“And the Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness. He was in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan; and he was with the wild beasts; and the angels waited on him.”

The Spirit drove Jesus into the wilderness. This was no limo ride with plush seats and oversized windows. This drive feels more like a can of hydrogen strapped to His body, propelling Him forward. Immediately. Now.

Iʼve been driven, dragged, and disciplined into Lent. I donʼt get a limo either.   I remember Lents when it felt like I was driven by an old rattletrap car, like the Studebaker Lark I drove the summer after my freshman year in college. It leaked oil and often overheated. The ride was slow, worrisome, and given to frequent stops and re-starts.

There were too many years when I was driven by a self-improvement list that was longer than a five-year-oldʼs letter to Santa. I have had years when the drive resembled a carousel, round and round and going nowhere.  While we are in the amusement park,
I can see the roller coaster drive too, lots of ups and downs with great relief as it comes to an end.

I have been driven into the Lenten wilderness by the mournful bugle call of “Taps.”  Someone or something has died and I am lost, sad, and alone. The dark welcomes me.  It is just what my soul needs.

I have even scheduled my own ride into the wilderness, like a taxi that picks me up for an early morning flight. I know I have decisions to make or demons to meet or fears to challenge. As Ash Wednesday approaches I reconsider, but the cab is on its way and I canʼt find the phone number to cancel. As I enter the wild, I slowly get out, pay the fare, and watch my cab turn into a pumpkin. No escape now.

Once I am in the wilderness, I start to notice signs of new life. Little green shoots appear under decaying leaves, rotting tree trunks, or lingering snow. As my soul adjusts, I sense new life elsewhere. The buds on the branches swell, the birds call for a mate, the streams gather melting waters. The winds bring fresh smells of renewal.

None of us escape time in the wilderness. It doesnʼt always match the liturgical season; it isnʼt often convenient. Sometimes we are accompanied by others. Sometimes we go alone. We do know since the Spirit is driving, the Spirit is with us, just as the Spirit waswith Jesus. I wonder how the Spirit will drive me into the wilderness this year. How might the Spirit be driving you?

Mary Lou Logsdon companions people through their wilderness times in spiritual direction. She also leads retreats focused on liturgical seasons and other topics. She can be reached at logsdon.marylou@gmail.com or 651-583-1802.

For many years, I lived with the happy illusion that in my spiritual journey I would arrive at a place where I could take off my walking shoes, slide my feet into slippers, and coast.   The reality is that I have had to re-soul my walking shoes time and time again.

Back in the day when I first made the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius, I experienced the call of Jesus (formally known as the Call of the Kingdom).   In retrospect, I see that I made a choice to answer that call.  I just wasn’t aware that my journey would be so internal and downward. In the Spiritual Exercises, St. Ignatius encouraged me to make a radical shift in my thinking about who I was and what my purpose on earth would be.  The call to follow the path of Jesus is all about doing that.

Among the many ways St. Ignatius invited me to commune with my God was through the prayer of imagination.  The prayer started out with me entering into a stairwell.  If I had been in charge of this prayer, I would have created a grand staircase leading up to the gates of heaven.  Instead, this stairwell was very industrial looking and was descending.   I hesitated at the top of that stairwell.  It didn’t look very inviting, but the image kept coming to take the journey, so I finally accepted. After all, I did have my walking shoes on.  The stairwell had about seven steps down, a landing, and seven more steps.   So I began.

I could see each step as I began, and I was able to arrive at the first landing without mishap.  A piece of cake, I thought.  Oh, there was some clutter on the first landing, but I could step over it.  Being brave, I started the second set of stairs down. Now I found the second level of stairs not as well lit.  I wasn’t as confident of my footing.  I was given the inspiration of taking a flashlight to assist me.  I have this nice little flashlight that I thought would be all I needed.  But the second flight of stairs had much more clutter and my little flashlight just wasn’t much help.  Did I really want to continue this dangerous journey?  I looked back up the stairwell and I could see Jesus standing at the top.  I asked him if he had a bigger flashlight that could assist me.  He smiled and said he did.  In fact, he had a searchlight, as well as a broom and dustpan.  So, with Jesus lighting the way, I have continued this journey downward into the depth of my soul, sweeping, clearing.

In answering the call of Christ, I have discovered the inner work that leads me deeper into my soul and deeper into the heart of my God calls for surrender, discovering my true worth, and relishing in my gifts and graces.  The work of sweeping and clearing continues as well.  Each landing of the internal stairwell brings new challenges, new awareness, and a deeper love for my God.

And so the journey continues.

Maggie Klaers holds a bachelor’s degree in Psychology, and a certificate in spiritual direction from the College of St. Catherine’s Masters of Theology program. Maggie has directed for Sacred Ground since 2000.  She is on the teaching staff for the Spiritual Direction Formation Program.  She can be reached at mlklaers@frontiernet.net

“There is a vitality, a life force, an energy, a quickening, that is translated through you into action, and because there is only one of you in all time, this expression is unique.  And if you block it, it will never exist through any other medium and will be lost.”  —  Martha Graham (1894-1991)

From perhaps fourth or fifth grade, I felt drawn to priesthood as a possible vocation, and, after high school, I attended seminary for four undergraduate years.  Then I decided to change course:  I received a Master’s degree and a license to teach.  “Knowing how way leads on to way,” as Robert Frost writes, I went on to work over three decades in many educational positions and at various levels, with my “way” leading eventually to retirement after a wide-ranging career in education.

A couple years later, a new feeling began to stir inside—well, perhaps it was not exactly new.  What I once again felt moving in my soul was a “calling,” but whereas before I had felt a call to minister as a Roman Catholic priest, now I sensed being called to another kind of ministry.  To determine whether this new calling was authentic, I enrolled in Sacred Ground’s Spiritual Director Formation program in 2006, then struggled mightily with, but eventually yielded gratefully to, the discernment process, and in May 2011, was certified as a spiritual director/companion.

The meaning I’ve made from my own journey is this:  I re-discovered—or, more precisely, reclaimed—that much earlier calling:  to be of service to people as they discern where God is moving in their lives.  While the speaker of Frost’s poem says, “I doubted if I should ever come back [to that first road],” I did return, “and that has made all the difference.”

At the same time, need I ask why over forty years passed by before I answered what I am convinced was/is the Call of the Spirit?  No, because I know that God is patient, and that perhaps God’s was a steady, forty-year calling that God waited for me to hear and accept.  Also, God wastes nothing, including my experience as an educator.  When I began to serve as a director-in-training, my “way” took me to launch a practice I called The Journey Within, through which I led spirituality groups focused on spiritual practices.  In facilitating the groups at my church, I blended together talents in teaching and in spiritual companioning.

Then, last fall I was invited to co-facilitate Exploring Your Spiritual Path, a new offering at Sacred Ground.  Deb LeMay and I have been inviting the participants to enter into EYSP as an on-going retreat.  This is a challenge to me.  On my own—and I noticed this especially during my journey through the Ignatian Exercises—I can walk away from experiencing God and move towards learning about God.  While I realize I don’t have to choose between my mind and my spirit, I understand from my history that hiding in my head with theology or “God information” is a barrier to being with God in prayer and silence, with my heart open and available.

Barbara Brown Taylor observes, “People don’t want more information about God.  They want more God.”  So while I am a licensed educator, in EYSP my goal is not to teach (or teach about) spiritual practices; I wish instead to present participants opportunities for discerning how they might rest in the Holy.  Of course there is “presentation” of the practices, but even in the presenting, a wise facilitator models with the humility and freshness of “a beginner’s mind.”  And for the participants, the invitation always is to engage with the practices:  participants “try them on” and discern which practices feed their relationship with God, and also recognize that practices they (we!) resist are sometimes where the Spirit is leading.

Maybe you are asking, as I am, How is it possible that John began his training at Sacred Ground in 2006, and just five years later is facilitating an on-going retreat at his alma mater?

The way I see it, this “leap” continues to be all about hearing and responding to a call—and about being that called person—rather than about anything achieved, attained, or accomplished.  As my own spiritual director regularly challenges me, “John, are you a human being or a human doing?”  My role, I believe, is about being rather than striving, which is another way of saying, the call is grace, and offering a response to the call is due to more grace still.  And the grace of the call, of course, is pure gift.

In my life’s journey, I have indeed observed that way leads on to way, and that so very much of the path forward is grace-full.  But I’ve also noticed something else.  Discovering one’s purpose or vocation or bliss is about persistence and clear seeing and, ultimately, cultivating a heart that IS open and available.  Oh, yes…and also, as Martha Graham notes, answering a call is about claiming one’s vitality, translating one’s life force into action, uniquely expressing one’s energy, and saying yes to—instead of resisting or blocking—one’s soul.  What a gift this journey is!

John Pikala received his spiritual direction certification from Sacred Ground.  Through his ministry, The Journey Within, John offers group and individual spiritual companioning, leads retreats, facilitates spirituality groups, meets with people in Twelve Step recovery, receives Fifth Steps, and teaches at Sacred Ground.  Contact him at onipickle1@aol.com

Ever since I was a child, I have liked to swim. I loved being outdoors in the fresh air, and delighting in the colors of the bright blue sky and the deep green of the pine trees. The water always invited lots of play—running, splashing, jumping, diving. I felt fully alive as a child.

I remember one late afternoon dozing off on the beach under the shade of my beloved pines. As I slowly awakened, everything seemed so still and yet so alive. I first noticed the softness of the light as the sun was just beginning to descend. The summer colors were so vibrant, and I heard the sweet songs of the birds as they sat perched in the trees. The waves quietly lapped up onto the shore. I had a child’s experience of being embraced by God’s all-surrounding presence. All was right and lovely in my world.

Fast forward many years to midlife, and I found myself asking, “Where did the play go? What about that feeling of being fully alive?” Around that time, I was beginning my studies in the Spiritual Direction Formation Program at Sacred Ground. Early in the program, I came across a quote by St. Irenaeus: “The Glory of God is man fully alive.” I was so drawn to those words, and so much wanted to recapture that way of being fully alive in this world – the playful, joyful, spontaneous spirit that felt so natural to me as a child. It now seemed a mystery to me as how to regain that playful, fully alive spirit.

While in the Formation Program, I began to see how small my God was – judging, keeping track, thinking in black and white, conditional in love and approval. Through the program, and sessions with my dear spiritual director, my God grew, and grew, and grew, and grew. God became complete acceptance, all-forgiving, unconditional love, and has the most amazing gaze of delight. God delights in me, laughs and plays with me. As God became bigger, gentler, kinder, I became freer—free to be me, fully alive in God’s embrace.

Slowing down, inviting silence, and meditating are ways that nourish my new found freedom, and keep me fully alive. There are many ways to meditate and one of the ways I like to meditate is to swim. As I move through the various front and back strokes during my laps, I give time and focus to each of my senses: sight, sound, smell, taste, touch. I feel buoyed up by God’s all-surrounding presence.

Recently, as I was getting out of the pool, a swimmer in the lane next to me said with a smile, “You make swimming look like play.” I smiled back and said, “You don’t know how much your words mean to me. Thank you!”

All is right and lovely in my world.

As swimmers dare

to lie face to the sky

and water bears them,
as hawks rest upon air
and air sustains them,
so would I learn to attain
freefall, and float
into Creator Spirit’s deep embrace,
knowing no effort earns
that all-surrounding grace.

—Denise Levertov

Catherine Tautges is a certified spiritual director through Sacred Ground.  She has a long history in the health care industry.  Currently, Catherine provides spiritual direction and professional life coaching.

It was 1980, and a typical day at work, when I received a call that my dad was going to need open heart surgery.  I felt a wave of shock move through me.  ”How could this be?” I thought.  He was only fifty-three years old, and I was twenty-four.  I wondered what I could give or do to help my dad.

I pondered this question as I walked through Rosedale looking for something meaningful, some small gesture that would tell him how much I loved him and how deeply I cared.  A small plaque caught my attention.  It had a small human figure holding a heart in its hands.  It was offering the heart outward with a gesture, and had the words, “I give my heart to you.”  Immediately I thought this would be a meaningful gift.

When my dad was at Miller Hospital after his surgery, I presented this plaque to him.  In his profound wisdom, he signed and dated the back of it, and wrote, “From heart to heart, with best wishes and good luck.”  He then passed it on to the next person who was recovering from open heart surgery.

It was nine years after the first surgery that my dad needed a second open heart surgery.  I reflected back on the gift I had given him nine years earlier.  When I was visiting him at St Luke’s Hospital, I told the nurse about this plaque.  She looked at me with amazement, and said she knew where it was, then offered to go get it.  She came back carrying the plaque and presented it to my dad and me.  We read in amazement all the names of the people who had signed and dated the back, passing on their best wishes to the next person in the recovery room.

It had been carefully moved when Miller and St Luke’s hospitals merged to form United Hospital.  Eventually, it was hanging on the wall near the front of the cardiac unit.

My father and I were very surprised and delighted to see and experience this gesture of the heart coming full circle.

It’s been over fifteen years since my dad’s passing, and, as I ponder this event, I feel gratitude for sharing this heartfelt experience, and a deep sense of wonder for how the mystery of God’s work continues to unfold through the language of the heart.

Laurel Breustedt is a Healing Touch Spiritual Ministry practitioner.  You may reach her directly at laurel.b@usfamily.net

So much speculation about 2012.  The ancient Mayan calendar predicts doomsday.  The fundamentalists talk about the rapture.  The New Agers call it a shift to a higher consciousness.  So what is it really?  I don’t think anyone really knows for sure, but it’s hard not to notice that something is going on.

Whether it’s the global economy, the weather, or political mayhem, most people would probably say that they are being affected by these changes on a personal level.  So why all the angst?  My guess is it’s because we don’t like change.  Who does?  It’s uncomfortable, it’s weird, and it’s just plain annoying to not know the future.

Whatever it is that is going on, however, I like to think that we as people are being called to live more deeply.  What does this mean?  I think this means something different to everyone.  For me, it means to let go of things.  Things that may have been important once but just aren’t anymore.  A deeper trust in what is going on right now, and responding to it with affection rather than anxiety.

I remember when my kids were babies, I couldn’t wait for them to walk.  And then when they did, I wished they were babies again.  Next, I couldn’t wait for them to talk in full sentences and then when they did, I wished them right back to silence.  Now that they are teenagers, I find myself looking forward to them being self-sufficient and independent, yet wondering how I will feel when they leave home and start their own lives.

I guess it will continue to be a mystery until I experience it for myself.  That seems to be the theme I go back to as I anticipate 2012 and the years that follow.  Accept the mystery that lies ahead while relishing in that which is going on right now.  Grieving that which was and anticipating the graceful movements that lie ahead.

I never think this kind of letting go and letting bewill be easy but then again holding on to the past has never served me well, either.  So is it new life or holding onto to things that are no longer fruitful?  I hope I choose new life.  I hope I’ve learned by now that the one thing that is permanent is change and I can either fight it or roll with it.  Boy, I hope I roll with it!

How about you?   Are you going to move along gracefully or fight it every step of the way?  What might you let go of today?

I hope as a people, a country and a world, we all do our individual parts in letting go of something (anything) that no longer holds purpose.  What will that be for you?  And how might you play a role in causing a wave of global grace around the world?  Yes, I think we are that powerful.  And yes, I think it’s a conscious choice we all have to make for ourselves.

Why do the one in twenty stop and give?   When I asked, “Why did you stop to give?”  almost always the answer had something to do with gratitude.  One lady holding her Starbuck’s answered, “This warm coffee was so good I just wanted to share with those who don’t have anything warm.”  Another gaunt lady said, “I have enough now but I have slept under bridges.”   When I thanked an arthritic grandmother for hobbling over to give, she answered, “I want to help because we too have a family member without work.”   She’d miraculously turned family pain into compassion.  An eighty-four year old Korean vet unable to walk came riding up on his cart with an American flag and a Santa hat.  For him, this giving was nothing special.  “I gave two years in Korea, was always cold, but came home while my buddies didn’t.”   His smile said how happy he was that he was alive to give the thirty-five cents he could dig out of his pocket to keep someone alive and warm.

Best of all was a grizzled, gray African-American who passed me by and then whirled around and returned.  I asked, ‘Why did you come back to give?”

“The Lord told me to!”

“What did he say?”

“Say?  Not say, it what he DONE for me.”

“What did he do for you?”

“He done give me EVERYTHING I have.”  This man gave me everything he had — two quarters and a smile that stretched off his face to embrace those twenty feet away.  They gave too.

Gratitude is infectious and I fed the kettle too.   All the givers taught me that Christ comes not when I dutifully give gifts but each day when I gratefully remember “He done give me EVERYTHING I have.”

So why did I stop to give three hours at 7 a.m.?   The times I had less, have left me grateful.   Last year I lived mostly on rice and beans for a month while ministering to those in the Dominican Republic who often had only rice.   Living alone in our empty novitiate with neither heat nor community made me grateful for a roof over my head and friends that I had taken for granted but now needed.   So this Christmas it’s the times for which I am not so grateful that make me grateful and remembering, “He done give me EVERYTHING I have!”

There is a comfort in the dark.  It requires little.  The once abundant garden lies dormant, the grass is coated in crystals, the remaining blooms are bent by snow’s first layer.  The dark calls me, like a familiar friend who knows me a little too well.

The darkness draws me toward the fireplace.  I find a book, a favorite song, a well-worn wrap and I relax into the low light of the flame.  The darkness leads me to the kitchen where I dig out yellowed recipes that are as familiar as the narratives that accompany them.  It is these cooking directions that bring the aromas of this season–cinnamon, roasting meats, chocolate, breads.

Into this darkness I bring my Christmas tree, cover it with small lights that shine brightly in the early dusk hours.  I dress the tree in story-bearing ornaments–friends’ gifts, my mother’s handiwork, creations of children now grown.  The lit tree gives an aura of festivity.  I invite friends and family to share the dark, to join with me to celebrate our stories, our connections, our promise and hope for a future that will outlast the darkness.

The gift of darkness is that I can see even the dimmest of light so clearly.  No wonder we of the north celebrate our great feast of the Incarnation at the darkest time of the year.  It is the light of hope and wonder, and our God does not want us to miss it.

“The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light.” (Is 9:2)

Mary Lou Logsdon explores the light and the dark in her spiritual direction practice and retreat leadership in the Twin Cities.  She has an MA in Theology and a certificate in Spiritual Direction from St Catherine University.  She can be reached at logsdon.marylou@gmail.com.

I’ve come to appreciate Advent as a time to embrace my slowness.  It really doesn’t matter where I am or what I am doing, because I will process, gestate, and wait forever, if necessary. I can’t remember a time when I wasn’t like this.   The biggest problem for me–any time, not just during Advent–is to manifest something or to actually get something done!  The holidays are a true testimony to this, because while it might be a mild sprint for the Marthas of the world, it’s an endless marathon for a Mary-natured gal like myself.  For example:

• Baking cookies–a grand idea but it would require planning and scheduling, which, quite frankly, would take the fun out of it, so why bother?  I’d rather just savor those delivered to me by friends and family.
• Sending packages to family and friends.  Again, nice idea but there is an imposed post office deadline of 12/15 to guarantee Christmas delivery.  Besides, I’d probably get lost in the wide variety of holiday stamp designs.
• Christmas cards!  My kids took over 700 photos from the back of our scooters while touring the Black Hills this summer, so I would have to sort through many buffalo and deer to find one decent shot of our family.  Talk about stimulation overload!
• Christmas decorations.  A fake tree is perfect for the Martha-challenged individual.  I simply tell the family that the decorations go up on Thanksgiving weekend, otherwise we run the risk of not getting them up at all and quite possibly give Santa the wrong impression.   So off yee go, little ones, round up those dusty boxes from the basement. Don’t mind the lingering turkey whiff and let’s get those Christmas CD’s in the daisy wheel pronto!
• Christmas shopping, yikes!

 If given the chance, I will take in everything in the store at once and then begin to ponder and explore each individual item. First, I savor the color, then the shape, then the style, and, eventually, touch the item, fabric, whatever, which starts a whole new loop of processing.  This can take hours, so if you ever actually receive a gift from me, know that it was thoroughly absorbed and reabsorbed before it was presented to you.  I never give food to anyone for this very reason.

The messier the store the better, is my motto!  Folded items don’t work for me. I’m all about the hunt.  Some may be intimidated by a big open box full of purses but not me.  At these times, my intuition goes on high alert and I will dig to the bottom of that box, even if I have to crawl in it myself, because I know there is an item in there that is just what I am looking for!

Of course, nine times out of ten, I don’t actually know what I’m looking for, but agree to like it once I find it.  And when I do, I anticipate a glowing light surrounding the item with a slight hint of Messiah’s Hallelujah Chorus playing in the background.  Who knew TJ Maxx could provide such a profound religious experience!

So how does someone like me get through the holiday season and still have time to scroll and sort through her own hundred page Amazon.com wishlist?  Having low expectations is key.  Also by embracing the month of December as the one month where it is actually acceptable, per the Virgin Mary, to not rush, and to honor the wait.  And really, why would I want to argue with that?  I just wish all holidays included an escape clause for those of us who struggle to be Marthas in a Martha world.

Vera Snow is a spiritual director, a mother, a blogger, a Mary in a Martha world.  You can reach her at vera@verasnow.com