by tashmcgill | Apr 28, 2020 | Leadership, Poems, Prayers
It’s Day 35 of Covid-19 lockdown for me and while usually I would make no attempt to timestamp these types of offerings to the universe; I began to notice a few weeks ago that more and more of my friends around the world were beginning to report of sleeplessness. Once reliable patterns of rest and slumber and recovery becoming unreliable in the face of a strange new unknown threat. A symptom for the symptomless, but nonetheless impacted victims of Covid-19.
So amongst the liturgies I have written for this Covid -19 time, I wrote a liturgy for sleeplessness. I wrote it first on hearing the sigh of a dear friend sleepless in the dark skies of New York. I read it to myself watching the dawn rise after another sleepless night. It does not promise to cure your insomnia, but I hope it will comfort you and keep you company in the small dark hours.
This is my gift to you. May you find rest.
A Liturgy for Sleeplessness
At the counting of the hours
and as the ‘un’s’ collect before my eyes
The undone, unsaid and unfinished things in my body
The work of my hands
The unsolved puzzles of my day
May there be rest in knowing there is always something undone that we might sleep and rise tomorrow
The unfelt, unheard and unspoken things that haunt
Swirling in the soft, shadowy edge of the mind
Not enough to wake us but enough to jostle us from deepest slumber
Let my slumber be the safe and soft space for all that is un-
To become part of tomorrow, safe for tonight without needing my concern, my worry, my energy.
For today, I have given all portions and allotments that belonged to it.
But for the catchment of hours left in the night before dawn, grant me abundant mercy as I wander long hours in the small darkness, awake or dreaming.
Give me strength for the dawn. Satisfy even the curiosity of the deep night I find myself aware of.
May the alchemy of body and mind, mystery of eyes responding to light and noise relent — to the tonic of sleep; the easy weighted fall of eyelids, the slowing rhythm of breath.
I lay down into the rhythm of the hours and surrender to them, even the most unwilling parts of me. Grant me mercy in slumber and keep me there.
I offer my evening prayer to the morning and ask for the unknown knitting together of fibres, for entering the healing of deep rest.
For the peace and end of the day, done and undone, and for sleep.
Pax.
by tashmcgill | Dec 2, 2015 | Culture & Ideas, Spirituality
The Advent season starts for each of us, alone. No matter that by Christmas Day, most of us will find our way to be connected with some others – family, friends or communities. But it starts with people alone.
Elizabeth, the cousin of Mary, is carrying a child in her old age while her husband is struck silent. Elizabeth is very much alone.
Mary, the teenage girl engaged to Joseph is visited by the angel Gabriel while she sleeps. She is alone, left to wonder if she is going mad and what will become of her.
Joseph is also alone when visited by the angel, who assures him he should still take Mary as his wife. Joseph had been secretly planning to break off their betrothal; in secret and alone.
Eventually Mary gives birth alone in a stable, no mention of midwives, mothers or sisters to accompany her on this journey. Mary, the mother of God spends much of the Christmas story alone, if not lonely.
Although the traditional Christmas story ends with Mary, Joseph, Jesus and a motley crew of shepherds, wise men and innkeepers gathered together in a stable; for each person the journey starts alone. Nativity scenes paint a picture of otherworldly peace and calm, but the story itself is actually full of human anguish, anxiety, fear, rejection, anger and loneliness.
It is the same for us. Whatever our thoughts or beliefs around the Christmas season or story are; we begin the season alone.
This aloneness is an extraordinary opportunity.
When we are alone, we are left with no choice but to be confronted with ourselves. Our fears, hopes. Our sense of hopelessness. Whether it’s the pressure of unreasonable expectations created by us or other; perhaps it is the secret list of disappointments, perhaps it is our aloneness that confronts us when we are alone. But the story starts in Alone.
That’s where Hope emerges from too.
Why remember Advent?
It’s healthy and good to give pause at this time of year. No matter where you are, the season is changing from hot to cold or cold to warm. Business calendars roll over and many of us find ourselves pondering family, lovers, friends and community. We ponder our sense of togetherness and our sense of aloneness. We wonder what the New Year will bring. We try and navigate a season that is increasingly complex – multiple families, multiple faiths.
The Advent season follows four themes – Hope, Peace, Joy and Love. These eternal ideas are human ideas, not restricted to religion alone. Yet, Advent seems a useful time to refocus on them. Hope emerges from our sense of frailty and our imagination. Peace is a life-long human pursuit and we are living in times of highly publicised civil wars. There is much to be said for meditating on these themes and bringing deeper meaning to our day-to-day existence.
So this week, take a moment and be alone.
What do you see in the mirror?
What are you pregnant with? What rumbles inside you and will not let you go?
What are you reaching into – what newness?
What are you afraid of? What is lonely? What is crowded? What is finished?
Advent is about expectation. The expectation of Hope, Peace, Joy and Love arriving. Interrupting, expanding and challenging the day-to-day human experience.
