For many years now I have become increasingly reluctant to wear a cross necklace in public, not because I am ashamed of my Christian faith but because I’m afraid it will mark me as something I am not –- one of those people, as David Brooks put it, who “have crosses on their chest but Nietzsche in their heart—or, to be more precise, a high-school sophomore’s version of Nietzsche.”
Today, September 14th, the Catholic Church (along with Anglican and Eastern Orthodox Churches, I learned from Wikipedia) celebrates the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, a special feast day for my home parish of Holy Cross in Santa Cruz, California. My non-Christian friends may find it strange to exalt what they see as an instrument of torture and death, and I can’t blame them. In the Roman Empire crucifixion was a brutal method of execution meant to instill fear, and the cross was a symbol of their power. But for early Christians it came to represent the great love story that was the origin of the Church: the love of Jesus who laid down His life for his friends.
No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. – Jesus (John 15:13)
To say that the cross symbolizes love might seem simplistic and vague, so I’m turning to Jesus’s own words for insight on how to be a little more specific. When I read the Gospel, it seems that for Jesus, love meant solidarity with the poor in spirit and pure of heart, with the meek and merciful, and with peacemakers (Matthew 5: 1-12). He asked his followers to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, and look after the sick, even to invite the stranger in and visit those in prison (Matthew 25: 34).
I confess to you, dear reader, that I am far from living up to this call, but that’s what I aspire to. If you notice the Brigid cross in my garden or see me wearing one around my neck, please know that it’s not a political statement. It simply means that I am choosing love over fear.
Once a year, midwinter, a question starts percolating in my mind: what should I give up for Lent? These days I also wonder how to steady myself as a citizen witness in a time of chaos and discord when men in power willfully inflict suffering. On Ash Wednesday my answer boiled down to resistance. Instead of fasting from candy or alcohol, I stopped shopping at Amazon and withdrew from Facebook and Instagram.
Will my individual action make a difference? Honestly, no. Boycotting companies owned by oligarchs can’t be effective unless some critical mass of consumers join in and sustain the embargo for as long as it might take – like the bus boycott or the UFW grape boycott. And would scaling up be a fair ask? Lots of people rely on Meta platforms to promote their businesses, and online shopping is a lifeline for the homebound — not to mention all the employees who depend on these companies for an income. Lent has made me realize how lucky I am. Shopping local and taking a break from social media for forty days haven’t turned out to be much of a sacrifice.
The forty days before Easter are not just about giving something up though. Fasting is meant to be joined with prayer and almsgiving, an intertwining of traditional practices that braid action and contemplation. This Lent has brought me new prayers: a friend taught me to chant the Mangala mantra, which includes the plea, May the leaders of the earth protect in every way by keeping to the right path,* and Abbey of the Arts introduced me to earth psalms. Meanwhile, an old prayer has become more heartfelt: deliver us from evil. To whom shall I give alms? I have only to pose the question for answers to come. Last week I got an email from Second Harvest Food Bank asking for help as they try to “overcome the challenges created by recent shifts in U.S. policy, including federal funding freezes that have disrupted our food supply.”
With its threefold practice of fasting, prayer and almsgiving Lent has given me hints for how to be a good citizen. The personal is political, and, as it turns out, the spiritual is too.
* Translation from Sri K. Pattabhi Jois, Yoga Shala Nashville. I’ve also heard this translated May the citizens, lawmakers, and rulers walk the right path.
Amidst last winter’s lettuce, henbit deadnettle flaunts
small purple velvet blooms
unfurling
yet smaller
speckled petals.
The beauty of what I call weeds
startles me into gratitude,
and I sing praise to the earth.
I name you, holy uninvited —
nettle and broom,
thistle and vinca –
and bow before your tenacious ingenuity,
for you glorify the Author of Life
in your surging greenness.
When I looked out my window,
you showed me your loveliness;
your bounty reminded me of our plenty.
All the fearful would surely recognize abundance
if they could see the unstoppable
flowering in this garden,
if they only breathed in the aromas of
sweet peas and angel’s trumpet.
Though the Beloved dwells in paradise,
She cares for the nettle and broom
as much as the jasmine and rose;
both planted and uninvited
are holy in Her sight.
Though I fear scarcity,
you fill this plot with hurtling life.
You offer enough to feed us all,
more than enough to save us.
The earth will make good her purpose for me;
O Sacred Earth, your greening endures forever;
do not abandon the fruits of your flowering.
Audio version of The Holy Uninvited
A note about this poem: In January I started reading the book Understorey: A Year Among Weeds by Anna Chapman Parker, and it inspired me to pay attention to the weeds in my garden. Although oxalis dominates with its neon yellow flowers, when I set out to explore the verdant greenery currently burgeoning in my backyard, I identified twenty other species— many of which I would have considered wildflowers if I’d discovered them on a hike. And now that I know another name for oxalis is Bermuda buttercup, how could I not want to make peace with it?
Then last week, for an online retreat through Abbey of the Arts called Earth Psalter: Writing Psalms for the Anthropocene, I was asked to “bring an object from an outdoor place that is meaningful to your experience of your ecosystem.” Minutes before I was supposed to show up on Zoom, I raced out to the still dewy backyard with my clippers and put together a small bouquet of weeds/wildflowers that inspired this song of praise and gratitude.
Thank you to Abbey of the Arts for this new approach to the psalms!
Some days it seems the only happiness to be found is in the elusive oblivion of sleep. On those days the price for staying awake is high, tears the only outlet for a toxic broth of fear and rage against disaster I’m too small to change. When I feel like my kayak has capsized in the rapids, I try to return to the ritual of lighting a candle to Brigit, a ritual that symbolizes and feeds my faith in the light — that Great Love that kindled my inner flame, that light that can overcome any darkness. Then I’m a little better able to see difficult feelings as potential tools for survival: fear warns of danger, anger powers action, tears are a vital expression of sorrow. To balance and bear these emotions I’ve learned some coping strategies from friends over the last few months that help me access the light and nurture my inner flame.
1. Keep things in perspective.
The sweep of history is long, holding meteor strikes and ice ages, the rise and fall of civilizations, cities destroyed and rebuilt. Positioning the current calamity on that long arc lets you view it in a different way — it may be overwhelming now, but it won’t always be. In my late thirties infertility and divorce seemed like the defining events of my story. Now at age 63 they are simply chapters in a much longer book. If this is the case with a lifetime, it is even more so for a country. In just 250 years the United States has witnessed a successful fight for independence from empire and civil war; Americans saw the excess of the Gilded Age give way to the corrections of the New Deal.
To be clear, the suggestion to keep things in perspective comes with a few caveats. For one thing it can feel limited to the privileged. Perspective might not be available to me if my home had been bombed or burned, if I had just lost my job or feared being deported. Nor should it provide false comfort that things aren’t really that bad. “Pay attention” was Mary Oliver’s first instruction for living a life, which means noticing goodness and beauty but also recognizing tragedy and treachery. Perspective doesn’t minimize calamity, it places this knot of suffering in a larger tapestry. Yes, what is happening now is unprecedented, but as a friend told me recently, we’ve been here before, and we know what to do.
2. Seek sustenance in nature.
My favorite tree when I was growing up was the pine in our backyard. In my essay “The Secret Forest” I describe it as “a bit of the wild in our tract house neighborhood where my sisters and I could climb, build a clubhouse, or imagine elves and fairies. The green needle canopy of that single pine, its sappy branches, duff carpet, and unique scent formed an entire arboreal world, Sherwood, Narnia, Fangorn Forest. And when I tired of company and play, it became a place to hide out, just the pine tree and me, my first hermitage.” Even as a child I understood the solace to be found in nature.
Now more than ever, go outdoors and open your senses wide. Try closing your eyes. What do you hear? Smell? Take off your shoes and find a place to plant your bare feet. As I write, I’m imagining the sensation on my soles of hard-packed sand, cushiony grass, moist and loamy garden soil. Walk among the trees. Press your forehead to the trunk of the redwood and lay yourself down in her duff. If you don’t have a place nearby to forest bathe, look up. On busy days, I like to take what I call “sky breaks” to savor for a moment whatever that immensity above me has to show.
3. Lean into community.
Even an introvert like me needs community. Now is the time to seek deeper connection with yours. Another caveat: social media might not be the best way. Instead gather with friends, go to church, play pickleball. I see people around me engaging in all kinds of ways: singing in a choir, taking a dance class, volunteering, joining a protest. Does all that sound ridiculously beyond what you have the capacity for right now? Text a friend and ask her to light a candle for you. (Or email me, my candle is ready.) Next week you might have the energy to meet for coffee.
4. Find joy in the ordinary.
For several months last year, caring for my aging parents meant spending more time than I ever had before in the emergency room and ICU. My sisters and I were inundated dealing with doctors, insurance companies, and attorneys, trying to arrange at-home care and then assisted living, reacting to one crisis after another. In the midst of this, my mother shared advice that her spiritual director had given her when Mom was caring for my grandmother. You might expect a nun to encourage you to honor your parents or pray the rosary, but that was not this sister’s approach. Instead, she advised my mom each and every day to look for joy.
When I tried it, I had the same experience Ross Gay did when he started writing an essay everyday about something delightful. He discovered “that the discipline or practice of writing these essays occasioned a kind of delight radar. Or maybe it was more like the development of a delight muscle. … Which is to say, I felt my life to be more full of delight. Not without sorrow or fear or pain or loss. But more full of delight.” Now the same thing happened to me: I developed a joy radar. A perfect feather from a hawk on the wing floated down into a crosswalk just as I was about to step off the curb. A friend’s baby granddaughter flashed me a bubbly smile. Soon my sisters and I were texting each other our daily joy, multiplying the effect.
***
As I struggle for equanimity, I find encouragement in a letter written almost two thousand years ago: “Let us lay aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light.” This was St. Paul to the early Christians in Rome, and by light he meant love. Why then does he choose such a martial metaphor? I personally would rather draw a cloak of kindness around me than put on a suit of armor. But choosing love in challenging times takes great courage and fortitude, and I want to feel protected when I go out into the world, not by weapons, not by metal, but by light — the great love that kindled my inner flame.
Nature, community, joy — it may sound corny, but these are rays of light, and you can probably see how they feed each other. Moments of joy are highly likely when you’re stargazing or line dancing at the community center. In the life of a redwood this moment is a blip, and connecting with the world beyond your immediate crisis can shift your perspective.
Darkness does not have the last say. No matter what happens you are held in the great web of life.
I wrote this poem last October in a writing salon with Patrice Vecchione at Gabriella Café in Santa Cruz, where her art show Imagination Migration was on display, a flock of hand-colored birds carrying flowers, maps and pencils in their beaks. I didn’t guess then how much I would need imagination to move into my next chapter, our next chapter.
For me, today is a day for remembering the courage and wisdom of Martin Luther King, Jr. “We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline,” he admonished in his “I Have a Dream” speech. “We must not allow our creative protests to degenerate into physical violence.” Although he was talking specifically about civil rights for black Americans, his sagacity transcends the March on Washington in 1963. Dignity, discipline, and nonviolence are his guidelines, and just as important, “We cannot walk alone.”
Today I’m also remembering the four freedoms Franklin Delano Roosevelt articulated in his State of the Union address on January 6, 1941: the freedom of speech, the freedom of worship, the freedom from want, and the freedom from fear. Today I call on our collective creative energy to imagine a future of freedom and justice for all.
Dear reader, at this time of winter darkness, about to light the fourth candle on the Advent wreath, watching for the return of light heralded by the winter solstice, and admittedly overwhelmed by the consumerist frenzy that hijacks Christmas in our culture, I wish you sanctuary — your own pool of light in the labyrinth — and a pathway to hope in the New Year.
The Kingdom of Enough 