It is the last day of May and my children are scampering through the sprinklers. It is like miracle, to be this lovely and warm so early in the sunny season. It feels as though the whole city is breathing a sigh of relief and sinking back into the lawn furniture, which they’ve only just now got brave enough to pull out from the basement to expose to the elements.

It’s Monkfish Abbey night –which, for those of you reading this post on my Magpie Girl site—is a small house church/spiritual growth community that we’ve hosted for several years now. The RSVP’s for this week have been trickling in and our numbers are teeny tiny. The summer siren song … {read more…}

Recently I had lunch with a bunch of visiting pastors and rabbis from the eastern seaboard. One of the women was a Unitarian minister with a jones for Jesus. When I described Monkfish Abbey, she wrote down the “rule” of her congregation. I like it so much, I’m giving it to you here:

“Love is the doctrine of this church.
The quest for turth is our sacrament,
and service is our prayer.
To dwell together in peace,
and to help one another in fellowship is our deep desire,
that all shall grow into harmony with the Divine.”

How does that work for you?

Two fabulous Sara Vowell quotes to be loved by pomo’s everywhere…

“The flight between questions is a workable system”

The week before Mother’s Day we did this meditation at Monkfish Abbey. I’m interested in trying to capture images that speak to the feminine aspects of God, and this was our attempt at retrieving our foremother’s knowledge, lost to us when only men became the scribes. (Read a little more about that here.) The really interesting visualization phrases are about two-thirds of the way down, so scroll down if you only have time to read that bit.

This led us to have a very interesting conversation about gender, and God, and self-identity. I wish I could have recorded it all and just podcast it here. My dear monkity monks are stunningly insightful. I feel privlidged to be exploring with … {read more…}

I hosted a time of healing for the monks a couple of weeks ago. I still feel like it’s very brave of me to do things like this. Even though I’ve been doing them off and on for a couple of years now. Even though they are usually well received. I have to gather all my energy and concentration to walk people through this kind of meditative work without feeling (and sounding) like a flibbertigibbet. (Which is actually what I am best at, flibberdigibbeting.) At any rate, I thought I’d post the basic outline of what I did, in case it appeals to anyone else out there.

Note: I used special “facial massage stones” which I paid a ridiculous amount … {read more…}