in Mother Earth's embrace,
and while looking ever upwards
we find the still point
of the skies
and yet
inwardly gaze
into
the light of story
long-kindled
against the cold of winter,
and so become
re-minded,
re-hearted,
re-souled,
by she who is our solstice,
whose self-forgetting
Yes
brought to us
the turning of the light
and blessed us
all
like barren trees
brought to beauty
by a sudden
anointing
of
new snow.

Celtic Christianity: a brief essay

Celtic Christianity:

For the Feast of the All Saints of Ireland here is an essay on Celtic Christianity!
I was invited to write this by Sr. Stan Kennedy for inclusion in her 2015 Book: To Live from the Heart.

Celtic Christianity

The interplay of culture and faith has always produced unique ways of being Christian,

(or Buddhist, or Hindu, or Muslim), When a faith encounters a new culture there are two possibilities – domination, which leads to resistance, fear or even violence; or fusion, which leads to a comfortable inter-being in which the best of what was is nourished by the best of what is. In the Christian tradition, this second way of being has over the centuries led to the beauty of the various Rites of the Church. Each is distinct in language, history and ritual yet all are one Church in confessing one Lord, one faith, one baptism. Unity in diversity is the very mark of the Church in its

catholicity, in its universality.

In the faith communities that grew up in Europe at its westernmost edge between the fourth and tenth centuries this accommodation to native culture, and yet illumination and completion of it by the Christian message, was undertaken in a way never seen before in the history of the Church. A faith community emerged, which though seeing itself as part of the larger Christian Church nevertheless had a unique way of being and a distinctive vision of itself, of the world and of God; a vision that is characterized today as ‘Celtic’. Much of this has been lost in successive waves of invasion and ideology but the traces that remain whisper to the sacred places in many people’s hearts and offer a glimpse of a way of relating to faith and to the Church that seems to ground them in this world and the next in a way both fully human and fully in communion with creation.

The ‘Celtic Christians’ in essence inherited an older form of Christianity from the deserts of Egypt, Lebanon, Syria and perhaps even as far away as Ethiopia. Theirs was a monastic Church, founded by monk missionaries who carried the disciplines and teachings of a contemplative form of life that both completed and transformed beautifully the ‘pagan’ understandings of the pre-Christian Celts. Perhaps it was this origin in a monastic and contemplative way of being that led to the ready fusion of old and new, for the Christianization of the Celtic tribes and lands, particularly Ireland,

happened quickly, and largely without violence or persecution.

To a people who worshipped a pantheon of deities and saw the presence of the divine in every aspect of nature, the revelation of Christ and the Trinity offered a Hero and a High King as well as a God who was, at one and the same time, utterly transcendent of and gloriously immanent in his creation, so it took little to bring the pantheistic pre-Christian Celts to a more subtle understanding of a pan-en-theistic faith, especially when the transition nourished their longing and hope for an afterlife that could be gained without the sacrifice of lives in war, one open to all genders and classes of people regardless of their rank or tribe. Awareness of the presence of the divine in and through the beauty of nature is a mark of this particular expression of Christianity: to such adegree that whilst it is present, and always has been, in the Judaeo-Christian tradition, it had never been so poetically and beautifully expressed before, and would not be again until the Franciscan School in the 1200's.

So what were these ways of being Christian that were manifested in such a unique way in the Celtic forms of Christianity? The early Celtic Church often built on the foundations of monastic communities, each led by an elder known for their holiness and wisdom. The parallel of this structure to the tribal/clan system of the indigenous peoples under a chief meant that there was an immediate understanding, as the two systems seemed to share a common way of life despite their different origins. Loyalty to Clan and to Chief and through him to the High King beautifully paralleled the monks’ obedience to the Elder and above all to Christ, the High King of High Kings. A people raised on the sagas of the Fianna and the Red Branch Knights saw the sacrifice of one’s life to an ideal, and especially to the service of a king, as noble and to be admired. Leaving home and family to serve the Gospel became attractive, even to those of royal and noble blood. This can be seen in the stories of

Colm Cille (Columba) and Brigid. The so-called ‘green martyrdom’ of trusting in the providence of God called forth great missionaries like Brendan and Columbanus, who brought the Celtic expression of the Christian faith to parts of northern Europe and perhaps, in the case of Brendan, a good deal further! Rowing out from land into the ocean currents, they simply went wherever wind and wave, fellow servants of the High King of Heaven, brought them and there lived their life of prayer and praise.

Despite the lush greenness of much of the Celtic territories the spirituality of their monastics was influenced greatly by the fathers and mothers of Christian monasticism who had flourished in the deserts of Egypt and the Lebanon; large monastic complexes – often called ‘Disearts’ for the perceived extremity of the observance – often vied with each other in their pride in the monks and nuns who fasted the most or kept the most vigils, or whose elders worked the most miracles. This ‘boasting in God’ was not meant as a source of vainglory or pride: it came from the bardic culture that esteemed its heroes and heroines and commemorated their deeds to inspire the spiritual practice of others. The bardic culture of long epic poems and sagas created an educated class who,

along with the druids, were among the first Christian converts; they aided in the exchange of ideas, links between cultures and cultivation of wisdom that led to the Celtic monasteries’ reputation as bastions of learning and contemplative practice when the rest of Europe was falling into the chaos of the so-called “Dark Ages”. In Celtic monasticism the fusion of desert spirituality with a holistic understanding of creation and humanity’s place in it saw redemption as bringing

about such a healing of the person that a new and holy unity with creation was the result. Through the ancient remedies of prayer, meditation, fasting, vigils and charity, the monastic began to experience that oneness with nature that Adamic humanity first knew. We have many stories of the Celtic saints and their animal companions: Kevin and the otter, Colm Cille and his horse, Gobnait and her bees, among so many others, show a marvellous intimacy with our fellow creatures in which we all serve the Lord of Creation according to our capacity and gifts.

The visible creation can be a door to the unseen world too. For the Celts, a liminal and animistic people, the nearness of the supernatural, the world of angels, demons and elemental powers carried over from pre-Christian days, was actively completed by the sacramental view of nature that is at the very heart of the Christian contemplative tradition in which all that exists is a word from the Word of God, and creation itself the universal testament to all peoples of all times of Divine Beauty and its nearness to us in every breath.

In the Celtic, domestic form of spirituality every household act, no matter how small, could be performed mindfully in the presence of the divine and

thus assume a cosmological and redemptive purpose and meaning. The blessing prayers and poems that come down to us from places like Donegal and Kerry

and especially from the Hebrides hold an immense lexicon of benedictions for every activity and task of the day and important moment in life. The making of bread, the laying of the fire, the opening of the hall door, the kindling of the evening lights all had their blessing prayer and ritual (usually performed by women in the home and by men on the land), and each had its patron saint or angel. The domestic scene, an expression of the Church in its own right, mirrored and deepened the life of the larger Church, nurturing the sense of belonging and being part of the redemptive mission of Christ through his Church.

With the turning of the year the old festivals found their fulfilment in the liturgical calendar. For example, the honouring of the ancestors at Samhain has its counterpart in the feasts of All Souls and All Saints in which the ancestors were no longer to be feared or placated but to be assisted by the prayers of the living. The old grave offerings became the blessed salt and bread left in the hearth overnight and consumed the next day. The Fires of Lughnasa became the bonfires of St John’s Eve and the dancing around them continued, as did pilgrimages to holy wells and trees and mountains, places now sanctified by the observances of the saints and the miracles they wrought. “Cuimhnionn an tir na Manach,” the people would say ever after: “the land remembers the monks”. So the people would gather to celebrate the goings in and goings out of life; the births, the marriages and the deaths, sanctifying them by their association with the saints of old in ruins and caves

soaked in centuries of prayer.

Today, this unique spirituality and way of being Christian appeals to a generation that achingly feels its distance from the earth and her seasons, that is stressed and distressed by the pace of life and by separation from its inner rhythms. In the wave of mindfulness and meditation programmes and classes that has swept across the Western world we can detect a hunger for the wisdom of the old ways and old paths. Perhaps we need to return to the pace of the ancestors who lived with a foot in both worlds, and in domestic familiar intimacy with God; to return to a pace slow enough for us to discern the language of praise and beauty that issues from every tree and rock and rivulet of water, to realign humanity with its ancient purpose and meaning as the Celtic Christian understood it.

It would be no small thing if this wisdom was recovered and renewed for the next generation. A humble affinity with nature and a sense of our place in the cosmic context of creation and redemption would allow us to recover ourselves as pilgrims

passing reverently through this world with one eye always on eternity and a heart and soul on fire for the High King of Heaven who blesses every place, every moment and every breath.

Ripening not Ageing: A Contemplative reflection.

Ripe.

What if
instead
of calling it
ageing;
we named it
ripening?
Seeing
in
each passing
stage of life
the
beauty
we ascribe
to
Seed,
Shoot,
Leaf,
Flower,
Fruit.
Never asking
one of them
to be,
or
remain as,
another;
but delighting
in their
present
presence
as a gift
from each
season.
Each perfect
and apt
in their
own
time.
What if
instead of
calling them
wrinkles
we saw in
them
only the
evidence of
experience?
Counting them
the way
children
count the
rings of trees;
delighting
in them
as
signs of
stories
to be told;
wisdom lines
to be
wondered at,
whether born
of tears,
or laughter,
or even,
pain.
What if
we taught
the young
to see
the old
as we,
standing back
in awe,
gaze upon
the ancient
being
of
trees?
Travelling to
simply
see them,
touch them,
to be
in their
canopied company.
Resting our
frantic
minds
in their
deep green
slowness,
while imagining
with awe
all that has
passed
beneath their
crooked branches;
the seasons
they have
seen,
the storms
survived,
and
the myriad lives
they have
sheltered
in their
long growing.
So then,
Go out,
go out
my friend
and let
yourself
ripen
beneath
the sun
and moon,
breathe freely
of your
present season
letting
the regrets
of lost time
fall from
you
and fly
like leaves
upon the
air.
Fear
no longer
Autumn's
harvest
or even the
seeming sleep
of Winter
for,
when ripened,
fruit's
earthward drop
frees seed
and
begets
always,
a new
Spring.

(with thanks to our brother Paul Dressler for the beautiful picture of Br. Teobalda of Italy, one of the noted elders of our Order.)

St. John's Eve: A poetic contemplative reflection

St. John’s Eve

Now, as Vespers sings itself to dusk’s silent sitting.
The beacons begin to burn.
Men watching for the moment
of Moon’s waning
in twilight midsummer sky
of a Sun too lazy to truly set,
to kindle flame for the Forerunner;
John.
He whose element is fire.
Both lamps now hanging in cloth of such deep blue
that the world seems enfolded in the mantle of she
who midwifed his birth,
even as she joined her magnificat
to old Elizabeth’s pangs and doubting Zechariah’s silence
beneath the shining stars of desert sky.

Now, as Matins touches midnight of Monks long vigiling
the herbs are gathered.
Women seeking the helpers and the healers
in wood, and dell, and garden bed
where, blessed by dew and moonlight
and the long warmth of Sun’s summer
the Yarrow and the Bracken,
the Fennel and the Rue,
the Rosemary and the Foxglove and
always the Elder and
the great yellow flower of the Forerunner
willingly give up their essence on the night
that marks the first whisper
of the Word’s healing breath,
breathed through the one who is His healing herald Voice;
John.
Dried, and hung, and laid upon the Lady Altar
to become more than they are
they will bestow divine healing.
Twice gifted and graced by
Summer’s picking
and Autumn’s
Assumption blessing, they
reveal the medicine present always beneath.

Now, as Lauds’ psalms sun skywards
the pots and pans and ancient drums are beaten.
The children sing the old songs and rhymes
long lost to meaning,
as young men and women harelike
leap heedless across the
dying flames together.
Recalling he who leapt with joy,
filled with fire, even in womb’s waters
so near was the One who first kindled flame
and rendered the rivers holy and made the wells
vessels of new birth.

Now, as Mass bell tolls dawn’s daily resurrection
monks and men, and women, and children all
hear the summons of the Sanctifier and His herald
loud upon morning’s breeze
as embers die down, and herbs are hung up.
Beneath the vaulted stone they gather
to join their voices to praise that vastness veiled
in simple bread and wine,
and hear again the word first spoken by
the herald,
the lamp,
the flame,
the leaper,
the prophet,
the angel,
the voice,
the Baptist
whose birth they have
blessed anew
“Behold the Lamb of God!”

Of Weed-killer and Wonder...

I’m ashamed to say it, 

but it all began with weed-killer…

and looking back now, the fact that I even thought of weed-killer as a solution to the problem is a source of horror and embarrassment…

or perhaps it began with the feeling of frustration at needing to ask for it…

As Novices one of the duties we had was to assist the brother who looked after the extensive novitiate gardens. These were traditional cloister gardens that only the novices and the novitiate staff used. I loved them. There were beautiful old fruit trees, vegetable patches, an extraordinary spliced Laburnum tree that flowered spectacularly once a year in a half yellow and half purple explosion, lots of small green lawns and fulsome flower beds and around them all and through them all long gravel paths that led to little shrines and hidden areas set aside for prayer, reflection, reading or simply enjoying the autumnal sunshine in those first months of the ancient year long retreat experience we call novititate.

Working with the Brother Gardener meant mowing lawns and trimming trees and planting and hoeing and doing all the usual jobs that a large garden entails while learning from him the arcane arts of gardening. We worked on a rotation between the three of us novices. One on Fruit and Veg, one on Lawns and Flowers and one on the dreaded Weeding of the Paths. Then came the day the rotation shifted and suddenly I found myself moved on to Path Weeding Duty. Three times a week I would spend an afternoon kneeling on the path plucking out the little sprouts of Dandelions, Daisies and other invaders that threatened to overcome the order of the paths and bind the gravel together into a muddy mess. Having completed the section I was working on I would then hoe and rake the gravel back into order before the bell rang for evening meditation and prayer. Looking back as I left I would notice that the section I had just worked on was clean and clear but whatever satisfaction I was taking in my work for that day would be miserably mitigated by seeing the apparent miles that awaited my attention in front of me, to say nothing of the light green fuzz already accruing on the section I had done last week. I hated it. It was back breaking, and slow, and stupid, I thought. I could not understand why so much time was being expended on maintaining the paths by hand when surely a once a month treatment with weedkiller would have rendered them just as free for much longer and would have freed me in the process for much more necessary and important work… and so I would spend my time there kneeling on the paths no longer focussed on the beauty of the gardens but grumbling deep within… especially when other friars passed me by mowing grass, digging beds and generally seeming to have a much better time than I.

Then came a particularly bad day. It had rained the day before. The path was muddy. The roots were deep. The back was sore. All through evening meditation I ached and fulminated in equal quantities as around me the gentle breathing of the brethren did nothing to calm my mood. Tomorrow, I resolved, I would do something about it, and so I did. As soon as the morning classes were over I asked to see the Novice Master. Sitting in front of him I made my request for money to go and get weedkiller for the paths. I was reasonable in my tone. Clear in my arguments. I enunciated my request clearly and calmly, being sure to stress that this would make the job easier not just for me but for everyone.

“Think of all the time that would be saved”, I said,

“I’m surprised no one has ever thought of this before”, I said,

“I’ll be free to do so much more”, I said.

The Novice Master just looked at me.

Then, when I had quite finished and talked myself into silence, he said quietly,

“Brother, when you can come to me and tell me why I’m refusing your request now, then you won’t have to weed the paths anymore.” 

There was a moment of silence and then, stunned slightly, I left the room.

Over the ensuing days and weeks I grew to dread those paths. And always as I was working I would stew over what the Novice Master had meant. Was it because we never used chemicals in the garden elsewhere? Was it a Franciscan thing? Was he just being cheap? Was it supposed to be penance? (It certainly felt like it at times). And so I grumbled and weeded and made my way slowly around the paths for about a month feeling the encroaching green army always at my sandaled heels and losing no opportunity to tell the brothers what I thought of Weedkiller and weeds and futile work until I’m sure they longed for the bell to ring that issued in silent time in the evenings.

Then, one day, out of the blue, and a day in all respects like any other, it happened. I was weeding away. In the background I could hear the other brothers chatting as they worked on the fruit trees. It was a sunny brisk day and I could feel the earth drying on my fingers as I parted another weed from the ground and pulled it free from the gravel… and then, just as I shook it, watching the clods of mud fall away from the roots something fell away from me as surely as the grains of gravel fell to the ground. I can only say I was freed, that I was connected.

Connected to the gravel.

Connected to the root.

Connected to the earth beneath.

Connected to the sunshine,

Connected to the dust.

Connected to the breath.

Connected to the Love that holds it all in being.

I was myself apart and I was connected to all of it.

It did not matter that I was weeding or not weeding.

It did not matter that the paths were greening behind me and were still green before me.

There was just me in this moment.

Now.

Performing this action.

Now.

Breathing and moving.

Now.

Loving and being loved.

Now.

I kept on weeding, but it was as though a deep quality of experience that is always just below the surface was revealed. I realised that we float on the surface of a deep ocean of Being. It was like seeing a familiar but dark room illumined dazzlingly as a curtain is suddenly pulled back. Everything was still in the room, all the familiar furniture was there but illuminated and outlined in sunshine.

It wasn’t peaceful, it was peace.

It wasn’t joyful, it was joy.

It wasn’t loving, it was love…

It wasn’t praying, it was prayer…

And I, well I kept weeding! What else could you do?

It only lasted a moment, though it seemed to expand within me and around me forever, and then, (foolishly I know now,) I looked at it, not from within but from without and began to rejoice not in the experience but at having the experience and, as ego awoke, immediately, it vanished…

At first I was sad, but then I smiled and…kept on weeding…after all that was the job in hand… From then on weeding was no longer the burden it had been. It was just weeding. It didn’t matter that I would be kneeling in an island of soon to be consumed again gray, loose, gravel…

there was just this moment,

this weed,

this job,

this breath…

and that was ok.

The rhythm of weeding of bending, bowing, plucking, shaking, hoeing, raking became the background music to an inner attention to the prayer of the breath that now, many years of practice later, I know marked the beginning of the Mindfulness of Divine Presence that is the foundation stone of Christian Meditation practice. Over the weeks I grew to quite like weeding… all thoughts of weedkiller were forgotten… I simply dwelt in the ordinary wonder of the garden.

Later, I discussed the experience with the Novice Master.

He smiled.

Said nothing about it then, and, next day, relieved me of weeding duty.

Over the months the experience would come and go, I realised it could never be forced, though it could be encouraged and it always happened when I was just in the moment, in a fluidity of being that very often brought body and mind together in a repetitive disciplined action, in which intention had been set to dwell fully in the work and be fully present to it, while preserving a loving attention at the centre of the heart on the Divine Presence. There is a reason we call it cultivation! This work of attuning the inner attention to that which is always present to us. It takes a life time to master but the joy is in knowing that when we begin to practice Divine Love swoops down into the gap between what we are, (our usual distracted, self-centred existence), and what we could be, (centred, peaceful, present) and gives us a glimpse of the latter so that we might wish to work on the former…

If you would like to begin to weed out your own distractions, so as to begin to enter this mindfulness of Presence then a few suggestions come from the tradition.

Intentionality:

Consciously make a prayer setting your intention to be present to Divine Love every day. If possible do this first thing in the morning. (The Morning Offering practice.) It can be good to return to this prayer at midday and in the evening. Invite the Holy Spirit to begin the work of attuning you to His presence and inspiration.

Sitting:

A later post will look at this in detail, but for now simply begin by setting two periods of about 20 mins, morning and evening, to sit comfortably but alertly. If 20mins is too long start with 10 and allow it to grow. Invoke the Holy Spirit and offer the time to the Lord as a time of being consciously present to Him by being consciously present to the reality of His Love breathing through you, and then follow the gentle rhythm of your breath as it rises and falls. We will add a prayer word to this later, but for now, just follow the breath and when you become distracted return to it gently and without stress.

Work:

We are all busy people, but our work, whatever it is, can still be prayer. Moving from activity to activity, pause long enough to re-set your intention each time to be inwardly present to the Divine Presence within and around you. A simple moment in which you breathe deeply three rounds of in-breath and out-breath dedicating each one to the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit can be a beautiful way to do this. In time you will need to re-set less and less…

Finally:

Don’t use weedkiller!