What does deep spirituality feel like to you? Spirituality is impossible to define and difficult to describe.
For me, it feels like connection—connection to myself, to others around me, to the earth and all of creation. Connection to myself feels like deep peace, awareness, calm, authenticity. Connection to others feels like compassion, community, acceptance, and enduring love.
Spirituality is not an idea; it is an experience.
When I experience connection, dividing lines disappear. Inner conflict gives way to integrity. The line that separates my individuality from others fades; we become one. I find connections with my deepest self in times of solitary practice and reflection. I find connection with others in community, often in worship. All the great spiritual traditions teach this.
Today the connection with creation, with the earth and the cosmos, may be the most difficult. We live in artificial, controlled environments that separate us from the natural world. More than humans in any other time, we live separated from the natural world, the world from which we emerged and that sustains our lives.
We so very much need to experience our world. We need to let go of controlling our world and allow ourselves to become one with it. We find ourselves when we lose our selves.
May we connect, really connect. When we do, it changes everything.
Rev. Peter Morales is the President of the Unitarian Universalist Association.
Today’s practice is to experience connection. Connection to yourself, to others around you, to the earth and all of creation. How do you experience connection? Take time for it today. It might be a walk in the woods, or a visit to a waterfall. It might be lighting candles, praying, or visiting a sanctuary. It might be a yoga practice or a lovingkindness meditation. It might be being of service to a community organization. Experience connection in your own way.
Today’s resource for deepening this message is the movie I AM, a 2010 documentary by a filmmaker who set out to answer the question of what’s wrong with the world but ultimately ended up discovering what’s right—exploring the deep connections among all life by way of conversations with some of the world’s leading scientists, environmentalists, religious leaders, and philosophers, including Bishop Desmond Tutu, Noam Chomsky, Howard Zinn, and Coleman Banks. Be inspired by this 7-minute clip of the film that talks about deep connections that defy logic.
Commit2Respond's Climate Justice Month intends to take you through a transformative spiritual process leading to long-term commitments to climate justice. At the end of the month you will be asked to SHIFT to a low carbon future, ADVANCE human rights, and GROW the movement. Learn more and start thinking about how you will #commit2respond to climate change.
Showing 2 reactions
Sign in with
To remain neutral on our moving train
help me know which way we’re spinning,
how fast,
when we might slow down,
how much,
to sustain polycultured rich neutrality.
How do I sleep
while SuperEgo-logic Earth Day
longs and trains for here in now?
Stuck in nightmare time too fast,
stride too slow
unable to will-force our faster pace
or slow-growth race,
but both together falling
leaps reopen terrified
reassuring wakefulness,
in sleep I can be you and there
while longing here
belonging both as SuperEgo We.
Hey!
Ground of All Being!
Elder cellular horsepower!
Wake up!… Scream!
your ultraviolet pitch
and flow-echo waves,
rebound this Dense Dark Mirror Message:
We would be more humane
to dinosaur-whisper amongst ourselves
diversely radiant Golden Ecologics,
empathic SuperEgo
EarthTribe Originating Call:
Let our nutrient horsepower free,
flow animate leg-kicking stories,
hibernating through Yinnish Winter’s advent,
to graze through Spring,
and Yang prance Summer’s maturation dance,
to harvest Fallen permaculture compost
winnowing while predicting cooperative apple commodities
luscious pregnant seed:
Spring forth to ride and run this SuperEco Train,
Boddhisatva Warriors of EarthTribe Peace!
Hey!
Ground of Regenerate Power!
Regravitate our octave prime-color Paradise!
Namaste, Balanced Mind.
Active karma empowering
Eternal Diastatic Time
for Climax Global Community
within, as without,
without, as within,
coincidentally converging landscapes
riding SuperEco’s Beloved Peace Train.
Gerald Dillenbeck, M. Div., MPA, PDC
Unitarian Society of Hartford, friend