A Sacred Journey Towards Earth's Wellbeing
On this day
the blessings of heaven.
On this day
the blessings of earth.
On this day
the blessings of sea and of sky.
To open us to life
to ground us in life
to fill us with life
and with wonder.
On those we love this day
and on every human family
the blessings of heaven
the blessings of earth
the blessings of sea and of sky.
From Praying with the Earth: A Prayerbook for Peace by John Philip Newell | photo credit: Ben Lindwall
Glory be to you
Great Creating Spirit
who shines in distant stars beyond numbering.
And on earth peace.
Glory be to you
Great Creating Spirit
who sings and wings in birds on high.
And on earth peace.
Glory be to you
Great Creating Spirit
whose thunder shakes the shining firmament.
And on earth peace.
Glory glory glory
and on earth peace.
-from Praying with the Earth: A Prayerbook for Peace by John Philip Newell | photo credit: Chuck Summers
In my mother’s womb
you knew me, O God.
In my father’s birth
and in the birth of his father were my beginnings.
At the inception of time
and even before time began
your love conceived of my being.
As you have known me
so may I come to know you.
As you prepared my birth
so may I make way for fresh birthings of your Spirit. As you sowed all things in love
so may your love for all things be born in me,
so may your love be born again in me.
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by John Philip NewellWhat is it we have forgotten about ourselves and one another? In the Celtic tradition, the Garden of Eden is not a place in space and time from which we are separated. It is the deepest dimension of our being from which we live in a type of exile. It is our place of origin or genesis in God. Eden is home, but we live far removed from it. And yet in the Genesis account, the Garden is not destroyed. Rather Adam and Eve become fugitives from the place of their deepest identity. It is a picture of humanity living in exile.
The image of God is the essence of our being. It is the core of the human soul.
At the beginning of the Hebrew scriptures, the Book of Genesis describes humanity as made in the “image” and “likeness” of God (Genesis 1:26). This is a fundamental truth in our biblical inheritance. Everything else that is said about us in the scriptures needs to be read in the light of this starting point. The image of God is at the core of our being. And like the Garden, it has not been destroyed. It may have become covered over or lost sight of, but it is at the beginning of who we are.
A nineteenth-century teacher in the Celtic world, Alexander Scott, used the analogy of royal garments. Apparently in his day, royal garments were woven through with a costly thread, a thread of gold. And if somehow the golden thread were taken out of the garment, the whole garment would unravel. So it is, he said, with the image of God woven into the fabric of our being. If it were taken out of us, we would unravel. We would cease to be. So the image of God is not simply a characteristic of who we are, which may or may not be there, depending on whether or not we have been baptized. The image of God is the essence of our being. It is the core of the human soul. We are sacred not because we have been baptized or because we belong to one faith tradition over another. We are sacred because we have been born.
Christ of the Celts, 2008 (Jossey-Bass: San Francisco) 2-4.
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Brother Timothy Joyce, of Hingham, MA is a Benedictine monk at Glastonbury Abbey. He was one of the first recipients of Heartbeat’s Pilgrimage Scholarship Award and consequently made the journey to the Isle of Iona for a retreat with John Philip Newell last month. “I have recently celebrated my 80th birthday,” he told us, “I want to mark this rite of passage in my life with an experience such as Iona. I have led Celtic Spirituality retreats and workshops. I want time and space such as the Isle of Iona, with its natural beauty, can provide. I am learning more about myself as well as God, the Christ, the meaning of life in an evolutionary world. Closeness to nature has become very significant in my search.”
I was looking for a place in nature for a retreat to mark some important passages in my life. The opportunity to go to Iona seemed like a providential call. This had been a sacred place on my previous visits and I relished the time and space to pray, reflect, celebrate. I had also read John Philip Newell’s works and resonated with his teachings.
Br. Timothy Joyce at the Nunnery Ruins on the Isle of Iona
The opportunity to go to Iona seemed like a providential call.
Overlooking Columba’s Bay
Iona Abbey
Image courtesy of the BBC and GETTY IMAGES In 2014 I wrote a book entitled The Rebirthing of God in which I included a chapter on Aung San Suu Kyi, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991, as a modern icon of compassion. Since then she has become the de facto leader of Myanmar […]
