The Sacredness of Time

As 2020 draws to a close and a new year opens before us, I’d like to offer some words that invite us to reflect on the sacredness of time. This year has been so hard, in ways unimaginable to us at the start of it: deepening climate crisis with both drenching rains and severe drought […]

December 12, 2020 by Barb Kelly
Categories: Christmas, Community, Compassion, Contemplation in Action, Contemplative Leadership, Contemplative Living, Contemplative Spirituality, Continuous Prayer, Coronavirus, Discernment, Listening, Loss, Love, Nature and spirituality, Non-duality, Pandemic, Prayer, Retreat time, Self Compassion, Service, social justice, Solitude, Spiritual Deepening, spiritual direction, spiritual discipline, spiritual growth, spirituality at work, and spirituality in community. Tags: 2020, awareness, Christmas, community, compassion, contemplation, contemplative tradition, discernment, Genesis, God, grief, grounding, healing, hope, Howard Thurman, Inspiration, Jesus, joy, leadership, listening, love, Meditation, nature, New Year's Eve, peace, prayer, presence, qadash, Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, Rabbi Heschel, Renewal, silence, spiritual growth, spiritual practice, spirituality, suffering, and trust. Formats: Friday Blog. Interest Areas: Friday Blog.

Let This Light Grow in Us

Let it grow in us, this light, let it grow in all of our hearts, the light of our love for one another, let it grow and get stronger, let it not be dimmed but increased, becoming ever more radiant, reaching out to enfold all the people who need its blessing so badly. Let it […]

December 12, 2020 by ANITA DAVIDSON 2 Comments
Categories: Christmas, Community, Compassion, Contemplation in Action, Contemplative Leadership, Contemplative Living, Contemplative Reading, Contemplative Spirituality, Continuous Prayer, Loss, Love, Nature and spirituality, Pandemic, Prayer, Self Compassion, Spiritual Deepening, spiritual discipline, spiritual growth, and spirituality in community. Tags: awareness, Christmas, Christmas Star, community, compassion, contemplation, contemplative tradition, dark and light, earth, God, grounding, healing, hope, Inspiration, Jesus, joy, light, listening, love, Meister Eckart, nature, peace, prayer, presence, spiritual growth, spiritual practice, spirituality, Steven Charleston, suffering, trust, and Winter Solstice. Interest Areas: Friday Blog.

Celebrating the Triduum Together While Apart

Holy Thursday begins the Triduum—time set apart to reflect on the meaning of events from the Last Supper to the Resurrection, not only in the lives of Jesus and his disciples, but also in the Paschal Mystery unfolding in our lives. Following the great tradition observed by generations of Christians, we gather to commemorate these […]

April 04, 2020 by Mary van Balen
Categories: Community, Compassion, Contemplation in Action, Contemplative Living, Contemplative Spirituality, Continuous Prayer, Covid-19 Easter, Lent, Listening, Loss, Love, Non-duality, Personal Spiritual Deepening, Prayer, Retreat time, Self Compassion, Service, Spiritual Deepening, spiritual direction, spiritual discipline, spiritual growth, spirituality in community, and Triduum. Tags: awareness, community, compassion, contemplation, contemplative tradition, Covid-19 Easter, God, grounding, hope, Inspiration, Jesus, joy, listening, love, Meditation, peace, prayer, presence, religion, retreat, Service, silence, solitude, spiritual growth, spiritual practice, spirituality, suffering, Triduum, and trust. Formats: Friday Blog. Interest Areas: Friday Blog.

Finding Hope

Today’s blog is by Mary van Balen People long for hope, for peace, for cooperation. While some are bent on stirring up distrust, and spreading fear based on dividing the world into “us” and “them,” most of humankind is looking for a better way in 2020. Many I talked with over the holidays desire an […]

January 01, 2020 by Mary van Balen
Categories: Community, Compassion, Contemplation in Action, Contemplative Living, Contemplative Spirituality, Continuous Prayer, Love, Prayer, Self Compassion, Spiritual Deepening, spiritual growth, and spirituality in community. Tags: awareness, community, compassion, contemplation, God, grounding, hope, Inspiration, joy, love, prayer, spiritual growth, and spirituality. Formats: Friday Blog. Interest Areas: Friday Blog.

What Holding A Newborn Can Teach Us About God’s Amazing Love

Today’s blog is by Tom Adams Sometimes I find it very difficult to appreciate and accept how much God loves me and you. The world seems kind of gloomy; my own and others’ imperfections seem to shout at me. Other times I get a glimpse of the tenderness and sweetness of God’s love and am […]

December 12, 2019 by Thomas Adams
Categories: Community, Compassion, Contemplation in Action, Contemplative Living, Love, Parenthood, Personal Spiritual Deepening, Prayer, Self Compassion, spiritual growth, and spirituality in community. Tags: awareness, children, compassion, contemplation, God, Inspiration, joy, listening, love, Meditation, parenting, peace, presence, and spirituality. Formats: Friday Blog. Interest Areas: Friday Blog.

Learning To Sit With Not Knowing

Today’s Special Video Blog is by Carrie Newcomer, the recipient of Shalem’s 2019 Contemplative Voices Award on October 27! “Learning To Sit With Not Knowing” from “The Point of Arrival”   “Abide” by Carrie Newcomer and Parker Palmer from “A Permeable Life”   “Room At The Table” from “A Permeable Life”

October 10, 2019 by Carrie Newcomer
Categories: Community, Contemplation in Action, Contemplative Leadership, Contemplative Living, Contemplative Spirituality, Contemplative Voices Award, inspirational music, Love, Nature and spirituality, Prayer, Self Compassion, Spiritual Deepening, spiritual growth, and spirituality in community. Tags: art, awareness, Carrie Newcomer, community, compassion, contemplation, grounding, Inspiration, joy, listening, love, music, nature, parker palmer, peace, prayer, spiritual growth, spirituality, and trust. Formats: Friday Blog. Interest Areas: Friday Blog.

A Beautiful Soul

Today’s blog is by Ernest Yau. “The meaning of earthly existence lies not, as we have been used to thinking, in prospering… but in the development of the soul.” (Alexander Solzhenitsyn) As I gaze at him, every inch an ordinary man, I spot something extraordinary: an alive body, a surrendering mind and a loving heart. […]

September 09, 2019 by ernest yau
Categories: Community, Contemplation in Action, Contemplative Leadership, Contemplative Living, Contemplative Spirituality, Love, Prayer, Self Compassion, Spiritual Deepening, spirituality at work, and spirituality in community. Tags: children, compassion, contemplation, God, Inspiration, Jesus, joy, love, prayer, and spirituality. Formats: Friday Blog. Interest Areas: Friday Blog.

“As we discover more joy, we can face suffering in a way that ennobles rather than embitters. We have hardship without becoming hard. We have heartache without being broken.”

-Desmond Tutu

Categories: Loss and Love. Tags: desmond tutu and joy. Formats: Monday Moment and Quote.

When was the last time you danced?

~Question put to the sick
by a
Native American medicine man

danced

Categories: Body Prayer. Tags: dance, dancing, joy, and Native American. Formats: Monday Moment and Quote.

Sighing Through Song

Today’s post is by Jeff Nelson It’s different for everyone, yet all know this experience. A woman driving home after receiving good news at work finds an uplifting song on the radio that speaks to her newfound joy. A man back from a hard visit with his mother in the nursing home starts his Spotify […]

August 08, 2016 by Jeff Nelson 1 Comment
Categories: Body Prayer, Clergy & Congregation, Contemplation in Action, Contemplative Living, Loss, and Love. Tags: joy, lament, music, song, and Thomas Merton. Formats: Article and Friday Blog. Interest Areas: Friday Blog.