I viewed Chagall's "White Crucifixion" at the Art institute of Chicago during the Parliament of the World's Religions in August 2023.Having dedicated myself to “contemplative life” since I was twenty-two years old, I still wrestle with the question of whether, when it comes to social and political action, contemplation is simply out of the picture. Lately I’ve been thinking that “out of the picture” can mean different things. It can mean “irrelevant.” As presidential advisor Stephen Miller...
When I lived in Nova Scotia, midwinter meant frozen water buckets at Nova Nada Hermitage: our wood stoves and inadequate insulation in our lakeside hermitages failed to prevent water buckets from forming a layer of ice. And yes, they were indoors. The buckets were in our hermitages because we had no running water in the winter. We took water from lovely old rock-lined wells. Later in Crestone, Colorado, winters were much colder than in Nova Scotia. But thank goodness our hermitages were new,...
I am sorting and evaluating decades of my writings. It’s encouraging and embarrassing to look back! But certain threads persist, fibers of what William Blake called a “golden string” that, as we wind it up through our lives, leads us to glory, to “heaven’s gate.”We celebrated one of those threads on February 2, the Feast of the Presentation. That is halfway between winter solstice and spring equinox. And around that time, I entered monastic life in 1975. Fifty-one years ago! I took the name...
A recent article by Lynn Casteel Harper on the Commonweal magazine...
One evening in the early 1980s in a log lodge at Nova Nada Hermitage in Nova Scotia,...
In summer, mesquite pods and Saguaro fruit husks cover the Sonoran desert floor. Symbols of desert fecundity, they even litter city and suburban yards where locals tend these native plants. You can read about this special season in Tessa’s post from two years ago when we harvested Saguaro fruit, guided by...
We are six months into the year, and I’m...
My friend Adam Bucko has written a beautiful reflection on our human capacity to imagine a way of life that revolves around solidarity instead of capital. He describes ours as a world “where profit overrides life.” As I grow older, I feel this more keenly. I have made very little profit in my life. I was a volunteer for thirty years. So now,...
In 1980, Poland's Solidarity movement became the first labor union in Soviet bloc countries. The "Solidarność" banner became iconic. In November 2024 United States citizens elected a president who relishes chaos and vengeance. My anguish over the suffering this administration’s wrecking crew inflicts leads me...
In the torpor of Tucson’s summer heat, it can be hard to think. I walk or bike along the Santa Cruz River at dawn, or even shoot hoops in the park. Then I hole up and focus on survival as temperatures soar. But here are three book reflections and some thoughts that simmer in my heat-muddled...