When the Rev. Dorothea Harvey passed into the spiritual world last week she left quite a legacy as the first woman ordained in the Swedenborgian Church.
We honored her in worship here in Fryeburg, reading the wonderful excerpt that was printed in her obituary where Dorothea offered the lovely and profound statement:
“God’s will is not alien to my own will;
God’s will is that I find my deepest joy.”
Christian history and tradition is full of all kinds of ideas of what “God’s will,” might be for us. At times renunciation of the world, self flagellation, servitude, denial of the flesh, martyrdom, etc. And perhaps for each Christian these paths were what, at the time, led them to their greatest joy & their greatest connection to God.
And what I wonder will lead me to mine?
I am grateful to Dorothea for her life, for her bravery and her wisdom. She has stood in a line of saints that have been helping to birth the new church into the world for generations. May we all honor her part by doing ours.
March 04 2010 | Happiness | 2 Comments »
Do you suffer from perfectionism?
When you miss the turn to a store you wanted to go to do you say to yourself ”Oh, well… I didn’t really need to go,” instead of turning around to go back? When you miss a day with a new exercise routine do you then feel so ashamed and dissapointed with yourself that you don’t ever get back to it? Do you have trouble learning new things because you can’t stand to be in the place of not knowing what you are doing?
I believe perfectionism is one of the most destructive personal demons of our time, because it denies our very human nature. When we can’t have a do-over, when we can’t pick up and start again, when we can’t be in the place of not knowing, then we can’t change. And if we can’t change, we can’t grow, we can’t learn new things, we can’t play and discover all that we might in this exciting and fabulous creation that we’ve been invited to be a part.
So, as you may note… I am battling this personal demon of mine by picking up my abandoned blog and starting again… While I have visited my own feelings of shame and dissapointment for falling off the blogging wagon in the first place, I am giving myself a do-over, I am declaring all is not lost, I am getting back on the wagon and saying perfectionism be damned!
It’s good to be back!
March 03 2010 | Spiritual Struggle | No Comments »
I spend just about every day with people who are dying. People hear that I work for a hospice and they often recoil. “How can you do that work?” “How can you be around all those dying people?” I have stopped trying to come up with answers. We’re all surrounded by dying people. All of us will die. It may be sooner it may be later but it is certain. The only difference with the people I spend my days with is that they know it and they have a slightly shorter time frame.
What is amazing me today about these angels in the making that I am journeying with is what scares them. It’s different for everyone as you can imagine. For some it’s pain, for some it’s losing control, for some it’s leaving loves ones and family. For one gentleman who I have recently come to know it’s that some of his hair is changing color.
Of all of his symptoms, all of his pain, and loss of function, weakness, weight loss, it’s this odd, unexplainable symptom that has him the most bothered. And when I ask him why he tells me “fear of the unknown.”
Death is the ultimate unknown. What will it look like when we cross that veil? What is it to spend your days knowing this unknown is waiting to meet you?
And can we meet the unknown with something beyond fear?
August 19 2008 | Death and Dying | No Comments »
To journey with someone as they pass into the next life. To say goodbye. To forgive. To be thankful. To accept. Wow. This job of walking with the dying and their families in hospice is truly humbling.
I’m not quite sure what to reflect on it all yet as the newness of this work settles in. So I want to share a poem that I discovered.
Is Life the Incurable Disease
Is life the incurable disease?
The infant is born howling
& we laugh,
the dead man smiles
& we cry,
resisting the passage,
always resisting the passage,
that turns life
into eternity.
Blake sange alleluias
on his deathbed.
My own grandmother,
hardly a poet at all,
smiled
as we’d never seen her smile
before.
Perhaps the dress of flesh
is no more than a familiar garment
that grows looser as one diets
on death, & perhaps we discard it
or give it to the poor in spirit,
who have not learned yet
what a blessing it is
to go naked?
Erica Jong
August 09 2008 | Eternal Life | No Comments »
Sorry, so, so sorry….. I have been a BAD blogger. Over three weeks and not a Sage reflection to speak of….. ugh… I could hide my head in shame but it’s time to speak again! To re-enter the blogosphere and trust that while three weeks may seem like an eternity for a blogger, it is but a blip on the spectrum of eternity!
Eternity Now!!
So I am back 
And I am back coming to you live from a whole new spot on the globe. Yes, I haven’t just been hiding from my computer over the last three weeks I have been moving to Portland, ME and starting a new job with Allegiance Hospice.
My call has shifted, I have had to say goodbye for now to the parish, goodbye to my many beloved friends at The Church of the Holy City in Wilmington, and hello to a grand new adventure. A new adventure of journeying with people on the edge of this world and the next. Journeying with people saying their goodbyes and preparing to say their hellos to a even bigger spiritual future. It will be an adventure!
So stay tuned!
I will leave this initial entry with just one very simple reflection that is sitting with me this evening. If I make it to very old, what will I be like? What will you be like? Thoughtful? Dreamy? Crotchety? Content? Flamboyant? If you become a lot more what you are right now what will that be?
Hmmmmm. Good to be back!
July 16 2008 | Death and Dying | No Comments »
This image from a garden in Taormina, Sicily was was taken by Alan Misson the developer of one of my favorite Swedenborgian Sites www.spiritualwisdom.org.uk. What a great depiction of congugial angels, partners in heaven. This is one of my favorite aspects of Swedenborgian spirituality. The strong conviction that our propensity to love one another here on earth, is not just a physiological drive, or convenience, but a deep spiritual call that continues unto eternity.
When we enter into loving partnership with another human being, when we decide to face life together, we are signing up for a grand adventure that as Swedenborg describes will deepen our individual humanity, widen our capacity for compassion and joy, and etch out and complete our personal character. And this adventure, continues far beyond our physical lives.
I love to imagine myself throwing my head back on a sunny day in heaven in the arms of my conjugial partner. Setting off on an adventure together with our bags packed!
While discovering love and making love stay are not always easy tasks, it is profound to consider them divinely ordained, gifts from God, and tasks that lead not to an end, but a continuing adventure!
June 16 2008 | Partnership | No Comments »
I know that summer will not officially arrive for a couple more weeks, but here in Pennsylvania it “feels” very much here. The sun is hot, the air is muggy, and night doesn’t come until close to nine o’clock at night. The kids in our Sunday School are beginning to take on the restlessness of school’s end, summer is just around the corner.
I love summertime. I love the green, walking in wet grass with bare feet, the warmth of the sun on my face, and the smell of sun tan lotion. Summertime is a lush season of fullness.
And Swedenborg describes as much as he discusses the spiritual significance of this season. He writes that summer signifies “a state of fullness of the church (Emanuel Swedenborg, Divine Love and Wisdom #73.)” Summer is the time of fruition, or completion. No more planting, no more planning, no more waiting. Whatever lay dormant under the earth germinating in winter, whatever was planted in spring will soon be here in it’s completeness. This time of “fullness” also can correspond to the stage of adulthood, the time in our cycle of regeneration when we have become who we are to be, and are fully “being it.” While we certainly are always growing and learning, we can think of the approaching summer’s spiritual significance as a time in our cycle of growth where what we are most called to do is just rest in the reality of who we are and live that to the fullest.
This is my meditation right now as I feel the sun on my face. May we all bask in the joy of who we are right now, the fullness of our own journey with God. For there is much to be grateful for.
June 07 2008 | Nature & Spirit | No Comments »
I dream a lot. I have long winding dreams, with huge casts of characters, that seem at times like English novels with long run on sentences and hard to follow plots. AND, when I take the time to parcel through my dreams, to look at what they might mean, there is always gold. My dreams always give me a picture of where I am, what’s growing in me, what’s changing, what’s calling. Always.
Last night I dreamed that I was at my high school reunion and everyone had grown up to become diverse and interesting adults. I didn’t recognize any of the people in the dream as actual kids from my high school but there was a fellow minister, a friend from seminary, oh, and Jon Bon Jovi was there And the reunion took place on a school bus headed to the Mid-West as if this was a destination point.
In my waking life I know that there are certain things about me that are “being reunited.” Attributes that were strong in high school, that I am rediscovering in my 30’s as core elements of who God has created me to be. Core elements that have reunited again on this strange school bus reunion, more mature, and having a great time.
I see my dreams as angel talk. And boy do angels have a way with words. I had a dream teacher in seminary, Jeremy Taylor, a great student of dreams, who said that “All dreams use the most effective image possible to communicate their content.” And I really believe that. Angels don’t mince words. I believe that my dreams are always gifts from the spiritual realm, written by angels to speak to me about my place in the Divine design, to help me understand where I am, and where I am going.
When I remember my dreams and work with them I tend to start seeing more levels to my day, it’s as if the dream follows me into my waking life and begins to unlock the mystery of what I’m learning now. It makes my days more magical, more full, and it reminds me of the angelic connections that are constantly with me.
So apparently today Jon Bon Jovi will be along for the ride I wonder what mysteries he will help me unlock?
May 16 2008 | Dreams | No Comments »
Have you ever felt spiritually “vulnerable”? Like you’re standing in the stream of providence with no pants? I’m beginning to believe that in order to become spiritually mature beings it is this muscle movement, of practicing “spiritual vulnerability,” that is the most important to our spiritual regeneration.
What are some examples of being spiritually vulnerable? Well, it’s likely different for everyone but in general I believe we make ourselves spiritually vulnerable every time we show up with total honesty, with ourselves, with God, and with the people in our lives about where we are at, what we believe, who we think we are, what we want, and then leaving the outcome of all of this to God.
Phew…. it makes me a little dizzy thinking about it.
To be vulnerable is to be exposed. The dictionary definition of vulnerability is to not only be exposed, but exposed to possible attack or injury. It points first to the dangers of this state, because in all honesty there are dangers. If there weren’t it wouldn’t be hard! It is hard because when we leave ourselves open we can be hurt, we can be criticized, we can be taken to places we may feel afraid to go… AND it is in this state of openness, honesty, and trust where we can also be led to the most exciting, most nourishing and most heavenly new opportunities we could never imagine.
So what shall we choose?
To be spiritually vulnerable will likely be often an uncomfortable and overwhelming ride. Much more intense than any amusement park roller coaster, because this ride won’t necessarily let you off at the cotton candy booth. But perhaps it will bring us all some place much sweeter.
April 30 2008 | Spiritual Struggle | No Comments »
“[Divine] peace is like the morn or dawn in springtime, when once the night is done, all things of earth begin to live anew from the rising of the sun; the scent of the leaves is wafted here and there, awakened by the dew that falls from heaven; the gentle warmth of spring makes fertile the soil and grants as well a joy to human minds. This is because morning and dawn in springtime correspond to the state of peace of angels in heaven.”
From Heaven and Hell #289
Peace. The bursting buds, the sprouting green, the colors and scents of Spring that are so quickly overwhelming the landscape correspond to the “peace of angels in heaven.”
I am struck by this today because I must admit to often associating peace with stillness, truce, quiet time and inactivity. Spring is beautiful, joyful even, but it is certainly not still! There are bees mating outside my window, there is creation growing and changing all around me! It is not a time of stillness but tremendous activity! And this is what heavenly peace feels like?
Well, perhaps it is? Perhaps true peace necessitates activity, living out our love in the world, being useful one to another, being in the flow of offering our skills and gifts and passions to one another.
Of course this would be the peace of angels.
My prayer today is to look for peace within the activity of my life, not as something I must step away from my life to find, but that peace that exists within being of use in the world. The peace of heaven.
April 25 2008 | Angels and Uncategorized | No Comments »
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