Dissonance and Harmony

Liturgical dance set to Balinese and Javanese Gamelan music, during a Service of Dissonance and Harmony at Louisville Seminary's Caldwell Chapel. The service celebrated the unity and diversity of Indonesian culture and the possibility for progressive harmony in all communities.

Presbyuniquakertarian

The past few weeks have reinforced the fact that I do not limit myself to one single faith tradition. It is not that I have studied the in-depth theologies of each faith practice and fully agree with the prescriptions of each. And it’s not that I find a glaring gap in one tradition or another, which needs to be filled, changed or altered somehow.

Instead, I feel that each expression of faith that I have encountered and hope to encounter throughout my lifetime, presents me with something worthwhile and valuable to my spiritual development.

My desire is not to meld the various spiritual paths into one cohesive, unlimited sense of the Holy… that’s God’s prerogative. Instead, I simply enjoy the fact that we all see and experience God in different ways. I take pleasure in the multiplicity of various forms of worship and prayerful communion that we have beyond our own windows of faith.

The Presbyterian tradition is one particular window or lens through which to experience God. This path offers a particular structure of worship and a means of decision making which creates order but also sustains differing points of views. There is room for dialogue and continual reformation, which was not just a one-time occasion that occurred during the 16th century.

This form of theology works well with my preference toward discipline and my tendency to color-coat my class notebooks. It’s also a very safe place in which I can explore the significance of Jesus without feeling confined by a unilateral Christology.

Despite my Presbyterian roots, according to a spirituality quiz I came across on Youthink.com, I espouse more Unitarian beliefs. This is not a fluke thing or the result of the some revelatory conversation that challenged my Protestant background. In fact, I think my upbringing in a social justice-minded, community-oriented faith community, appeals very strongly to the Unitarian Universalist path. And that’s a good thing!

I am proud that my church has nurtured a more progressive, open-minded understanding of God which celebrates ecumenism and the diversity of world religions and spiritual practices. Therefore, it is no surprise that I felt at home during my recent visit to the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Saratoga Spring.

While the structure of the service was remarkably Presbyterian, I observed some very intentional departures from Protestantism. First, the liturgy was full of inclusive language. As I’ve learned at Louisville Seminary, inclusive language is not just throwing in an occasional “she” pronoun for God. What Louisville Seminary attempts to put forth in terms of expansive language, the UU church in Saratoga has fully adopted.

The songs, prayers and sermons are devoid of any reference to God which are exclusively masculine, hierarchical or authoritative. As such, I was hard pressed to find any reference to “Lord,” or “Father.” Instead, there was beautiful imagery which immerged from the alternative words of “Source,” “Creator” and a favorite one at Louisville Seminary, “Holy One.”

All of this discussion on language and word choice can become exhausting, especially when one is really trying to say the right thing. For example, during my Introduction to Worship class, my professor asked a volunteer to open the class in prayer. It was during the first couple weeks of class and I was feeling particularly inspired. So, I proceeded to lead the class in prayer.

However, despite the emphasis on inclusive language which I heard both in class and during Chapel services, I reverted to a more conservative reference by opening with “Dear Holy Father.” I think I may have even included a few references to “Lord,” regardless of its potential reference to power and control.

I didn’t realize until later what I had done. But rather than kick myself for adopting more traditional language, I accepted the fact that those references do hold meaning for me. Rather than remove all masculine or power-based references to God, it would be more beneficial to consciously introduce additional language, further enriching one’s perception of God and the many ways God is, speaks and acts.

When I had reached my limit on the way our words limit the unlimitedness of God, it was time to just be silent. And I found that space in a wonderful forty minute Quaker meeting, which was planned as mid-week Chapel service on campus. I was familiar with this form of worship, having visited the Quaker Friends Meeting House down the street from my co-op in college.

I was aware of the Quaker commitment to silence, interrupted only by the spontaneous prayers and utterances of those present. Rather than be a time for sharing joys and concerns or the “prayers of the people” often included in Protestant worship, the words spoken had less context and were somewhat removed from the daily struggles of individuals. Instead, people shared how the spirit was moving within them at that given time, and what words God was compelling them to share.

The first student to speak simply said, “The creaking of wood in this chapel is a reminder to follow God’s path, one step at a time.” After several moments, another student shared a story of a professor she had who described our often fruitless search for God. She noted how we often act like a person desperately looking for her glasses and eventually realizing she’s wearing them. I offered a reminder to accept our wandering thoughts and not judge them, inviting them, like a busy child, to be calm and still.

The most consistent sound during our time together was the sound of our breath and the creaking and groaning of the wood rafters of the Chapel. I felt fed and nourished in a way I had not felt in a while. After spontaneously singing a traditional hymn together, we stood to exit, embracing and shaking hands in silence and walking out into a sun-filled afternoon.

As I crossed the courtyard outside of the Chapel, I felt an expanse of space in my chest and heart that was distantly familiar. It reminded me of those rare moments of clarity and spaciousness that make us feel content, healthy and alive.

While the Quaker faith connects itself to this practice of meditation, so does the Buddhist faith, just as the Christian tradition enters silence during the passing of bread and wine. Silence is the bedrock of communion with God and it is something that defies any religious identification.

Similarly, the social justice model and democratic approach to Presbyterianism is far from a unique claim to that tradition. And the Unitarian church, with its emphasis on inviting other voices and names into worship, is as much feminist as it is humanist.

As we each seek to find our own spiritual identity, I hope that we find our identity less in the names of religion and the repetition of someone else’s words and images. Instead, I hope we follow our own unique holy path, which bends and stops, waits and greets, changes and grows. And ultimately, that we find our identity through God and not in the ways we attempt to define that which is Holy.

Bring It

At a meditation retreat, which I attended in the Berkshires a couple years ago, my yoga instructor reminded us to “Bring it to the mat.” Bring what? I thought. My body? My water bottle? What else is there to bring?

Meditation, as far as I knew, didn’t require anything but oneself, and maybe a stop watch to reassure one when there is only five minutes left.

For some, meditation is a terrifying practice. It means attempting to sit still amidst the chaos of one’s life. It means resting (or wrestling) with oneself, which can bring feelings of estrangement if one is not comfortable in one’s own skin.

It can also be deafeningly loud to hear the beating of one’s own heart, especially if one hasn’t stopped to listen in a while, or ever.

For those who experience this sense of upheaval when seated silently, the phrase “Bring it to the mat” carries more meaning. Bring your confusion, your pain, your frustration, your questioning.

For me, meditation has been less frightening then tediously boring. I realize that is either because I am in denial of my own need for calming or my mind is full of such a raucous that I simply can not overcome it. Either way, meditation for me has been something to attempt and endure, rather than enjoy.

Here in lies my answer to that question “What am I to bring to the mat?” Simply put, the belief that I don’t need the mat is precisely what I bring to it.

My yoga instructor’s spouse co-led the retreat and put it in a more comical way. He described our natural tendency to rush from the mat, to give up on meditation, to walk away from the prayerful practice of just being.

He said, "Be patient with yourself, be kind. Imagine yourself as a puppy being potty trained. When you feel the urge to step off the mat and walk away, gently place yourself back on the ground like a puppy being guided back to the newspaper."

Elizabeth Gilbert, author of the well known memoir Eat, Pray, Love gives another lovely analogy. When her thoughts take her hostage during a time of meditation, she says in a tender motherly tone, “Not now, Honey. Mommy’s talking to God.”

It’s so very difficult to put aside those nagging thoughts, especially when one is trying to commune with the sacred. But the wonderful dichotomy is that while we are attempting to prioritize the Holy over our chatterbox minds, it is in that very cacophony of active thinking that God works so proficiently.

So, instead of pretending that one’s mind is utterly placid and peaceful, we might as well accept that our mind is more often than not in a state of frenzy. The relief is the fact that such chaos is exactly what we are asked to “bring to the mat.”

This invitation to “bring it to the mat” is especially reassuring as I become more absorbed in my studies at Louisville Seminary. What started off as grown-up summer camp has now turned into a full-fledged culture shock. In fact, I’m feeling my first few weeks in Peru resurfacing in surprising ways. The most obvious connection being language immersion.

During my first six weeks in Peru, I felt consumed by a dense and foggy headache. My speech was reduced to simple phrases in Spanish and I entered a state of hyper-listening, which translated hand gestures, lip movements and facial expressions, not to mention new verbs, nouns and colloquial sayings.

Here in seminary, I am overwhelmed not by a new spoken language but the written text of ancient Hebrew and the thinking text of normative ethics. These elements of Biblical Hebrew and philosophy seem similar to me, in their capacity to have a heavy monotonous sound, like the distant vibration of a gong.

Yet while that sound more often is a call to prayer to meditation, this droning sound carries for me the burden of needing to understand – the need to grasp, the need to excel.

For a recovering perfectionist, such as I am, being in a class which requires mastering something new is… terrifying. I thought I had gotten over this! I thought I had reformed my need to be “good” at all costs!

But unfortunately, my perfectionist tendencies are creeping back. Those preoccupations with incessant “rightness” are knocking on my door, as if my time in Peru and at the City Mission had taught me nothing.

During the past few years in grassroots ministry, I learned that God doesn’t need me to be perfect. In fact, such disregard for my humanity harms God’s purposes for me and the community I am a part of.

So, if at that meditation retreat I didn’t think I had anything to bring to the mat, I do now.

I would bring the question, “How do I reconcile my tendency toward unrealistic standards for myself with God’s unique and specific standards for me?”

And while I still “bring it to the mat,” I find more and more the need to bring it to the pew.

Having been raised in the Presbyterian tradition, I’m accustomed to pew sitting as a pretty orderly activity. You dress nice, sit still and follow along with the rest of the congregation. For quite some time now, my family even sits in the same pew, left side second row.

Until recently, I have not viewed the pew as a place to bring anything other than a put-together self. But oh, how unrealistic that is.

Thanks to the pastors in my home church as well as the unconventional forms of worship I’ve experience in Peru and at the City Mission, I see the pew as a worthy place to bring just about anything.

Whether it is an old creaky wooden pew, a plastic chair, picnic table or stone slab, the pew is simply a place where I can come and bow my head. Sometimes I am surrounded by people I know and love, other times I find myself flanked by strangers or maybe even alone.

For me, the pew has become much less a place of expectation and standard keeping, but a new seat in which I can commune with and hear from God.

At Louisville Seminary, there are plenty of opportunities for pew sitting. Three days a week, the high-ceilinged wooden chapel is the sight of experimental worship services where students and faculty change-up the equation of traditional worship.

This past week I was invited to wave sheets of green lace and dance down the center aisle, in order to illustrate the reading from Psalms 150 “Praise the Lord with trumpet sound, praise him with the lute and harp! Praise him with timbrel and dance; praise Him with the strings and pipe.”

The theme of the service was “Make a Joyful Sound” from Pslam 98. And what really made the room alive were the toddlers of various seminary students banging drums, shaking maracas and clanging sticks together.

I think how lucky these children are to be able to be themselves in these pews, which for many has been a place where sound could not be made, restlessness was not accepted and alternative expressions of faith have been unwelcome.

As I walked into chapel on Friday, I was absolutely overwhelmed. My Hebrew class had left me in a state of inconsolable confusion. I was coming to terms with the reality that this is something I may not master, God forbid…

I felt even worse by the fact that I was losing my love of language – that joyful and exciting process of unraveling of mystery behind new words and sounds.

I slipped, more like slumped, into a pew near the back of those gathered. I needed to be calmed, I needed to breathe. Then, one of my classmates stood up in the front row and began reading about Woman Wisdom from Proverbs 8.

“Does not wisdom call, and does not understanding raise her voice? On the heights, beside the way, at the crossroads she takes her hand; beside the gates in front of the town, at the entrance of the portals she cries out, ‘To you, O people, I call, and my cry is to all that live.”

Then another student, Irene, stood to speak, although not in English. Knowing she is from Indonesia, I recognized the language as Bahasa. The words were round and bubbly and somehow friendly. Then from the very back pew, my friend Karol stood and read the same verse from Proverbs in French. "This I recognize!" I thought.

I got what was going on. I realized that I was hearing the call of Wisdom in different tongues. Each one was unique, beautifully spoken and revealing something deeper than just the words expressed. I closed my eyes and remembered why I love language, its diversity and song-like quality, different sounds, musical phrases and melodies.

Jessa stood and recited the Scripture in German, and I imagined my ancestors generations back reading those same words. And finally, a language from Africa was spoken and I imagined women gathering together at a water well, laughing and singing those same words.

Somewhere in the middle Blare rose from her seat in the opposite side of the chapel. As she began to speak, I recognized the guttural sounds and syllabification. She was reading from the Biblia Hebraica. She was speaking the very words that just moments before had pulled me into a stupor of frustration and anxiety.

She read each word with such ease and delight and because I was familiar with the verse, I could understand her. I could understand Hebrew! This new language, with its strange letters and right-to-left reading, was actually decipherable.

The language carried new meaning, no longer a cryptic ancient language, but one that added to the symphony of languages being uttered that morning.

In that simple reading, and re-reading of the Biblical text, I was transformed. Right there, in my pew.

I had come with an arrogant attitude, thinking, “If I can’t do this Hebrew thing well, it’s not worth doing.” And in bringing it to the pew, I was able to be changed. Had I not brought that load of self-importance and perfectionism with me, and honestly sat with it, I would not have had the opportunity to let it go.

Whatever it is that you have to bring and wherever you chose to bring it, just bring it. Bring it, sit with it and be willing, maybe even able to... let it go.

Unspoken

She didn’t come home last night. So unlike her. We knew something was dreadfully wrong.

Did she visit that man she still couldn’t rid herself of? In a grime-filled hotel room, or maybe the local prison. Or maybe, in her courageous effort to remove him from her life, he chose to retaliate. Taken. Hidden. Maybe even beaten.

That’s how she first arrived at the shelter. Hair done, a slick pleather jacket, shiny hoop earings and oversized celebrity sunglasses. Once inside my office, she removed the dark shades, revealing an even darker black puffy circle around her left eye. Punched in the face. Never to go back. And I believed her.

Five months later she is missing and it just doesn’t add up. She was on a new path -I could see it in her eyes, in the way she prayed, in the way she took younger, more frightened women under her wing. Her wings, which were just beginning to stretch to their widest potential. Job training program, local news interview, no longer hiding behind a curtain of braids.

So, no, I didn’t think she would be the one to not come back. To be out, somewhere else with no word.

But then again, there have been so many women who, the moment their light begins to truly shine, they unplug the lamp and cancel the electricity, preferring the cold, damp cellar they are used to. “It’s familiar, it’s easy, and no one will bother me down here.” And if one is afraid of tripping up the stairs, one may convince herself that it is safest to live at the bottom level.

Hours passed and my hope began to betray me, and I too wondered if she had sunk underground. Others literally thought she was left dead somewhere. We heard from a friend of hers and rushed to the starling reality, “Is she alive?” Her friend denied knowing anything. Such loyalty. Such need to protect.

“She’s safe,” the friend finally admitted, whispering under her breath to the one person who could spread the news the fastest. At least she’s safe. Yet, when would we see her, and in what condition?

The day slipped into early evening, the sun casting an end-of-the-week glow on the desk plants, client files and bags of donations. One more week of shelter provided for fifteen women and twelve children. The question was whether one bed would remain vacant, waiting for a lost woman to return for rest, surely safer then where she laid last night.

I began to close up my office for the night, prepared to pass the uncertain news unto the evening shift. The day’s residency notes stated that at least she was safe. But just as I forfeited responsibility to the next in line, she came home.

She raced straight to her room, saying she would be down in a minute. She needed to gather herself, compose her disordered heart and think of what to say. And we could only guess, waiting for her to explain herself.

Moments later, she came into the office. I closed the door and invited her to sit on the most comfortable chair we could find. Another staff member knelt to the floor by her knees. I began in an adjacent chair but eventually lowered myself to the ground. It was time to hear her story.

“Start from the beginning,” we offered, her heaving tears rendering her speechless. She couldn’t. This large proud woman in her mid-thirties, who so often expressed such wisdom, such truth, could now only throw her head to the side in anguish.

“Were you hurt?” No, she declared, it was nothing like that. At least our worst fears were put to rest. But what then could bring this woman of strength and perseverance to a state of utter despair?

Her face was saturated with tears, the pitch of her voice unrecognizably strained and desperate. She heaved and turned, trying to avoid our questioning faces. She closed her eyes and another avalanche of tears was dispelled beneath her eyelids.

As I looked longingly into her drenched eyes, I noticed a small beauty mark below her left eye. I never noticed it before. It must’ve been covered by her woundedness that first time she entered the shelter doors. Yet what about the next five months? How could I not have noticed that feature.

Just like I had never observed her hands before, the length and texture of her fingers, covered in tough skin yet ending in delicate unpainted fingernails. I placed my own hands on her left knee, noticing for the first time the radius of her knee cap, wide enough to envelope my palm.

As she sat there searching for language, I noticed the spaces between her teeth, the roundness of her surrounding cheek bones. The characteristics that made her face so familiar to me these past several months, but which now were distorted with unintelligible pain.

When words finally found their source, she began to speak. “I’m so sorry. I never meant to worry you… I just couldn’t…” She said she was wandering the streets during the day, cars rushing by, leaving gusts of exhaust in their wake. And buses. Barreling vehicles, which, she admitted, she considered walking in front of. To end all this.

But she just as quickly knew her life was still worth living - even though in her mind she was less than complete, tainted, a woman in shame. “No,” we pleaded. “You are beautiful, and whole and loved.”

Yet how do you convince someone of her sheer G-d-given completeness when the past twenty-four hours included hearing the words, “You are HIV-positive.”

As her tears dried and her story ended, she sat exhausted and worn, and together we mourned.

The Mighty Mohawk

Hurricane Irene has come and gone, but she has left her mark. As I watch the news coverage of the damage, I am lost in the images of my old neighborhood, the Stockade District of Schenectady. My heart goes out to the families, renters and owners, whose homes and lives have been uprooted by the flooding of the Mohawk River.

June 28th, 2011

My hands still have the faint smell of pomegranate and current, from the room freshener I just sprayed through every inch of my apartment on Ingersoll Avenue in the Stockade. Will it make a difference for the latest visitor, a prospective tenant after I leave this weekend?

Will she be overwhelmed by the scent? Or will it be so inviting, that and the fresh flower arrangement on the kitchen table, the she decides, “Yes, this will do just fine.”

That is exactly what I experienced two years ago. After entering just about every available apartment between Front and Ferry Streets, it was obvious. Listed as the “Stockade Sweetheart,” the denim blue exterior with cream trim and green ivy billowing from the second floor balcony - surely this was a place to settle for a while.

Since moving in that summer, my seasons have been captured and framed by the desolate stretch of the Mohawk River. Just four door fronts from my own, the river makes itself known with a quiet yet enduring presence.

In late June, where I find myself now, the river's surface weaves back and forth with the afterthoughts of boat waves and water skis. The bank opposite me hosts a miniature rain forest of ballooned tree branches and outstretched vegetation – casting a grey green reflection across the width of the divide.

On my last night on Ingersoll Avenue, I’ll share this backyard with a handful of locals - families and old-timers who know that the best view of the Fourth of July fireworks is not down the river at Jumpin’ Jacks. People will walk from the side streets of downtown Schenectady, with ice-filled coolers and collapsible lawn chairs, which are just starting to fray at the edges.

Others will drive, lining the narrow streets of the Stockade, many of which will be illegally parked. But on such a special night, maybe the Schenectady Police will lock up their ticket machines in their glove compartments and stand in the back of the crowd, relieved to witness a peaceful gathering and not another reckless teenage shooting.

At the end of the summer, I’ll be waiting for the leaves to change in Kentucky, not far enough south to short change autumn. Unphased by my absence, the Mohawk corridor that informed me of the seasons, will put on its burnt colored cloak and wring out the last hues of the spectrum.

And enjoy them, one must, as the winter won’t shed any sympathy for four long months. What was once a gladly rolling playground for fishing poles and kayaks will become a thick unmovable tundra. The only species brave enough to cross the sheet of ice are fur-lined foxes, who skidder from one side to another, desperate for food.

I still walk down to the green bench at the end of my street, even when a burgeoning mound of plowed-out snow stands as a body guard against the shore. I look out and wonder how one corner of the earth can exhibit such drastic sweeps of change. It’s simply unrecognizable from the fresh air water-color postcard of spring.

But the ice does break, shatters really, with cave-like groans that announce the force of nature that is the melting of the Mohawk. With an early thaw, the ice upriver will break and ride up over the stubborn solid mass in its way.

With enough build up, out from the level surface appears a crystallized beast, jagged and insurmountable. The mounts of ice coalesce and create an even more severe barrier for the newly released river to flow.

The water level rises behind the ice damn and here in the Stockade we wait. We wait for a high enough rise in temperature, which will lure the frigid water to build energy and momentum.

Eventually, the ice loses its grip and starts sailing downstream with a build-up of water at its back. Held captive for long enough, the rush of water barrels downstream, carrying iceberg-sized sheets, if they were feathers.

A few neighbors and I stand back from the water’s edge, now flush with the shore line. We are helpless and in awe. Many are used to this and bring thermoses of coffee and hot chocolate, seated front row at the annual spectacle. My landlord stands ready with a water pump and knee-high rubber boots, prepared to clear out tenants’ basements when the river finally overflows.

At the end of the day, one can't help but surrender. At once beautiful and destructive, the Mohawk calls us to accept its might, and we are remiss to think, even for a moment, that we can control this body of water, this ever flowing, always changing force of nature.

Lights Out Louisville

Sometimes I just need a good old-fashioned power outage. Not an endless deprivation of light or refrigeration, and certainly not the type caused by a dangerous storm that leaves homes damaged. But the kind of electric shortage that creates no harm and provides unasked for peace.

The kind that comes at dusk, when I have enough time to scamper through cupboards for extra candles. The kind that is long enough that somebody’s got to eat the ice cream, and it might as well be me. The kind that comes when there seem to be so many tasks piled up to be done and the lack of electricity is reason enough to delay their completion.

And I further welcome a late summer black out because of the good it does for my soul to shut off, retreat from, lay low and quiet down.

It seems appropriate that this unplugged state occurred during my first week at Lousiville Seminary. Having driven for two days through the heartland of Kentucky with the welcome company of my mom and slightly sedated cat, I was ready for some stillness. But there were boxes to unload, groceries to buy, orientation to complete and a new life to adjust to.

I quickly learned that coming to seminary doesn’t mean one instantly enters a tranquil bubble of spiritual awareness. I may come to know the Hebrew roots of certain Bible verses, but there are still bills to pay, dishes to wash and a liter box to empty.

It was important to remind myself that seminary is not meant for saints or angels or otherwise perfect souls. Instead, it has quickly become clear that seminary, at least Louisville Seminary, hosts regular human beigns who are rough and tender around the edges, at times quirky, and most often, we are simply ourselves.

Some have an affinity for reality television, while others are content walking their large dogs (or ferrets) on campus. Some are outgoing and self-described comedians, while others are more reserved, having grown up in a small tight-knit community on a rural farm.

To be in seminary doesn’t mean one is removed from the daily tasks of life. In fact it seems that in this particular seminary community everyday life is profoundly visible.

A pavilion loaded with bikes and children’s tricycles is visible from my room in Seminary Hall. A community garden with a giant rubber pig as its mascot grows proudly in the courtyard behind my apartment.

A basement closet has been converted into a food pantry to supplement students’ groceries and provide emergency rations for such instances as the recent two-day power outage.

As my “Beach Walk” scented Yankee Candle continues to glow on my desk, I imagine what early travelers, scholars, soldiers and nurses must’ve felt when they relocated out of necessity. I envision a small wood-floor room with a straw bed, a crooked corner table bearing nothing but a tattered journal and a single candle stick.

The new arrival would be carrying little more than a briefcase or a carpet bag, and his or her new life would begin without a welcoming committee. And surely, there would not be an arrangement of food items (a box of spaghetti, can of tomato sauce and cornbread mix) placed on the countertop with a friendly prayer of dedication.

While such weary travelers may have had less material resources, I would bet that they may have been more prepared for their coming journey than some of today’s college-bound students, with our laptops, four-door sedans and bank accounts.

While part of me feels guilty of my level of comfort “for a seminary student,” I also know that spiritual development doesn’t always require complete deprivation or removal from mainstream society.

I noticed this while traveling in Italy this summer. Having chosen the destination for the purpose of a pilgrimage of sorts, my travels exposed me to new people and ancient pathways, revealing a certain cosmic energy that has sustained me into this new chapter.

It was in Assisi that the contrast between spiritual formation and contemporary culture blended seamlessly. While standing in the Piazza del Comun, I observed a gathering of Franciscan monks in their traditional brown hooded robes.

Their presence seemed to blanket the cobblestone city with a sense of serenity. The town seemed to radiate a gentle hum, a collective vibration of hundreds of humble prayers. Having just arrived on a sweaty overcrowded train from Rome, I felt far from the apparent centeredness of the monks and nuns, breezing through the street archways.

However, I soon felt a certain solidarity with the pious visitors in canvas robes, for they too were disoriented. I observed a group of monks huddled around an ATM machine, slipping cash beneath their folds of fabric. One spoke hurriedly on a cell phone, while another flipped a crumpled map from side to side.

If that wasn’t enough to shatter stereotypes of ever-placid holiness, I was delighted to see two more laid-back monks, with dusty sneakers, baseball caps and trendy sunglasses.

Somehow, that encounter gave me permission to simply enter Assisi as I was, without presupposition of how to be more holy or sanctified.

It is that same acceptance that I feel here at Louisville Seminary, a place that allows me to be myself. And maybe the power outage was a reminder that this place is still affected by life. In fact, it is the unapologetic infiltration of life that will make this experience most enriching.

Warmth of Stone

Tuesday, July 2nd, 2011
Assisi, Italy

This has been a delicate couple of hours, as I experience the creeping sense of loneliness. I’ve returned to the Basilica of St. Francis for a second time, to welcome the sunset and honor another day spent in Assisi.

This sanctuary is surprisingly welcoming, despite its size and droves of visitors. The space is inviting with its plane wooden pews and single aisle flanked by faded pastel frescos. The paintings are playful and childlike, whimsical, Dali-esque.

The center naive is spacious and alive, without the ominous presence of towering statues of saints or grotesque images of Christ. Even the painted images of St. Francis are understated.

Overhead, a sky blue ceiling with golden stars creates a dreamlike canopy. Oxidation has created pools of brilliant turquoise, as if the painter splashed a brighter shade at his leisure.

The floor seems newly renovated. Cream, brown and tan marble tiles are displayed in alternating geometric patterns. Their freshness is uplifting, unlike the smoothed-over stone surfaces inside the Convento San Damiano. There, the depression made on each slab step seem to harbor the weight and woes of millions of feet having trod upon them.

Outside the Basilica, a stone wall separates the cobblestone streets from the surrounding landscape of the Spoletine Valley. I sat alone and peeked through one of the openings in the wall to note the level of the sun – still hung significantly high in the horizon.

Within moments, I reached that point of sadness in which one gives into gravity, as hot tears rolled down my cheeks, stinging the sun burnt skin under my eyes. I felt far from, without and alone.

My heart was suddenly lightened when a priest, or monk, I’m unsure of the difference, walked purposely in front of me. I admired his intentionality and focus, his unwavering direction... and then, suddently, a crack in the stonework caused him to trip forward in an awkward lunge.

He instantly regained his balance, as if tripping was well within his plans. In his unmovable peacefulness, he was not phased and I admired him all the more.

The holy men and women who wander this city are so vibrant and genuine - like the priest from the Chiasa Santa Chiara who I saw in his more humble brown robe and white rope sash. Last night, as I listened to a brass band marching along in hot pink polo shirts, the priest sat on the side steps of the church, utterly attentive to the young woman sitting next to him.

Not overly consiliatory, but listening intently, he hunched over at her same level. The two were unlikely to be on the same walk of faith, yet there was nothing in the priests’ demeanor that spoke of superior spirituality.

I find that Catholicism is renewed here. It is made more human, more versatile, more lasting, more tolerant. This tradition, somehow purified in this new place, is worthy of pause and reflection as a credible means through which one can develop a relationship with the Divine.

There is space for the spiritual here.

The stones are still warm, having absorbed the heat of the Umbrian sun, causing their already luminous rose hue to glow all the more.

The crowds have left for the center of town in search of entertainment and company. The absence of noise has revealed the first evening’s birds and summer insects. Windows are being tied up for the night, store fronts shutting their trinkets away. A distant baby’s cry and her mother’s response can be heard from the entry way to the Basilica below.

Wooden door shut and locked, letting the holy space rest from the intensity of travelers, pilgrims and prayer seekers. How much that must ware on ground that is marked by the spiritual. All it asks is to be, not to be admired or revered.

The sun has hidden behind the elegant belfry, which just moments ago heralded the eight o’clock hour. Heavy resonant gongs echo beyond the hills, as if singing out to sister bells in India, Nepal or Peru.

Call it evening, Buena Sera, or call it the time of peacemaking, when gentle whispers and a quiet togetherness draws the day to an end.

Imperdible

On my last night in Huánuco, Peru, my host mother Elena and her daughter Carla surprised me with an unforgettable despedida. On that memorable Tuesday evening in mid-July, 2009, Elena and Carla had prepared a night of folkloric dancing in their living room. I couldn't have asked for a more special send off.

Elena and Carla retrieved a overstuffed plastic bag full of traditional Peruvian skirts and blouses and proceeded to dress me in layers of fabric and colored sashes. The first dress they presented me was for the Huayla dance of Huancayo, where I had traveled during Holy Week.

I stepped into two knee-length red and orange skirts, each with a wool border of giant hand-stitched flowers, tropical birds and even images of pumas from the surrounding jungle of the region. Elena pulled a black tunic over my head and adjusted the skirts. She then slipped my hands into two decorative sleeves, connected by a string behind my back like a pair of children’s winter mittens.

Over my shoulders Elena draped a heavy manta, or shawl, usually embellished with a flower-patterned square in the middle, but sometimes with more particular designs. And, of course, no look is complete without the typical hat of the region.

In the mountain town of Huancayo, the traditional hat is the simplest I’ve seen - a round top low-brimmed felt hat of tan or black, with a ribbon which gathers on one side in a delicate fan shape rather than a bow.

Hats are a bit of a status symbol in the more traditional regions of Peru, giving each woman a distinct look, without which their daily attire looks markedly similar. In Huánuco, women are seen wearing dark pleated skirts and pastel-colored knit sweaters with two black braided pigtails trailing down to their waists.

In the surrounding villages, women decorate their hats with a mix of brightly colored silk flowers, ribbons and even Christmas tree tinsel. Local shops near the market cater to this by hanging all the necessary hat accessories outside their doors, with women coming to refurbish or upgrade their otherwise bland cream-colored top hats.

At first glance the hats seem a bit excessive, but considering that these women have few possessions of their own, let alone freedoms in life, the hats represent a form of personal expression, identity and artistry.

As Elena continued to dress me in the outfit from Huancayo, Carla tried on a dress from the town of Huacaybamba, a small pueblo near Huánuco. She stepped into a longer black skirt, bordered with a vine of fuchsia flowers. The accompanying bodice was a pink and yellow satin button-up vest with longer panels laying over the sides of the skirt.

Carla then helped Elena put the finishing touches on my Hualya, including a multicolored woven sash wrapped around my waist to hold up the skirt and then a large safety pin to secure the heavy shawl across my back.

Elena asked Carla for an imperdible to pin the shawl and I remembered how much trouble I had had with this word. Sounding nothing like “safety pin,” I had to write it on a piece of scrap paper when heading into town for craft supplies. Carla, who had been my emergency language translater, offered a useful explaination.

Derived from the verb pedir, to lose, imperdible roughly means “unloseable.” What an absolutely sensible name for a safety pin!

While Elena secured the imperdible and rushed around me making final adjustments to my outfit, I pondered what it means to be “unloseable.” But as Carla raised the volume of the music and began dancing the zapateria across the living room, I left my reflection to the eight-hour bus ride I would take the following morning, returning to Lima and later back home to the U.S.

It was during that final journey over the crest of the Andean Mountains, that I came to see how my entire year spent in Peru was a demonstration of this newfound concept of being “unloseable.” To be held together, bonded to and constantly surrounded by loving and supportive people.

To work with survivors of sexual abuse who have surely been lost but have arrived at a human rights agency where the message is “You have been found.” To reinforce my faith and belief in G-d, which tells me that we are all found, already and every day without question.

As it says in Psalm 139, “Oh Lord, you know it [me] completely. You hem me in behind and before, and lay your hand upon me.”

I find this to be so absolutely reassuring, to know that no matter how lost I feel, no matter where I find myself, no matter what happens from here on out, I am unloseable. We are already found, already loved, already assured, already justified and already accepted in every way.

A safety pin, no larger than my pinky finger, held together my shawl so I wouldn’t lose it while dancing in the living room on my last night Huánuco. Just as an imperdible reconnects a shroud of material to its source, I too was reconnected. A safety pin, a seemingly fragile and ordinary object, held the mismatched pieces of my own fabric together, when I felt torn or detached, far from home and uncertain of what I could endure.

That simple object, at once trustful and resilient, has come to represent the faith that sustained me during a year of unpredictability and growth and embodies the strength of a community of people who displayed that faith so fully and honestly.

As this journey continues, I dedicate the contents of this blog to my friends in Huánuco and the Association Paz y Esperanza, who held together the fabric of my own heart when I needed it most.