Reflections
April’s Opulent Desert: Breathing Room
Our latest Fire and Light podcast is now available: "Breathing Room for the Spirit." We explore ways to create breathing room in a world of speed and utility. We describe a recent desert camping trip and I recite “Superbloom Toast,” the poem that appears below. Since April is National Poetry Month, we ponder the value of poetry and its...
Resurrection Superbloom
Happy Easter! Resurrection came early to the Arizona desert this year. After our winter rains and cool temperatures, we experienced a wildflower “superbloom.” And we immersed ourselves in it: luxuriant carpets of golden poppies and purple night scented stock, scorpion weed and delicate blue dicks – more lovely than their names – creamy white...
Holy Week Haiku
Photo by David Denny taken at the San Carlos Apache Reservation.
Desert Soulscape, Silence, and Poetry
Tessa Bielecki and I look forward to celebrating Easter Week with our upcoming retreat in Patagonia, Arizona. We will...
Breathing Room for the Spirit
As days lengthen and spring arrives in the Sonoran Desert, wildflower season begins. We went for a walk at nearby Sanctuary Cove and found fourteen species. My favorite is the yellow-golden Mexican poppy. We’re also planting petunias and marigolds on our porches. Tessa is a more avid and attentive gardener than I am, so her porch is...
Homeland of the Heart: The Desert and Poetry
April 14-15: Homeland of the Heart:Exploring Desert Landscape and Soulscape Cady...
Alchemy of Earth and Soul
March arrived bringing snowfall in the Sonoran Desert and the arrival of our third Fire and Light podcast: "Alchemy of Earth and Soul." Tessa rhapsodizes on the beauty of compost. She celebrates the season of Lent as alchemy: allowing the cast-off peelings, the inedible “garbage” of our lives to be transformed into fertile soil for future...
Weird Stuff I Love
All my life, I have heard the adage: “Count your blessings.” It works for me. And our friends at Grateful Living offer myriad ways to cultivate gratitude. Romanian novelist Petru Dumitriu witnessed and did some terrible deeds in his life. Yet he was still amazed by a beam of light striking a staircase or a jumble of kittens playing on a...
Blessing Candles and Celebrating John Lewis
In our second Fire and Light podcast, we explore the beauty of candlelight and the Feast of Candlemas. In honor of Black History Month we reflect on the spirituality of the late civil rights activist and congressman John Lewis. We celebrate the universal appreciation of candlelight and blessing candles in spiritual ceremonies. We suggest a...
Mother of Candlelight and Sorrow
I grew up in a Protestant family, so I learned about Roman Catholic feast days such as Candlemas when I was in college and began going on retreats at the Spiritual Life Institute’s Nada Hermitage in Sedona, Arizona. I discovered the feasts that followed Christmas and loved the reading from Isaiah that accompanied the Epiphany mass. With its...