Good Friday Journey 1 – “Looking Front”

"My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going.

I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain 

where it will end. Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that 

I think I am following Your will does not mean that I am 

actually doing so. 

...

I will trust You always though I may seem to be lost and in the 

shadow of death. I will not fear, for You are ever with me, and

You will never leave me to face my perils alone." 

Thomas Merton, 

Thoughts in Solitude

Reading Thomas Merton's prayer reminded me of the journey Kim and I took on Good Friday afternoon on  April 6, 2012. It was the most perilous drive I've done. Thomas Merton also traveled the same road to the Monastery of Christ in the Desert in 1968. His travel then would have been even more treacherous than the one we took. I imagine him writing the prayer above as he reflected on his journey to the Monastery. 

Glenn Dixon, a Canadian linguist, writes that in Aymara, a language spoken by about two million people in southern Bolivia and Peru, the past is spoken of as being in front and the future is thought to be behind. "We already know the past, we have lived it, and therefore we see it in front of us. It's in full view. The future, though, is unknown. it can't be seen and therefore is behind us, unseen and unknown." (Pilgrim in the Place of Words, pp. 212-4) I share the following images of the journey as I "look front" and experience once again what I saw on that day.

There are times in life when we don't want to "look front."  Thomas Merton's prayer reminds me that our faith journey is to look front knowing that God has never left us and will never leave us to face our perils alone.  

What do you see as you "look front"?

Imagine a sunny day driving in a lonely desert not really knowing for certain where or how your journey will end.  The photos I took are taken from a driver's seat.  So if you don't see much at the bottom of an image, it is because there was nothing much between the car tires and the precipice! 

Monastery of Christ in the Desert, Abiquiu, New Mexico

http://christdesert.org/

Monastery of Christ in the Desert, Abiquiu, New Mexico - video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U5YY684ZXDE&feature=player_embedded#!

Silence

"[One] who is capable not only of crying out but also of listening will hear the answer. Silence is the answer. ... [One] who is capable not only of listening but also of loving hears this silence as the word of God.

The speech of created beings is with sounds, The word of God is silence. God's secret word of love can be nothing but silence. Christ is the silence of God."

Simone Weil

Silence.

I didn’t know that silence was one of the things I was searching for when I was planning for my journey to Ghost Ranch. I planned for the desert experience – experience of seeking sacred beauty by searching for the images of desolation and renewal in the desert – but I had no idea that silence would be a major part of experiencing sacred beauty in the desert.

Silence – intermittently connected by sounds of wind, birds, and flowing water – was one of the most profound experiences I had in the desert. Desert offered me a gift of silence within me as well. Each passing day and night enfolded me with the silence of the desert. It was as though the noise I have been carrying in my heart and mind was being dissolved and cleansed by the great silence of the desert.

Silence of the desert accompanied Kim and I as we hiked the round trip of 4 miles to Box Canyon in Ghost Ranch. With each step the noise in my head and heart was dissolved as the beauty of the desert enfolded us.

I saw dried up leaves and withered branches of trees along the way. Trees perched up on the rock on top of the canyon showed me that the energy for life is stronger than the force of death. There was an eagle's nest perched way up on the canyon wall. There was a small patch of beautiful red plants on the canvas of the brown desert, showing me that life flourishes in different colours.

The trail through the desert and the rocky valley eventually led us to the box of the canyon. I saw water silently seeping through the canyon wall forming a small pond at the foot of the canyon. That pond became a source of a stream of water that would nourish the parched desert along its path. The scenery reminded me of Moses striking a rock for water in the desert as he and his people journeyed to find the land God promised.

I laid down at the foot of the canyon wall to be embraced by the beauty and silence of the canyon. I let go of the remaining noise I carried to that sacred place. Any place can be a holy place when you encounter silence and let it enfold you.

My journey on Wednesday, April 11, 2012 also represents a microcosm of my life journey with Kim. I am thankful for her willingness to accompany me in silence as well as for her wisdom of knowing when to break that silence. She also provides me a sense of scale of challenges and blessings in my life the way her presence at the foot of Box Canyon in one of the photos indicates the grand scale of where we were standing. We, two human beings, travelling to the box of the canyon, were two tiny creatures in that corner of the ecosystem. I am grateful that Kim was able to accompany me on this part of my sabbatical journey. We will be reflecting for a long time on our journey to and from the desert and on the experiences of sacred silence we found there. 

Here is my pictorial account of my journey on Wednesday, April 11, 2012. The images represent the world seen in and through silence of the desert and the silence within me. I invite you to let go of the noise in your life and enter into silence as you see the images I encountered in Ghost Ranch, Abiquiu, New Mexico.

Desert awakened me to silence. Desert reminded me what I have been craving for in my life and ministry. My brief sojourn in the desert of New Mexico provided me with an opportunity to reacquaint myself with silence as the sacred presence of the divine Word. 

Max Picard, a theologian, wrote the following words on silence:

“There is also more silence in one person than can be used in a single human life. That is why every human utterance is surrounded by mystery. The silence in a [person] stretches out beyond a single human life. In this silence [one] is connected with past and future generations." 

• How do we recognize the need of silence in our communal conversations in life and ministry? 
• How do we seek and encounter silence as God's secret word of love? 
• How comfortable are we in carrying silence within our life? 
• How do we share that divine silence, the word of God, with those we encounter in life? 

I offer these questions as I share the images of sunset I photographed on my sabbatical journey in the desert of New Mexico. 

In the evening, while Kim was deeply immersed in Hebrew Scriptures, I waited for the sunset on top of the mesa. I received the sunset with gratitude as the day was ending with a display of brilliant colours.

These are some of my thoughts I wrote down on my journal on that evening. 

"Ministry is about carrying people in my heart.  ...

I am grateful that I, too, am being carried in so many people’s hearts.  ...  

I picture each person from KRU and I send each of them the vast silence of God

as blessings from the desert.  ...  And, I am grateful."

*   *   *

* Words of Simone Weil and Max Picard are from Gregory Wolfe's book, Intruding Upon the Timeless: Meditations on Art, Faith, and Mystery. Wolf's book is listed as one of the sabbatical readings in my previous blog, Books for the Sabbatical Journey.

* Hiking Trails at Ghost Ranch, Abiquiu, New Mexico - http://www.ghostranch.org/groupsmeetings/hiking-trails

Through My Own Eyes

"I am sitting here wanting memories to teach me

to see the beauty in the world through my own eyes." 

Y.M. Barnwell 

http://www.ymbarnwell.com/

By Sweet Honey in the Rock: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=EpiZ1bpGVVA

By Keali'i Reichel: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RdapAqrcuvw 

I am remembering the words written by Dr. Ysaye M. Barnwell, a vocalist with Sweet Honey in the Rock. The first time I heard her words was in Hawaii. It was through Keali'i Reichel's version of her words that helped me to understand what it is like to remember – remembering something you have never seen and yet finding it to be so familiar. Coming to Ghost Ranch is like coming back "home" you've never been or seen.

Being surrounded by the beauty of Ghost Ranch in New Mexico, a place I've never been, gives me that sense of being home.  There are so many things that are so familiar. The beauty of the earth.

I am sitting by a window looking at Cerro Pedemal, a volcanic mountain that erupted many years ago. Rio Chama (Chama River) meanders through the dry and rugged terrain between Cerro Pedemal and Ghost Ranch.

"How can any one person own such beauty by oneself? The earth, one of the most beautiful things in life, ought to be shared by all." That was my first thought when I was driving into Ghost Ranch. Yet, the idea privatization has divided earth into so many desperate pieces, often resulting in poverty of soul and body.

I am surrounded by and overwhelmed by the beauty of the earth here in Ghost Ranch.

This is what Michael Martone, a writer, says about seeing:

"The midwestern landscape is abstract, and our response to the geology of the region might be similar to our response to the contemporary walls of paint in museums. We are forced to live in our eye."

Although Ghost Ranch is in New Mexico, Southern part of the US, Martone's words resonate with my experience of the geography of Ghost Ranch and its surrounding areas.

I am thinking that faith is our attempt "to live in our eye" so we can recognize each and every thing we encounter as sacred beauty. Our faith is like "wanting memories to teach [us] to see the beauty in the world through [our] own eyes."

Here are some of the beauty I have been surrounded by since my arrival here in Ghost Ranch.