September 23, 2008
retreat...run away...pilgrimage
So that is the story of a little adventure happening to
a boy which changed his whole life. Supposing he had
just put up with the loss of the jar and milk and gone
back to the hut, wailing and complaining? Well, if he
had--there would have been no jar, no milk, no friendship
with a king, and no story.
- from the life of St. Adamnan of Iona
I receive reminders about the Celtic saints daily from a yahoo site. You can follow the link in the pullquote box for more about the saint for today, St. Adamnan. Adamnan was the ninth abbot of Iona and was famed as a historian and lawmaker. According to his biography, he wrote a law "to protect women, children, and clergy from injury or participation in war ("Cai'n Adomna'n" or "Law of the Innocents" (697))and wrote the "Vita Columbae". The "Cai'n Adomna'n" established legal rights for women for the first time in the British Isles."
The abbey has been a symbol of retreat and pilgrimage for me for a long time...since well before I first visited. I have fantasies of going on retreat there and not simply visiting as a tourist. There is an international community that gathers at various times of the year...ecumenical, monastic...What's not to like?
The retreat for CCW this past weekend, as I said in the videoblog, went very well. Green Lake is a lovely place this time of year. The scenery can't be beat. The lake affords all kinds of possibilities for recreation. Bring you bike and cycle around the local towns. Bring your golf clubs and remind yourself why you are not a golf pro. And pray. There are trails and chapels and small cabins for retreats. We spent our retreat talking about finding God in the midst of activity, in the midst of business. We meditated on icons. We shared our individual reflections and walked together through a shared exercise as a congregation.
Now, not everyone can make the retreat every year. A friend of mine served in the pulpit. I am told she did a very good job and helped everyone feel welcome. She's like that. I wish, though, that we could include everyone in these times away from our usual schedule. It's impossible, but I wish it nonetheless.
in other news: Today is the first day of Bread for the Journey. It's the annual alum gathering and continuing ed opportunity at Seabury. I'm all up to my eyeballs in it this year. Today it begins in earnest and I have a ton to do.
I think I need another retreat.
Posted by tripp at September 23, 2008 06:58 AMI have always loved Iona. The stories of the mystical encounters with God that people have reported in their time there are inspiring. It is one of the places I would like to visit in my life!
Thanks for the reminder!
A question out of more or less idle curiosity about your retreat: what was or is the place of disagreement in the retreat setting? What degree of theological diversity exists in CCW's community?
Posted by: Megan at September 23, 2008 12:42 PMHey.
Um...Disagreement has a place I guess...though there was little disagreement and more sharing. And sharing allows for a multiplicity of perspectives. And that we certainly have in abundance.
CCW is less diverse than it once was. Becoming a "Welcoming and Affirming" congregation pushed the middle quite a bit to the left on most theological and some political fronts.
Why?
Posted by: Tripp at September 23, 2008 02:18 PMI've been to Iona twice, once for a personal retreat and another time with my brother-in-law during his Sabbatical (the church I serve now would never in a million years give a me such a sabbatical).
It is a beautiful place and I echo your thoughts that the rebirth of it speaks volumes. I left thinking a great deal about the Celtic idea of "thin places," where the earthly and sacred seem to draw close. I asked the teens back home what were the thin places in their lives and they all agreed a retreat center in the Kiamiche Mountains of SE Oklahoma we trudge off to every winter for a retreat. It is their Iona.
May ideas about justice and mercy keep reinventing itself in their minds just like in Iona.
Oh, and by the way, my brother-in-law and I mustered up the guts to find a Celtic music "session" in an Edinburgh pub and sit in, me with my banjo and he with his mandolin. We were intimidated out of our minds, but they were very friendly and even asked us to play a few American folk tunes. It was one of the best nights of my life.
Posted by: Tim Sean at September 23, 2008 04:53 PMI was wondering how much of the peace you gained from the retreat came from being among people who accepted and worked from the same basic principles that you do. I've been thinking more recently about what people gain from having exclusive, homogeneous options (an all-women's campsite, an all-African-American school, etc.) as well as inclusive, diverse options in their lives. It's food for thought.
Separate thought: as far as disagreement vs. sharing, I don't know that I grasp the distinction you're drawing. But to put out an example that is real in the congregation at the Church of What's Happenin' Now, some attendants believe Jesus was divine, and others believe he wasn't. This is the kind of thing I mean by theological disagreement.
The Church of What's Happenin' Now explicitly embraces that kind of diversity of theological opinion, and people who join the COWHN do so because they embrace the diversity.
Posted by: Megan at September 23, 2008 05:24 PMMegan,
CCW is a lot like the COWHN in that specific way. And what I mean by sharing is a person can speak their thoughts without needing to convince someone else. And someone else can hear those same thoughts without threat that their own ideas are being assailed. This is what I mean by sharing. Disagreement is oft synonymous with debate.
I gained peace from the retreat because the congregation did. It's not particularly homogenous...well, that's not true. Within our small sliver of humanity (liberal progressive protestants) there is a surprising amount of diversity, but we're mostly of the same cloth.
Posted by: Tripp at September 23, 2008 09:42 PMIona is a place where I need to be right about NOW! Not so much for its distance, but perhaps for its distance! More for the peace I understand it provides! I did hear yall had a lovely time at Green Lake, and for that, I am happy for you!
Posted by: robyn at September 24, 2008 08:03 AMBut, I think it is clear that the CCW will not tolerate snakes in their midst. That was too much diversity.
Posted by: Rich at September 24, 2008 08:19 AMAlthough I did find myself rather wrapped up in it...
Posted by: Jan at September 25, 2008 07:14 AM