Our entire Prairiewoods staff celebrates with you as we turn a new year. In the depth of our hearts, we know this turning as so much more than a calendar page. This great turning of time acutely attunes our awareness to an ever-present, loving invitation to loosen our attachment to all we have associated with our self—beliefs, values, assumptions, worldviews—so that a new, collective global community may be birthed through our intentions for the world. Through the words of Bruce Sanguin, we express gratitude for all that has brought us to this sacred turning and commit ever more deeply to ONE-ness:
…We give thanks for Mother Earth,
Your Spirit enfleshed,
giving birth from Her oceans,
carrying nutrients by Her rivers,
inspiriting us through the forests,
feeding us from Her soil,
and delighting us with beauty.We join with the finned ones and the winged ones,
the four-legged ones and ones that crawl upon Earth,
the mountains and trees, clapping for joy,
singing together a canticle of the cosmos…In the fullness of time, exceptional beings emerged
to guide us and set our feet upon a right path.
We open now to their wisdom:To the wisdom of Krishna,
who helps us distinguish illusion from Reality.
May we dispel the illusion that our current lifestyles are
sustainable.To the wisdom of the Buddha
who teach us to reflect on the
transitory nature of life.
May we find the grace to let go of our attachments
to all that is destroying Earth.To the wisdom of Chief Seattle and our indigenous peoples,
who share with us the wisdom of Earth.
May we feel our kinship with all life.To the wisdom of the Jewish prophets,
who show us there is a time to speak truth to power.
May we soon find our voiceTo the wisdom of the Christ,
who teaches us the subversive wisdom of the silenced ones.
May we count among the silenced ones our animal friends
nearing extinction.To the wisdom of Mohammed,
who inspired ecstatic prophets.
May we release into ecstasy.Inspirited by this wisdom – ever ancient, ever new –
we renew our covenant
with Source of All Being, with all creation, and with one another.
May we live peace in our promise
to walk gently upon this planet,
to raise our voices in the service of life,
to embody kindness,
to seek justice,
to love.—slightly adapted from Bruce Sanguin, If Darwin Prayed: Prayers for Evolutionary Mystics, 191
—Ann Jackson, PBVM, Prairiewoods spiritual services coordinator