A Room of My Own

Virginia Wolfe famously wrote about having a room of one’s own as being necessary as "a woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write fiction."  My memory of what she wrote was a bit hazier before I googled it as it is buried in the depths of my memory of my first University English class which was after all, in another millennium buried in the depths of the 1970’s.

That phrase, a room of one’s own, came to mind as Lorna and I have been settling into our cottage for the summer and I just returned from the room of my own, the bunkie which is my own space.  You might say it is a space within a space ̶ part of the space that Lorna and I occupy each summer in Prince Edward Island – you could say it is the place of our own. 

Virginia Woolf was speaking from what could be criticized as being a middle-class privileged space about the challenges of creating her place in the literary canon.  That being said, I believe it is also true for the development of a contemplative life.  At least for me, as an unapologetic introvert, I know that I must have a place where I can be alone with myself and in doing so perhaps also recognize and deepen the experience of being with God.  I know that God is always with me but it is far too easy to ignore that inner experience which I have come to identify with God.

I may have written in this space about my experience of growing up as an introvert in what seemed to be an extroverted world.  I hope you will forgive me if I am repeating myself.  As a child I found that I needed a small corner where I could hide out from a world that didn’t seem to be all that friendly to me.  It was my “small corner” following the lines from that children’s “Jesus Bids Us Shine”:

Jesus bids us shine with a clear, pure light,
Like a little candle burning in the night;
In this world of darkness, so we must shine,
You in your small corner, and I in mine.

This was not just a case of an introvert needing space to recharge his batteries and renew himself, it was a case of a place of safety from an unfriendly world.  I found the world and people hard to figure out and it was a challenge to engage with people.  As a grew older and possibly a bit wiser, I found it a challenge to differentiate between my need as an introvert to recharge my inner batteries and my desire to find a safe place which was truly not as necessary as in those childhood years.  Those defense mechanisms that we develop as children for survival can be retained even when they are no longer necessary as adults. 

I realize that I need to be aware when I retreat into my small corner to recharge my inner batteries rather than to escape from a world that is actually not actually unsafe.  I have discovered and continue to discover that my small corner is where I can recharge and strengthen my relationship with God.  If I can do this, I am much more likely to let my little light shine in the world.  This does not seem to be true for everyone as some people seem to find the room of their own to be in many different kinds of places.  It may be in nature or in encounters with other people and even, dare I say it, worshiping as part of a religious community.  I certainly have had experiences of connections with God in other places, including church.  That is part of the pulled to ordination.  However, to ground myself in my relationship with God I do need a room of my own.

May you find the room of your own in whatever form it takes and may you find blessings on your journey.

The Thin Places in Your Life

I have been thinking about “Thin Places” for a while.  The idea of a Thin Place is one that first came to my awareness some years ago when I was first introduced to Celtic Spirituality.  One definition of Thin Places that I found on the internet is, “A place where the boundary between heaven and earth is especially thin. It’s a place where we can sense the divine more readily.” 

I was reintroduced to the concept recently when I attended a workshop held at St. Paul’s Cathedral in London Ontario in May.  The idea of thin places was central to one of the presentations given by Rt. Rev. Barry Clarke who is the retired Bishop of Montreal and currently the interim Dean of St. Paul’s Cathedral.  In the workshop he was leading he asked the participants where their thin places are.  My response was “on the beach near our cottage in Prince Edward Island.  Actually that was not completely true.  There are many places here in P.E.I., including the beach (appropriately named Back Beach), that are my thin places. 

Although it is part of Celtic Spirituality, it is a part of anyone’s Spirituality whether it is formally Celtic or not.  My Thin Places include the Apple Farm Community where I go for retreats.  Apple Farm, in Three Rivers Michigan is a community founded by Helen Luke who wrote wonderful essays exploring biblical and classical themes and reveals deep spiritual wisdom contained in them. Her magnum opus is Dark Wood to White Rose which explores the wisdom in Dante’s Divine Comedy.  Helen chose the location of Apple Farm as it was for her a Thin Place as it has become for me. 

For a place to be a Thin Place does not mean that it is paradise and that life will not intrude when you are there.  Since arriving at our cottage at the beginning of June, life has intruded in different way.  The weather has been less than perfect with only a few days that would be considered a ‘beach day’. Lorna is particularly frustrated that her gardens are not doing much with the cool weather.  We have also had a few mishaps such as having to replace the glass in the door of the wood stove and I have had to deal with squirrels invading by Bunkie which is my thin place within a larger thin place where I can retreat to do much of my writing.   It is my small corner as the children’s hymn says:

Jesus bids us shine with a clear, pure light,
Like a little candle burning in the night;
In this world of darkness so we must shine,
You in your small corner, and I in mine.

The idea of a Thin Place is more than just a sense of being closer to God than usual—although that is very valuable.  It is a place where we can begin to question our perception of the world.  We can begin to see that there is more to life than our small corners where we believe we are safe and comfortable.  We can begin to question our assumptions of how the world is ordered, our understanding of God’s will, and even our understanding of God.  Richard Rohr addressed this in a recent Daily Meditation:

We keep praying that our illusions will fall away. God erodes them from many sides, hoping they will fall. But we often remain trapped in what we call normalcy—"the way things are." Life then revolves around problem-solving, fixing, explaining, and taking sides with winners and losers. It can be a pretty circular and even nonsensical existence.

To get out of this unending cycle, we have to allow ourselves to be drawn into sacred space, into liminality. All transformation takes place here. We have to allow ourselves to be drawn out of "business as usual" and remain patiently on the "threshold" (limen, in Latin) where we are betwixt and between the familiar and the completely unknown… There alone is our old world left behind, while we are not yet sure of the new existence. That's a good space where genuine newness can begin. 

Do you have a Thin Place?  I would be interested in hearing what yours is.  Blessings.

Sermon Christmas Day 2015

Our Gospel reading this morning is the wonderful account in the Gospel of Luke of the nativity of our Lord.  It is good to note that it is only one part of the story.   Did you notice what was missing?  It tells us of the visit by the shepherds.  But  we have to turn to the Gospel of Matthew to another part of the story—the part which includes the wise men or Magi coming from the East.  We have turned them into kings in our retelling of the story.  The Gospel of Mark, the earliest account of Jesus’ life doesn’t even have tell us of the events of the birth.  The Gospel of John takes a completely different approach.  It gives us an account which is a retelling of the creation story.  John tells us that Jesus—the Word was with God in the beginning:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. ²He was in the beginning with God. ³All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being ⁴in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. ⁵The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.

In essence, John gives us the big picture—the cosmology of the creation.  I like that because I am the type of person who likes the big picture.  I don’t do that well with details as Lorna will tell you.  John does sum up for us that is important fact that with the incarnation the Light came into the world and the darkness did not overcome it; Jesus is the Light of the World.

Whenever I hear that passage—that truth, I am reminded of the hymn that was one of my favourites when I was growing up—Jesus Bid Us Shine:

Jesus bids us shine with a clear, pure light

Like a little candle burning in the night;

In this world of darkness, we must shine,

You in your small corner, and I in mine.

That hymn resonated with me when I was young.  It resonated with me because it affirmed my desire to be in my small safe corner.  I was and am a strong introvert.  I found the world to be in many ways a big, mysterious place that I had trouble figuring out how to be in.  It was much better for me to be in my own small corner where I didn’t have to try to figure out what my role was in the world.  In my small corner I could let my light shine.  However, As I grew older I discovered that in my small corner my light didn’t shine that brightly and I realized I had to come out of my small corner and be in the world. 

Out of my small corner, I discovered that the light of my candle could join with other lights and become a much bigger light that will enlighten the world.  There is a movie made a long time ago—in 1940—that I saw on TV when I was young that illustrates.  

The movie, Young Tom Edison starring Mickey Rooney.  It is, as the title suggests, the story of the life of the young Thomas Edison the inventor.  In one scene Tom’s mother is very ill and needs an operation to save her.  The old country doctor says he can’t operate because there is not enough light in the home (there were no hospitals in the area and the only source of light in the home was oil lamps.  Tom, being the inventive young man he was, realizes he can solve the problem.  He breaks into the general store and steals a full length mirror.  He sets it up in the dining room and places all the oil lamps in front of it.  The mirror focuses the disparate light from all the lamps and reflects one brilliant light onto the table where the doctor is able to operate on his mother.  Of course she is saved and little Mickey—sorry Tom— is the hero. 

I don’t know if this story is a true event in the life of Thomas Edison but it contains the capital t Truth just as the nativity stories of Matthew and Luke and John contain the Truth of Jesus Christ.  Jesus Christ is the light of the world.  We each can light our little candles in our small corners.  However, if we come together as the Church, the body of Christ our lights will join together and be reflected through the mirror of Jesus Christ.  That light will be the light of Christ and will enlighten the world. 

As it says in the Gospel of Matthew, “You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid”.  Let us be the light of the world and let our lights so shine that the world knows that Jesus Christ, the Light of the World is born today.  Hallelujah.