Dearly Beloved,
This past Sunday, we held a few questions in worship together (from Cole Arthur Riley), and I want to check in with you about them:
What words of compassion can you speak over your body today?
When you’re stressed, what aspect of bodily care are you prone to forget first? What is one habit you can implement to resist this?
One of the things I am prone to forget is keeping myself hydrated, so as soon as I wrote those questions, I went downstairs and filled my water bottle and am hydrating as I type. I want to invite you to hold these questions in front of you as we transition into fall. Keep practicing those habits that help you keep bodily care before you. As poet David Whyte writes: "To rest is not self indulgent, to rest is to prepare to give the best of ourselves."
I also wanted to share some of the reading and resources that are holding my heart, inspiring my on-going practice of rest, and helping to humanize me this summer and hopefully continuing into the fall.
Tricia Hersey's book "Rest Is Resistance" and her work with the Nap Ministry have been foundational this season. Hersey writes unapologetically from a black womanist perspective and approaches the need for rest as a descendant of slaves whose rest and dream scapes were stolen from them.
This past week, I referenced the classic book "The Sabbath" by Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel.
For me, the deepest soul work and the place I have found rest for my spirit this season has been in the words and specifically the breath prayers of Cole Arthur Riley (she/her/hers) and her book "Black Liturgies: Prayers, Poems, and Meditations for Staying Human". For me, Riley's words are profoundly humanizing: they hold vulnerability and power, history and hope, courage and love all together. We've been using one of her breath prayers in worship almost every Sunday this summer. Riley leans heavily on the wisdom of black writers, poets, theologians and philosophers who have gone before, and I have been exposed to other prophetic voices through her writing. If you look at nothing else, if you read no one else, read Cole Arthur Riley!
Some of you may know that I am a pretty avid Instagram user, and I have discovered a couple of other prophetic voices calling me to accountability, hope, humanity, connection and faithfulness through Instagram.
One is poet, musician and speaker Adrienne Maree Brown . I read her poem "not busy, focused; not busy, full" as I was planning our summer season, and was inspired by it, inspired to think more about not being busy and talking about those bursts of work in different ways. What does it look like to be not so much busy, but focused? What would it feel like to describe my weekend as full instead of busy?
And one of the people I have been looking towards most regularly is Rev. Danté Stewart. His words in response to our world and so many of the things happening are profoundly humanizing. He consistently writes from the heart and holds the complexity of what it means to be human while still calling us, from the depths of our faith, to be more loving, connected and just. A couple of places to start are his Time articles "Civility Won't Save Us" and "Reading James Baldwin in an Election Year."
Read something that gets you thinking? Stop by the office on a Wednesday from 9-1 and we can talk about it. Or let's find another time that works to connect for conversation.
Who are you reading that is helping you navigate this time? Whose writing (or music or art) is helping you be more human and more loving in the midst of division and violence across our country and our world? Where do you find spaces for wondering, lament, hope, and truth? I do hope you'll share.
With love, hope and gratitude,
Thandiwe
