… watching for the brushstrokes of God
On the edge of war, one foot already in,
I no longer pray for peace:
I pray for miracles.
I pray that stone hearts will turn
to tenderheartedness,
and evil intentions will turn
to mercifulness, …
I pray that all the “God talk”
will take bones,
and stand up and shed
its cloak of faithlessness,
and walk again in its powerful truth….
I no longer pray for peace:
I pray for miracles. ~ Ann Weems
How far do your prayers go?
“The deep places in our lives — places of resistance and embrace — are reached only by stories, by images, metaphors and phrases that line out the world differently, apart from our fear and hurt.” ~ Walter Brueggemann
How do you find your way into those narratives?
“Today I am pulling on a green wool sweater
and walking across the park in a dusky snowfall.
The trees stand like twenty-seven prophets in a field,
each a station in a pilgrimage—silent, pondering.
…
I will walk home alone with the deep alone,
a disciple of shadows, in praise of the mysteries.” ~ Edward Hirsch
How do you walk with mystery?
“Because it is gratuitous, beauty points beyond itself, beyond survival to satisfaction. We think of it in opposition to narrowness, scarcity, drudgery, and constraint. We think instead of what is expansive, generous, abundant, connected, and expressive.” ~ Makoto Fujimura, Culture Care
What invites you into the expansive spaces?
“There is a bottomless resourcefulness in [humanity] that ultimately enables [us] to transform “the spear of frustration into a shaft of light.” Under such a circumstance, even one’s deepest distress becomes so sanctified that a vast illumination points the way to the land one seeks.” ~ Howard Thurman
“Humankind has not woven the web of life. We are but one thread within it. Whatever we do to the web, we do to ourselves. All things are bound together. All things connect.” ~ Chief Seattle, Duwamish
How do you notice the connections?
With the Eyes of the Heart 