Celtic Odyssey

It’s out! The new book from the Lindisfarne Community - Secular Monasticism: A Journey . Like an underground river, the monastic tradition keeps on resurging in a host of unexpected times and places. Secular Monasticism, A Journey describes one of its most recent incarnations. The founders and members of the Lindisfarne Community share with us their bold attempt to be a secular monastic religious order open to the exigencies of the contemporary world. Age-old wisdom once again reveals its perennial relevance in helping us learn how to be followers of Christ in God’s today. Brother John, Taizé In the first five pages, I thought of ten people I know who should read this book: young people, old people, all people tired of taken-for-granted spirituality. Devour this book. Let it help you dream up a way of joining or creating a micro-community of prayer and action that frees you to experiment in following the ways of Christ. That's what these folks have done. This story help...

10. We value the freedom given to us by the Spirit of God. Yet true freedom is not license, to do as we please, to satisfy every whim of desire. Freedom is the liberty to be all God wants us to be; liberty to love and be loved; liberty to serve and be served. To maintain freedom we need to check our hearts often for traces of legalism toward ourselves and toward others. True freedom means the absence of the need to control others, to dominate them. It means the absence of the need to self-justify, to prove ourselves in the sight of others. Freedom. We hear a lot about freedom about every four years. Of course I’m talking about an election year. There’s always some candidate(s) who tell us that the “other guy” wants to take more of our freedoms away. Most of the time it’s just an illusion. Both groups would make changes that some may feel take away freedom(s). But this Understanding is not about someone else. It’s about “us.” It’s about “us” taking away the freedom of “others.” Or, t...

Matthew 2.9-12; CEB. When [the magi] heard [Herod] the king, they went; and look, the star they had seen in the east went ahead of them until it stood over the place where the child was. When they saw the star, they were filled with joy. They entered the house and saw the child with Mary his mother. Falling to their knees, they honored him. Then they opened their treasure chests and presented him with gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. Because they were warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they went back to their own country by another route. This passage was part of my reading this morning. I have seen things today that I hadn’t noticed before. Let me share with you what I saw. First, this is a very well known story; that of the Magi. We sing their song every Christmas. They’re in every nativity play and scene during the holy day holiday season. The importance of this is that the Magi were not Jews. More about this in a moment. Second, notice that “the star they had see...