http://www.stjohnsuc.ca/index.cfm?i=13869&mid=25&blogid=6820 Everyday Enlightenment This blog will be a home base, where we share snippets and clues of God peeking out at us in the music that falls upon our ears on the drive into work, the conversations buzzing around the office lounge, you tube sound bytes and flick clips. I hope to lift up some of the snapshots of grace that inspire and challenge us, found in the midst of our daily rounds where our deepest beliefs intersect with our everyday moments (especially in the places we would never think to look!) I look forward to conversations and community being created, as you all share the findings from your own spiritual scavenger hunts! AdvancedMinistry This Advent season, I’m feeling a little bit like Zechariah. The Bible tells his story of the altar boy personified. We find him in the temple going about his perfectly rehearsed rituals. He is soaking in the words that have been embedded on his heart and his mind, the faith that he has inherited. And he sees a vision of an angel. He hears news of a coming birth that takes the breath out of him. And in an instant nothing will ever be the same. He is speechless. The priest, the preacher, the prophet, has run out of words. Have you ever had that happen...when the truth has come to visit you, and there are no words that can touch it? I lost a friend recently. She once asked me to pray for her Cancer to be gone, for her to get better. And for a moment, I was mute. And then miraculously the prayers tumbled out, “God, may your yearning for life, and our yearning for life be winding their way to one another”. Her unspoken prayer was always that she would not let go of life, that she would not give up. And she became the answer to her own prayer. These prayers became her chemo. And although I didn’t know it at the time, they were also a balm for my soul. Since she has gone, I am having trouble finding words...lost in an irrepressible longing for the thickness of silence. Maybe it will be quiet enought that I can hear her praying into me, until the words come again, and there is something worth saying, until God’s language that rests and resides in us, startles, and stings, and softly coaxes me into holy speech. Maybe by the time Christmas comes, there will be just enough room around the lump in my throat to choke out the songs hailing the birth of the one who is “the Word made flesh”, who is both beyond words, and for whom there will never be enough words. http://www.stjohnsuc.ca/index.cfm?i=13869&mid=25&blogid=6820&comments=29914 29914 Thu, 8 Dec 2011 23:29:00 +0000 The other night, I sat beside my six year old son Josh, sinking into the solidness of a pew, and listening to the magic of a children’s choir that rivalled the angel chorus. After the first piece, I looked down into his wide, shining eyes, expecting a reaction of pure, innocent awe, and instead he said loud enough for the amazing acoustics to echoe through the vaulted sanctuary “Is it over?” But it all sank in. On the way home, driving through the thick black of night covering open fields, he asked a million questions in one long, non-stop, run-on sentence. And then came the big one...Mommy, do you know why I love Christmas? Because I get presents. But I also really love that Jesus came into the world. Do you kno w what I love about Jesus...I LOVE THAT NOTHING COULD STOP HIM’. These words ushered in a whole other kind of Advent. This lead me on a search to re-imagine Christmas, and to finding a web-site called “Advent Conspiracy”, and I was absolutely taken in by its name. Christmas for many of us is a season to sink into cozy comfort, into traditions that invoke magic and warmth, and light. And yet, the ancient hope that Mary sang about was in Christ coming to change everything in a drastic, definitive way, that involves upheaval, and overthrowing of what we have made the cornerstones in our lives. The Advent Conspiracy project invites us through simple actions to be co-conspirators with Christ, actually participating in the possibility of our world being born into a more redemptive and reaching realm of God as if there is nothing in this world that can stop him. It challenges people to re-imagine their Christmas journey, by spending less on gifts (operating on the figure of $450 billion dollars in Christmas spending) and instead turns our focus to the 20 billion dollars that it claims it would cost for the world to have access to clean water, and invites us to donate to building water wells and sisterns. It also encourages us to invest in our journey with Jesus, finding ways in our daily life to worship more fully, and in to honour our relationships, through the gift of spending more time with family. Check it out at www.adventconspiracy.org. The promo video can also be found on youtube. How will you be inspired and con-spired by the Spirit this Christmas? http://www.stjohnsuc.ca/index.cfm?i=13869&mid=25&blogid=6820&comments=29913 29913 Thu, 8 Dec 2011 23:24:00 +0000 A lot of people have been thinking about what it means for our world to be living out the legacy of Steve Jobs, a truly definining icon of our generation. While listening to his inspiring, and now haunting message to the 2005 commencement class of Stanford University, his words capture a legacy of leadership lying in the message of his life, even more than in his relentless ingenuity and technological vision. Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure – these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart. Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life’s change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away...Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. In the closing of his speech, he left the fresh faced graduates with words that could be his epitaph, "Stay hungry. Stay foolish". What do you believe will be the legacy you leave this world with?   http://www.stjohnsuc.ca/index.cfm?i=13869&mid=25&blogid=6820&comments=28035 28035 Tue, 11 Oct 2011 22:18:00 +0000 Matt Damon is the new Bono. More humanitarian than Hollywood hunk. Recently, while researching the community development initiative H2o Africa, he co-founded with partner George Whyte, I discovered this speech that Matt Damon delivered as part of a Save Our Shools rally. While this speech unfolds in an American political context, his main goal was not to offer a sound byte, but to honour the mission, the heart and soul of the educational system with a profound blessing that touches all teachers and students of life, in all ages and stages. Here are some of the words from Damon’s speech... I had incredible teachers. As I look at my life today, the things I value most about myself — my imagination, my love of acting, my passion for writing, my love of learning, my curiosity — all come from how I was parented and taught. My teachers were empowered to teach me... free to approach me and every other kid in that classroom like an individual puzzle. They took so much care in figuring out who we were and how to best make the lessons resonate with each of us. They were empowered to unlock our potential. They were allowed to be teachers... This has been a horrible decade for teachers. I can’t imagine how demoralized you must feel. But I came here today to deliver an important message to you: As I get older, I appreciate more and more the teachers that I had growing up. And I’m not alone. There are millions of people just like me. So the next time you’re feeling down, or exhausted, or unappreciated, or at the end of your rope; the next time you turn on the TV and see yourself called “overpaid;” the next time you encounter some simple-minded, punitive policy that’s been driven into your life by some corporate reformer who has literally never taught anyone anything. ... Please know that there are millions of us behind you. You have an army of regular people standing right behind you, and our appreciation for what you do is so deeply felt. We love you, we thank you and we will always have your back.   Our hope is that this blessing falls upon all of us, inspiring us to see ourselves as teachers, whether we claim that identity and responsibility or not. In our actions, and in our living, we are entrusting one another into a collective well of wisdom, and wonder, and discovery that stretches us beyond ourselves, and our imagined limits. And we are touching upon the Christ who was and still is among us as a teacher, and truth bearer, who also and always embraced being taught.    What have you been learning in life these days? And what do you hope are the teachings that your living lifts up? Who are your teachers? Is there anything you can see yourself taking on to encourage and affirm the teachers in your life? What would it mean for you to encourage yourself and others in our spiritual education?   Peace,   Kelly http://www.stjohnsuc.ca/index.cfm?i=13869&mid=25&blogid=6820&comments=26386 26386 Thu, 1 Sep 2011 00:13:00 +0000