Peace of the Dark Sacred Night

There is such beauty in the night. Too often we ignore it, brush by it, try and light it up.

What is most wonderful to do is to linger in it. To go out into its silence and breathe it in. To honor the Dark as well as the Light. To honor the traditions that celebrate this dark Beauty.

The night is also a gift. Particularly here in the country, where we don’t worry as much about the violence that hides in the night. But we cannot let them steal it from us. There is a movement dedicated to safety for women in the dark: Take Back the Night. Yes! Let us do that very thing. Honoring the very holy Dark. Honoring the Women and Men who have always honored the flow of time. Finding my place in that long river of souls that know that nature is a thing of balance and that balance is to respected.

And this night? this is a dark, dark night. No moon. The sun is late to rise and early to bed. Winternight. The Earth is getting ready for rebirth. But that’s a time away from now. Right now we have Beauty and Abundance and this Dark and Sacred Beauty.

Let us go out into the Dark in the winter and breathe in that crystalline air, rejoice in the stars. Let us simply be at Peace in the night.

Alternative Advent, December 11: 2¢ for every bar or dispenser of soap in your life. Don’t forget all the stuff under the sink, in your linen closet or in the laundry room… You thought, oh, two cents. Hah! it adds up.

Sabbaths, Cycle of Life, Peace

My morning started in Beauty. I rolled over, and there was Miz Moon shining in my window. Hello, Thanks for dropping by. Thanks for watching over us.

I’ve had a busy week, so I’m happy to consider a day at home. It’s all been wonderful. But — enough. So today, Sabbath. Reclaiming my space from the detritus of travel and finding my rhythm at home.

Starting Advent. hmmm. not set up for that, but oh so ready… This afternoon the first candle will be lit:

Advent’s first candle is Hope. As we share the dreams we harbor for our lives, our families and for the world, let us reassure the world and one another: We are called to carry Hope in our hearts. Let us be those who offer visions of a better world and who work to make those visions reality. Blessed Be.

Today is a jumble of thoughts isn’t it? Moon? Reclaiming? Advent. (Hurrah, White Christmas!!!! Favorite Christmas Movie EVER!)

And lastly, I am so grateful to do the work I do. This week, in particular, I’m grateful for the celebrations of the cycle of life. I love it all. The brand new babies. The joining of lives. The new homes. The retirements. Even the memorials.

Such Peace as we begin my favorite season. I hope there’s Peace at your house and in your heart as well.

Hearts Must Join in Peace

It is something that you and I both work for Peace. But it is not enough.

At some point, maybe points, our hearts must join and we must work together.

Our notions of Peace cannot become competing visions because then we’re not working together. Peace is a thing of joined hearts.

So we must Peace. Together and separately. We must keep our hearts open to the possibilities and the beauty of Peace. It’s hard work. but it’s the only work.

Sunrise, Sunset, Sabbath, Peace

I received a video this morning to tell me that the sunrise had been beautiful. As beautiful, it turns out as the sunset last night. And the sunset was gorgeous. (even if driving west during the sunset is a pretty lousy idea.

Ah, this earth. and this beauty.

I’m grateful that this is my Sabbath today. After the tumultuous weekend, it will be so good to gather with those who are my family of faith. Our traditions may be different, but when they’re right for us, there is that sense of coming home. And when the world is so crazy, home is central to our well-being. And so many, so many have lost all they’ve known as home.

I must admit that after the long hours on the road, I’m really looking forward to an afternoon nap as well. zzzzzz.

But enjoy the day. it’s cold but beautiful. Do those things that remind you how good it is to be alive.

Peace be with us all, my friends. Peace.

Starry, Family, Sabbath Peace

Every once in a while you should have loaner kid sitting on your couch. Not that I have my own kids, but loaner kids bring another take. If they’re nieces and nephews, there’s trust and laughing and fun things to do, so you’ve already cut through any awkwardness.

You learn a lot about each other. They get another look at adulthood. You get a dose of what’s up right now.

And then, if it’s this fabulous young woman, she reshapes your hair, goes uncomplainingly to party’s with 70 yos and to smokey bars to see a new band. She then demands you stop and take a gander the stars (she IS an evans child… my parents would be so proud! and so will her bennett/hermanson parents be!)

And the next morning, she uncomplainingly goes to church with you. That’s a niece! And a darling. Lucky Auntie.

She’s my cousin’s kid. Back when we were losing family at a fearful and awful rate, the cousins one generation down from mine were saying, our family is too small, we’re claiming one another and my generation was saying, we didn’t know one another growing up, we’re going to know one another now. We live into that every chance we get.

So, a visit from a niece. It’s a wonderful way to spend a weekend. and a great way to spend a beautiful, brisk fall Sabbath.

Enjoy the day. Today I’m celebrating the Peace of developing family. Whatever you’re celebrating I hope it’s lovely.

Brisk and Beautiful Peace

Fall. It’s just lovely. And today’s as good an example of that as any day we’ve had.

This is one of those times I want to say to folks, slow down, be careful, don’t miss this.

People start to fret about winter. How cold it’s going to be, how dark. Yes (and i admit, I embrace that — and hey, we should maybe all examine the possibility of a little more vitamin d in our lives), but winter has a purpose. and it’s beautiful.

But right now. Right this very minute, it’s fall. and it’s gorgeous. Let’s be present right now. Count today’s blessings, worry about tomorrow, tomorrow.

Pretty soon they’re going to turn back time… and maybe I’ll start getting up in the morning!

Okay. Maybe not.

But today it is beautiful. Today, I look around and am overcome with the Beauty. Today I am at Peace where I am in space and time. I hope you are too.

And Dance by the Light of the Moon

Ah the sky. It offers such delight. Eyebrows at twilight. Clouds at dawn. Stars. Oh, my. Stars. And then our beautiful Moon.

Writing about the Moon has helped me get out there to see it. To look up. Just to stand still and be in the night…

We live in this beautiful world. We need to observe it and appreciate it.

That’s the only thing that’s going to help us protect it.

Last night the strongest Hurricane ever made landfall. Extreme storms are part of global climate change. What are we going to do?

Peace is up to us. Do we want it? Maybe that’s what that cocked eyebrow was telling me.

Something Beautiful, Something Peace

“I will set my bow in the sky as a promise…” Of all the biblical pieces that have stuck, this is one. Every time I see one, I’m happy.

So to see this one, on this day…when my heart was feeling so many things — so many things that in fact I blew past my exit and took the long drive to the next exit. It was only as I was turned around, coming home, that I saw the promise.

And it was gorgeous, hidden there behind the curtain of rain.

Such a gift of beauty. And I often think of rainbows as summer pleasures part of the joy of thundershowers. Yet not an hour before, we’d had snow.

But you take Beauty and heart’s ease where you find it. You find the holy, the sacred, in the ordinary. You count those blessings when they’re there to be counted.

Peace comes in so many little gifts. Let us celebrate. Let us Peace.

Peace on the Cusp

Today the Old Moon ends and the New Moon rises. Bye and large the harvest is finished. In Canada, tomorrow will be thanksgiving, which is much more in sync with the actual harvest.

Here in Pennsylvania, the leaves are taking their own sweet time to make decisions about changing. There are just the slightest hints of color starting. However, I just looked at the thermometer and for the first time i saw that the temps had dipped into the 30s.

No, Ann, really, time to dismantle the porch that gets no light (and by light I mean warmth) this year.

But I stood outside a barn yesterday (it was a wedding, relax, I wasn’t being rugged!) and looked down across the empty field toward the river. The late afternoon light was all Autumn, and everything was golden in the light. The air was clean.

The world had moved on even though many of us still clung to last season’s warmth. The Beauty on the cusp of changing Moon and changing season was lavish. Open your hands and hearts and let go. And what the heck, take the Sabbath to revel in it, why don’t you?

Notice the Beauty, my friends. We can’t move on to Peace, if we’re holding on to the joys and privileges of last season.

Peace Out of Time

It was just a sweet little caress in the grand scheme of things. But there it was, a beautiful little violet in grass that has not yet browned up for the winter.

All around it, the cooler weather is causing the trees to begin to burnish. There’s not been a freeze yet, but we’re all anticipating. All my gardener friends are busy putting their gardens to bed.

But in the meantime, one bold, and yes, foolhardy, violet is dancing in the grass.

“Look at ME!” she cries. And we do. Silly, we think, don’t you know you’ll be gone, soon.

And yet we look. and admire.

There is perhaps something to foolhardy declarations of Beauty and Possibility. After all Peace is not going to be won by our doing the same old thing. That as we have been told so many times, simply leads to insanity.

So Peace. Peace of the beautiful what is. and Peace of the wild, outrageous Violet. Peace. We’ll take whatever leads us in that direction!

Sacred Village

Building a World of Peace, Village by Sacred Village.

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