All of creation invites us to unify seemingly contrasting energies. Robin Hines and his dog, Odie, faithful friends of Prairiewoods, daily walk the woods and prairie. To Robin’s surprise, Odie and this deer held each other’s gaze for a solid five minutes, extending hospitality to one another. Odie and Robin stop and greet every person…
DetailsWhen Death Comes by Mary Oliver … When it’s over, I want to say all my life I was a bride married to amazement. I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms. When it’s over, I don’t want to wonder if I have made of my life something particular, and real. I don’t…
DetailsThis week the 2020 Olympics have been taking place in Tokyo, Japan. They are a year late and accompanied by controversy over the decision to host such an endeavor in the midst of a global pandemic. One of the biggest stories of the week was gymnast Simone Biles’ decision to remove herself from both the…
DetailsWhat are you reading this summer? And what spiritual reading are you doing this summer? I love to read any time of the year, but there’s something about summer reading when the days are longer and the sunlight mingles with the printed word that turns my bookworm self into a book butterfly because my imagination…
DetailsOne of our three-year-old family mystics teetered precariously on the top step of the stairs, clutching his stuffed “Bun-Buns,” and peering over the abyss. “There’s something down there,” he whispered, eyes wide with primal terror and simultaneous wonderment. VERY still, riveted with one toe over the edge, he listened with all ears, eyes and nose…
DetailsSaint Francis, who valued the natural world as “a place where God is revealed,” encouraged his followers by his own unique celebration of creation. God’s goodness, generosity and love were not off-limits somewhere in far-off cathedrals, but rather to be found in creation as a whole. This Franciscan spirit called Prairiewoods to create space to…
DetailsAs we approach this national holiday to celebrate “Independence Day,” I’ve been praying with my heart’s longing for our nation to rename it “Inter-dependence Day.” What would the world look like if we really stepped more deeply through our independence to a world-wide, collective consciousness that held “inter-dependence” as one of its highest values? How…
DetailsWe are living in extraordinary times. Even if a single day feels ordinary, the compilation of days that make up this week, this season, this pandemic is extraordinary. But what are we doing to commemorate this historic time? How are we living every day as though it is an ordinary but marvelous day? In 2012,…
Details“A huge shift in consciousness is underway in our time. A sea change from the “I and it” marketplace conception of the world to an “I and thou” sense of communal identity. Joanna Macy describes it as a “Great Turning,” an ecological revolution widening our awareness of the intricate web that connects us. Teilhard de…
DetailsDo you have a favorite place within the Prairiewoods land? A special spot? A reflection area where you feel especially at home? Maybe under a particular pine tree. Or at the center of the labyrinth. Maybe sitting on one of the logs encircling Grandmother Oak … The prayer circle in the woods. Sitting on the…
DetailsWhat are the sounds of silence? What speaks when we are brave enough to be still? What song does creation sing as we wake to a new language that might sound foreign? As my beloved other Mom propped herself up on one elbow in her hospice room, the wide smile and tears of joy indicated that…
DetailsI almost always take the present moment for granted. Obsession with the future or the past seems to take up most of my brain-space. The constant chatter can become too much. When this happens, I’ve found the practice of “resting in the present moment” to be especially helpful. I take a satisfying breath inward, pause…
Details“We do not emerge from a crisis the same; we emerge either better or worse.” To emerge better, we need to “care for nature so that it can care for us.” —Pope Francis, Earth Day message This week we celebrate as a global community the sixth anniversary of Laudato Si’, Pope Francis’ encyclical on the care…
DetailsThis winter, I slept eight or nine hours a night and still woke up exhausted. My eyelids fluttered closed as I put on eye makeup. By mid-morning, I could hardly keep my head up without the help of caffeine. For several months, my emotional exhaustion presented as physical exhaustion, because they were all rolled up…
Details“The journey, the sacred journey of the universe, is the personal journey of each individual … The universe is the larger self of each person, since the entire sequence of events that has transpired since the beginning of the universe was required to establish each of us in the precise structure of our own being…
DetailsI have this urge to dress in a green moss wrap braid twigs and grasses through my hair wear a dandelion necklace a feather bracelet a clover ring a star on each finger and toe swim in the river follow the sun live in a tree somewhere rest in the shady places sleep behind a…
DetailsDo you believe this to be true? You can’t teach an old dog new tricks. What is it that causes some to thrive and others to fall behind? What is it that makes winners and losers? It might be said without overstatement that we are overly obsessed with winning and losing in today’s world. It…
DetailsI had written this poem for a meeting last fall of the Women in Interfaith Dialogue, hosted virtually by Prairiewoods. The topic for the day was “spiritual self-care and resilience.” ONE DAY Are these two words—one, day— a triangulation, a trajectory, to one point, to some later day, something we imagine, we hope, to be…
Details“Even as tiny drops fill the water jug, so the patient ones become filled with good, even though virtue may come slowly.” —Buddha, The Dhammapada Life can change in an instant, but change also sneaks in by tiny increments. When life changes suddenly, it has a profound emotional impact. While steady changes can have the…
DetailsChristians throughout the world today sense themselves “called out,” complicit in the suffering and violence of the world. We hear the cries, “Why have you forsaken me?” from all walks of people and animals and Earth herself. THIS Good Friday, perhaps like no other, we see and experience face-to-face the world’s collective shadow through the…
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