A Salty Reverie

And He said to them, “Come away by yourselves to a secluded place and rest a little while.” (For there were many people coming and going, and they did not even have time to eat.) [i]

With elderly poise and grace, my four-legged friend gently made her way along the pathway to a favourite patch of grass near the water’s edge. Minx and I had been together for fifteen years. Her days of climbing mountains, fording rivers, chasing rabbits and catching sticks now belonged to her memories and dreams. It was summertime and she cherished the sights, sounds and smells of her world. Every now and then, we would catch a glimpse of one another.

It was a warm day in Picton where we lived then. A day to let work lie fallow and do nothing, except watch the world go by. Brightly coloured boats with generations of family on board, put-putted out of the harbour into Queen Charlotte Sound. Children in swimsuits played tag on the beach and then tucked into fruit salad and jelly. Seagulls hovered overhead, waiting for a pineapple chunk to come their way.  

This salty reverie carried me back to childhood, when I was five years old, on the beach at Blackpool in Lancashire, with my younger brother, Mark. We were wearing our new inflatable swim rings. Mark’s was shaped like a horse, mine, a swan. The Irish Sea is always cold. Yet small guardians of the future do not worry about such things. Dad gently coaxed me into the water, not letting me go until, screeching with fearful delight, I insisted on freedom. It felt so good. Afterwards, we headed to Notorianni’s ice-cream parlour for banana splits all round. To children belongs the Kingdom of God.

This quiet day-dreaming in Picton came to an abrupt end when two men in gumboots began to argue on the quay about how to divide up their catch of fish and I heard the distant gunshot of a pig hunter in the valley.

When I was Associate Minister at St. Giles’ Cathedral in Edinburgh, I recall the organists, Michael Harris and Peter Backhouse regularly playing, on the magnificent Rieger organ, some of the works of French composer, Oliver Messaien. He was a devout Catholic. His music was an expression of his profound Christian faith and also his love for birds, especially their colour and song. Dissonant and melodic, tonal and atonal, with regular and irregular rhythmic patterns and changing meters, the Cathedral was often filled with bright-hued, discordant fortissimo chords one moment and graceful plainsong melodies and transcribed bird song the next. I became increasingly captivated by Messaien’s remarkable musical language with its stark juxtaposition between the harmful and creative potentials of humanity, between deep calm and great complexity. Faith for this composer was not about comfort or blissful serenity. It was rather about the struggle of our spirits to live in the world as it is. Sometimes we are not fully aware of the place where we are standing or the time that is now. The flourishing and blossoming of a contemplative spirituality in the context of the busyness and distractedness of our lived experience is a constant challenge.         

Drawing from biblical texts, poetry and personal journal entries, Nicola Slee in her beautiful, thoughtful and practical book, Sabbath The Hidden Heartbeat of our Lives engages with this juxtaposition and encourages the practice of Sabbath time. She quotes from The Rule of Life of the Companions of Brother Lawrence,     

‘(It is)…making an intentional choice about ‘things we will leave undone or postpone, so that instead of being oppressed by a clutter of unfinished jobs, we think out our priorities under God and then accept, without guilt or resentment, the fact that much we had thought we ought to do, we must leave.’ [ii]

She continues,

‘Sabbath requires us to let go our habitual control and give over to…God’s Kairos moment. It opens us up to encounter with the depths which are both awesome and fearful.[iii] 

Sabbath time is the breathing space in our labours…the clearing in the woods through which the light comes, the empty dark hours of night in which our minds and bodies regenerate themselves and God givesgifts,treasures of darkness to God’s beloved. Sabbath is, indeed, the hidden heartbeat of our lives…[iv]

The invitation to pause…is part of God’s invitation to Sabbath, whether it is to rest, to eat, to gather with colleagues at work, to pray, to walk or take other forms of exercise, to weed or plant or prune the garden, to do other kinds of physical work…or to play with our children or pets…and create a rhythm, a gentle balance, a structure that can hold everything together before God.’[v]

I have discovered this rhythm and gentle balance in the ancient monastic practice of being present and attentive to the sacred rhythms of the day. The Book of Hours, popular in the medieval period, was originally written by monks who contemplated the nature of God in quietness, sometimes in isolation. It offered prayers for specific hours of the day, days of the week, months and seasons, with colourful illustrations to help the reader contemplate and meditate. It was read by all kinds of people from every strata of society, often carried in pocket or bag. The Liturgy of the Hours, The Daily Office, The Divine Services all originate from this early source of wisdom. It is a wisdom gifting us a way of knowing and living in a natural rhythm with the whole of creation, and connecting us to a deeper Unity.

May we value these gifts, the graceful moments, the here and now and be fully and prayerfully present.  

‘God of the here and now
and of eternity,
constant Presence,
help me to take time,
to be mindful,
delighting in each given moment,
since each contains –
like the sweet kernel of a hazelnut –
everything that is.’ [vi]

[i] St. Mark 6:31, New American Standard Bible
[ii] Nicola Slee, Sabbath The Hidden Heartbeat Of Our Lives, (Darton, Longman and Todd 2019) 88
[iii] Ibid., 89
[iv] Ibid., 91
[v] Ibid., 94
[vi] Jan Sutch Pickard and Kathy Galloway, Living by the Rule: The Rule of The Iona Community, (Wild Goose Publications 2010), 62

This article was published in Refresh: Journal of Contemplative Spirituality, Winter 2021. The theme of the issue was Practice. Refresh is published twice a year by Spiritual Growth Ministries Trust, Aotearoa New Zealand. www.https://www.sgm.org.nz/refresh-journal.html