John and I left supper simmering and took a quick walk this evening, enjoying evening sunshine after a cloudy day. I hoped to catch the evening sun on the fountains by the music center, but the college seems to have turned all the fountains off. We’re getting frosty nights; winter’s coming. I’d better go out and cover my rosebud again.

But for now it is still autumn, and we found the sun highlighting some of autumn’s warm colors.

  And there was afternoon light dancing in the fountains a few days ago. Not as flamboyant as the leaves, but lovely in its own way.

Ten days ago there were two rosebuds on the bush in my herb bed.  

Frost was predicted. I wondered if I should pick them and bring them inside. But each had only a tiny bit of color showing, so I worried that I'd be picking them too soon and they would never open.

I settled on bringing one in and leaving one outside, and watching to see what happened.

The indoor one began to unfurl slowly, and now looks like this.

The outdoor one also began to open, and having survived another night of frost thanks to a pillowslip cover, looks like this.

 Perhaps in a few more days they will both be open. And here’s the unexpected spark of light – barely a foot away from the rosebush I've been photgraphing, on the miniature rosebush between the lavender and the mint, without my ever noticing any rosebuds, I discovered this tiny rose, fully open, untroubled by frost or hail.

The presenter at our retreat this past week was Father Bill Sneck, SJ, who took us through the Rules for the first two Weeks of the Spiritual Exercises of St Ignatius, helping us better understand the Ignatian approach to the discernment of spirits.

Ignatius is a 15th century Basque nobleman and military commander whose life changes abruptly when his knee is shattered by a canon ball. During a long, difficult convalescence he begins to ponder the difference between daydreams which leave him discontented and restless and those which fill him with energy and purpose. The latter come as he places himself imaginatively in the stories of the life and death of Jesus, and of saints like Francis and Dominic.

Ignatius experiences a radical conversion and as he begins to live this out, pays attention to the interior movements of thoughts, feelings and behavior that draw him closer to God or that pull him away. He puts his experience into guidelines – the Spiritual Exercises -- so that he can share this with his friends. One thing leads to another and by 1534, he and six others make solemn vows that they will serve God together, forming the religious order that we know as the Society of Jesus, or the Jesuits.

We covered a lot of good material in our sessions, but the one I want to lift out here is the concept of consolations. Ignatius pondered his experience, and named the movements that draw us toward God consolations and the movements that pull us away from God desolations.

Consolations are the events and the interior movements that cause us to catch our breath in awe and delight, that inflame us with love for our Creator, that move us to tears, that increase faith, hope, love, joy and peace . . .these are consolations. We respond to something we glimpse in creation, in Scripture, in relationships, or in the world around us. “Aha!” I thought, hearing this description. “In watching for moments of light each day, I’m watching for consolations.”

Ignatius recommends that when we are enjoying consolation, we should take note, and store up the memory as strength to face the times of desolation. “Aha!” I thought, hearing this. “That’s what Leo Lionni’s Frederick does, gathering sun rays, colors, and words in preparation for winter. And it’s what I’m doing, in a small way, by keeping this blog.”

A good insight for the blog, I thought, and I tucked it away to write up later. But there’s another piece to add. I picked up a little book by Margaret Silf, Ignatian Spirituality for Everyday Living, and here’s what she had to say about consolations and desolations. “These terms come from the Spanish, and ultimately the Latin root, meaning ‘with the sun’ (‘con-solation’) and ‘away from the sun’ (‘de-solation’)" p 57.

With the sun, towards the Light….moments of light!

All the traveling took me to and from the Mennonite Spiritual Directors Retreat, held at the Jesuit Center in Wernersville, Pennsylvania. This building used to serve as a training center for 200 – 300 Jesuit novices. Now it is a retreat center, with a small resident Jesuit community.

A full day of sunshine on Tuesday, combined with ample quiet reflection time, allowed me to roam the grounds, discovering many moments of light out in their rolling hills.

My third floor window.

A moment of light from worship at Assembly Mennonite today…

The following paragraph appeared in our newsletter, and was also read to the congregation this morning, before we sang Adam’s beautiful song together.

Will You Hold Me in the Light. Adam M. L. Tice, associate pastor at Hyattsville (Md.) Mennonite Church, sent us this note about "Will You Hold Me in the Light."  He writes, "I don't know Heidi well but we are facebook friends.  I do, however, have numerous friends at Assembly and feel a strong connection to the congregation.  I watched the online display of candles holding Heidi 'in the light' and wanted to offer a song of comfort and healing to the congregation as a whole.  I had passed the text to my composer friend, Sally Morris, who always does amazing things for me.  Then last week, on Sunday morning, James Miller's death was announced during the sharing time.  My wife and I immediately began crying for our good friend Lisa Rose.  That afternoon I called Sally again to tell her that Assembly was in the midst of a second tragedy. She hummed what she had developed already for the melody, including some material still in need of text.  By the next evening we had a completed hymn.  I passed it on to several musicians at Assembly. Sally and I dedicate it to your congregation (hence the tune name) in the hopes that it can be a means of holding one another in the light during these dark times."

“Will you hold me in the light with prayer and song? Hold me in the light of God….”

As copastor Karl Shelly said, we are being held in the Light by people and congregations in many different locations, as he’s realized through messages and emails he has received this past two weeks.

A note to those who are visiting regularly….for the next five days I will be traveling and attending a Mennonite spiritual directors’ retreat in eastern Pennsylvania. I will continue looking for moments of light, taking photos and writing, and lifting Heidi, Lisa Rose and others to the Light. But I will be observing a technology retreat and will not post until I’m back in Goshen – come back and visit next weekend!

A hard frost last night, and sunshine this morning. I went back to the prairie plantings on campus and was able to catch a few sparks of light before the warmth dispersed the frost.

And here's a before and after shot -- yesterday's coneflower above, and today's below.

And to close with, maple leaves in the sun.

I wandered campus this afternoon, searching for sparks of light. At first I thought I wasn’t going to find anything – a dry, overcast day doesn’t tend towards the same interplay of light and shadow, or of light on water, as a sunshiny day or a wet day. As I looked more closely, I enjoyed the interplay of two different sorts of moments of light: interactions with people, and the light in the plants.

Usually when I walk on campus it is early morning, or early evening, and there aren’t many people around. Today students and profs were scurrying between classes, and I exchanged greetings with six or seven people I knew. One, seeing that I was prowling with my camera, directed me to this tree on the southeast corner of the Ad building which she described as “practically iridescent, even in this light.”

Another was checking the progress of the prairie plantings on campus. We stopped to chat about how well they are doing – even the section by the tracks that the train company had sprayed just after the college seeded that area. The black eyed susans, mulleins, cone flowers and grasses had already been catching my eye. Here’s a medley, along with a tree branch or two. The sun even came out towards the end of my stroll, bringing out the light of the plants.

Another rainy day – I have to look more carefully to find those moments of light. One came with the news that the biopsy on a friend’s mole had come back with the happy word, “Benign.”

Then there was the quiet light reflected in this bird bath.

And one more photo of rosebuds in the rain.

You'll notice that there are two rosebuds in the previous photo.  With predictions that temperatures will drop into the 30’s tonight, and in the spirit of “Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,” I brought one inside. It has a teensy bit of color showing. We’ll see if it opens, and whether the bud outside is able to keep developing.

I stood outside the library waiting for Judy this morning, and wondered whether there would be any moments of light today. I hadn’t bothered to bring the camera. It was a rainy morning and we were squeezing our walk in between rain storms.
I stood there, under gray skies and dripping trees, with no sunshine in sight. But slowly I became aware that there was a lot of light around me. The sky, though gray, was light. Bright headlights kept passing out on SR 15, and the windows in Umble Center caught the reflection of headlights waiting at the stoplight, multiplying them till it looked like a wild party was going on inside. The campus lights burned a warm yellow.

And the wet sidewalks reflected the campus lights with puddles of gold, and they reflected the gray skies with puddles of silver. Silver and gold, at my feet. More subtle than diamonds in the dewdrops on grass on sunny days, but a spirit-lifting light when I allowed it to seep into my awareness.

And rainy fall days like this tend to trigger a memory from my childhood days. I see the turn into Carter Rd, with wet leaves on the wet road. This is 10th St from this afternoon, outside our current home, so it's missing the curve, but this is close to what I picture.

And then I’m in our warm home. I can smell beef stew simmering on the stove, and bread baking, or maybe an apple pie. And Judy and I are at the piano, singing, “Joyful, joyful we adore thee, God of glory, Lord of love,” and working together on the music, one of us playing the right hand part and the other the left hand.
                All thy works with joy surround thee,
                            earth and heav’n reflect thy rays,
                stars and angels sing around thee,
                            center of unbroken praise.
                Field and forest, vale and mountain,
                            blooming meadow, flashing sea,
                chanting bird and flowing fountain,
                            call us to rejoice in thee.
                                                 HWB 71, v 2, Henry van Dyke

I must have absorbed these words at a deep level, because in some way, this is what I’m watching for and what I'm finding as I watch for those sparks of light – the invitation to praise and wonder, wrapped up in light and shadow and leaves and candles and grasses and puddles and clouds.

(this is Judy and me at the piano, from about the right time period, but given the position of our hands and the trolls above the keyboard, I suspect we are playing a duet version of The Hall of the Mountain King)

I was trying to take a photo of the cloudy, lavender, just-before-sunrise sky, and suddenly
                                                    Sunrise!

Later, I lit a candle for a direction session this afternoon, with these words from the opening prayer in Philip Newell's Celtic Treasure:

    We light a light
                    in the name of the God who creates life,
                          in the name of the Saviour who loves life,
                                   in the name of the Spirit who is the fire of life.

We ended the session with a small ritual from Children and Worship – snuffing the flame of the Christ candle and then lifting the candle snuffer so that the smoke swirls through the room, with the words:

 The Light that was in one         time and one place
        is now in all places,
                    in all times.

 

Light that has changed, Light that is absent and yet still present.
               

When I left for my walk this morning, the sky was just beginning to lighten in the east. A half moon floated overhead and the morning star shone in the west.

Fifteen minutes later, the sun was nearly up and the sky was cloud-free and incredibly luminescent.

And a half hour later, the sunlight was reaching the tops of trees and buildings. I was intrigued by this high-level repair work.

And back at home, the sun was just gilding the tops of our locust tree and the neighbor’s tulip poplar, with the moon overhead.

Sunday -- a gloomy, wet morning, and a grieving community, yet there is light in the darkness. During second hour, one option was a Taize-style worship service, with prayers around the cross. We sang of light in the darkness and at the end, we left our candles burning with our prayers.

And at the front table, the peace lamp burned: “The light shines in the darkness. “

Later in the afternoon, John and I went to the visiting hours for Professor Jim Miller. While we didn’t know Jim well, we have several connections with family members.

We moved slowly through the waiting line, past the display of family photos, and suddenly there was an echo of our peace lamp litany. One of the photos was of a table full of candles, burning brightly. Near it was a card with John 1:5: “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.”

Jim’s niece, a friend of our daughter’s, told us that it was a favorite verse of her grandmother’s and that they had a Christmas family tradition of having a candle hidden in each room of the house. They search for the candles and gather them all together in one spot, a festival of light in the darkness.

We did much singing of light today, but the song that is echoing in my ears at the moment is the last one from the Taize service --  Within our darkest night. How appropriate that it came in the section entitled “Preparing to take the Light into the world.” May it be so.

A day of many gatherings, which brought moments of light, but little time to write about them. Here are a few:

The quality of light in my backyard, midmorning, was striking. Leaves and clouds blew by swiftly, so one moment the yard was dim,

then the spotlight came on, and neighbor’s garage and maple tree blazed brightly,

  And then the garden was full of light and the maple tree faded into the background.

Then, later in the day, the calligraphy of bare branches lit by sun at Oxbow

  And the lights and shadows of these oak leaves still on the tree

Sparkles from the sun on the water in amongst the weeds and grasses and flowers in the roadside area near the Oxbow entrance

And a moment of light  (or perhaps “lite”) as seven former members of the Assembly group Fishslippers met for breakfast, after a gap of eight years, and remembered how we had come by our name.

Back then, we had just begun meeting. We had come together around an interest in exploring how to live justly and joyfully in North America. We went around the circle, telling a little about ourselves and why we were interested in the group. Two couples had recently returned to the US after MCC terms, others had spent parts of their childhood in other countries. There was a lot of energy and grand ideas were flowing about ways of being countercultural.

Then it was Andrea’s turn. She shook her head ruefully. “I don’t know,” she said. “You’re all so serious and here I am, knitting fish slippers.” She waved her knitting at us – and indeed, it was a slipper designed to look like a fish. A bit like this, only in a solid blue-green, and adult size.

 “Perfect,” someone else said. “We’ve been talking about swimming upstream, against the cultural current.”

“And we’re wanting to do it joyfully,” someone else chimed in, “ We could all use fish slippers.” One thing led to another, and Fishslippers we were from that day forth.

I nearly didn’t go out for a walk this morning. I didn’t have a walking partner and it looked cold and gray. But I wanted the exercise, so I went. Just before I left the house, I saw a little blue in the sky, so I grabbed my camera.

Good thing! The sky was amazing, full of fast moving clouds lit by the rising sun, and with fascinating shadows cast by other clouds. And always changing. It wasn’t the most aerobic walk I’ve ever had, because I kept stopping to take photos. The slide show below is in chronological order, over about a twenty minute period. If you are familiar with the Goshen College campus you may be able to tell when I'm facing east and when it's west. When you see the branch of maple leaves, you've been through the whole cycle.

I'm repeating the image of the full moon I recorded yesterday morning. Any midwife will tell you that there is often an uptick in births around the time of a full moon. And so it was.

Jodi Beyeler, one of Assembly’s elder group, and her husband, Ben, were beginning to wonder if their little one was ever going to make an appearance. The due date was October 4, and the days kept passing. Finally we got to that full harvest moon. Arthur Lester Hochstedler Beyeler was born about four hours after I took that picture, at 10:12 on 10-12-2011. No wonder he waited. A future in some mathematical field seems likely.

And about four hours after that, in a different time zone, Timothy Michael Yoder arrived, son of Katie and Luke Yoder, and grandson of Mike and Mary Lehman Yoder from Assembly.

It is good to celebrate new life in our midst.

And since I don’t have photos of either of the new families, here’s one of another new life. Twenty-six years and two weeks ago, David Isaac Glick joined our family. It was a full moon then too.

Here's David then.

And David now, seen here with sister Beth, at her wedding this August.

Sparks of light, the two of them -- and now Jesse too.

Beth and Jesse, sparking

My walk got delayed a bit this (yesterday) morning, because this friendly fellow was splayed on the screen door to our porch, and I had to take his photo. Something about his fresh green oddity, and that amazing leaf-look just makes me smile.

I did a little internet sleuthing and found this link to the katydid's song.
http://www.fcps.edu/islandcreekes/ecology/Insects/True%20Katydid/141sl1.wav

Listening to it gave me a little aha! moment -- we've been hearing katydid's in the regular night chorus.

The moon was nearing the trees to the west as I crossed campus -- and looked twice that big without the camera.

A little way down the bike path, the morning glories were trumpeting a blue hallelujah to the dawn.

And the darker purple morning glories are an embodiment of the Inner Light.

I’d gotten that much written last night, but waited to post. Yesterday evening, Assembly’s worship space was available for people to gather in silent prayers around the cross. I knew it would be a time of light in darkness, and it was.

The worship space was dark, except for the lights on the banners and front table, where the flame of the peace lamp burned steadily. Closer to the entry, two semi-circles of chairs embraced an open space. In the center of that space, the rough wood cross that we use for Good Friday services lay on the floor, with two terracotta platters full of sand at its head and foot. A few small white candles stood in the platters already, bright flickers of light in the darkness. Others were held by people silently praying in the chairs, or kneeling at the cross.

John and I lit our own small white candles at the Christ candle, and joined the silent prayer.

It was a restful moment of light in the darkness. And in the middle of it, there came another spark of light. We had been there for awhile, in the midst of that prayer-filled place. There was quiet movement, as some left and others arrived, and I hardly noticed when Bethany, chair of our worship committee, got up and quietly opened a nearby closet. She brought out a small side table.

She disappeared into the worship closet. While she was out of sight, one of the older members of the congregation got slowly to his feet, his cane in one hand and burning candle in the other. He moved forward to place his candle in the platter at the head of the cross. I wondered how he would manage to get down and back up again, but just then Bethany arrived with another sand-filled platter. In one graceful movement she set it on the small table and put the table near the cross. With a gentle smile, she helped Hilary set his candle in the sand.

It struck me as such a lovely, attuned-to-the-moment gesture, a small act of kindness that captured the spirit of so many small acts of caring that are happening in this community, sparks of light as we struggle with the chaos of one act of violence.

I’d end with that, but I want to add the quote that I saw repeated in several facebook entries and a few emails yesterday. Karl Shelly, one of Assembly’s pastors and Adjunct Professor of Peace, Justice & Conflict Studies at Goshen College, wondered what to say as his “Transforming Conflict & Violence” class gathered for the first time since Professor Miller's death.

 Here’s the quote. “Two things I know to be true: this world is filled with remarkable beauty and love. And this world is filled with unspeakable violence and pain. We live in between both; with glimpses of heaven and of hell; of darkness and of light. As one who seeks to transform conflict and violence, I will live by the proposition, and walk in the hope, that violence and pain never have the final word ...”

Amen and amen.

When I walked into my spiritual director’s study this afternoon, there were sparks of light dancing all over the room. My director was standing in a shaft of sunlight, holding a small bowl-shaped candleholder made up of many bits of glass soldered together. Each bit was at a slightly different angle and when she held it in the sun and moved, lights spangled the walls.

For most of the session, the bowl sat on a small table between us where it caught the light, spattering dabs of light around the room. Their wild dance was stilled to the nearly imperceptible rhythm of the sun’s crawl across the sky. Much of the time we were hardly aware of them, as we talked of illnesses and deaths, a prayer practice of looking for moments of light, and the interplay of darkness and light.

Beside my director’s chair was a small table with a candle and some pictures. I looked at them without really seeing them until suddenly a small flame blossomed in a dark area of one of pictures, an Annunciation. The right half looks like an old Dutch painting, with Mary as a peasant woman standing by a table. The left is dark with a wild scribble of light for the angel. “My Neon Annunciation,” my director calls it. The flame – a reflection from the soldered glass candleholder – slowly bloomed at the edge of the table. A little later, it lit the angel. Light and darkness.

I want to keep musing on the intersection of light and darkness in the days ahead. Looking for sparks of light is not an attempt to see life as all sunshine and roses. Life and death, darkness and light are more intertwined than that. My attention keeps getting caught by the interplay of light and shadow, joy and sorrow. Looking for sparks of light is a way to keep affirming that the light shines in the darkness and the darkness can not put it out.

* I've learned that the picture is of a mixed media installation by Theodore Prescott. He sculpted Mary "as a Mennonite girl standing alone in a humble house, preparing to bake bread." The angel is a scribble of neon tubing. You can see a thumbprint at

http://worship.calvin.edu/resources/resource-library/projected-images-in-worship-illustrate-or-illuminate/

Today’s sparks of light are of a different nature than recording the interaction of light waves on an object, three moments from this past weekend that made me smile.

  There’s the wonder in a child’s face as he ponders the mysteries of changing colors in striped light bulbs. (Thanks Jeff and Joah and Goshen’s First Friday festivities).

Rebecca with her eye on the speeding soccer players out on the flat, Lily fascinated with Rebecca, and Caitlin with that careful mom's eye, making sure Lily stays gentle in her enthusiasm. (You can't tell from the photo, but Lily is enthusiastically shaking Rebecca's feet, and a moment later reached up to give her a big hug.)

And a common scene from the weekend -- a display with photos of the 90 or so children now at Assembly Mennonite Church, and adults striving to put names to faces, so they can honor one of the Privileges of the Child at Assembly -- to be known by name.

Our congregation had its annual retreat at Camp Friedenswald this weekend. The trees in southern Michigan were at their peak of color and I spent much of the weekend wandering around taking photos of light shining through leaves. I’ll save some of that light and color for posting on the next rainy day – memories are a good source for sparks of light in the midst of dreariness, thank Heaven.

John and I went back to Goshen last night for a gathering with friends and returned just before sunrise this morning, in time to spend a peaceful hour watching the gradually increasing light in the fen, and listening to the calls of killdeer, geese, and redwing blackbirds.

Looking over the fen, just before sunrise

About an hour later, when the sun has risen far enough over the hills behind us for the light to reach the fen.

It was a restful gift of slowly increasing light and birds singing praise, a good base for learning soon afterwards that tragedy has again touched the congregation. The father of one of our members, and a colleague of the many members who work at Goshen College, Jim Miller, was stabbed and killed by an intruder in the early morning hours. His wife was also injured and is in the hospital.

Darkness and light. Death and life. How can this be?

During the worship service, after the children left for Sunday School and the details we knew were shared, after one of the pastors led in prayer and we sat together in silence holding the family in God’s Light and wrestling with the chaos, the worship leader stood and in heartfelt Hebrew cried, “Eli, eli,  lema sabachthani?"

"My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" he translated, drawing on Jesus’ words from the cross. “How can this be?“

And yet, he went on, it is. And so is the bright sunshine, and the colorful leaves, and this group of people gathered together, giving thanks to God.

 Life and death. Lament and praise.

Back home again, I found this prayer from Philip Newell’s Celtic Treasure:

O God of light,
from whom all life flows,
may we glimpse the shinings of your presence in all things.
In the darknesses of our world,
in places of fear and terrible wrong,
and in the darknesses of our own lives,
in times of confusion and doubt,
may we glimpse the shinings of your life-giving presence.

Amen and amen.

We’re having beautiful sunny days this week and there are plenty of sparks of light to capture. It’s hard to choose just one, and why should I? Better to collect all that I can. I feel a bit like a squirrel gathering nuts for the winter, or (a more attractive thought)  Leo Lionni’s Frederick, gathering sunrays and colors and words for the cold gray winter days.

Here’s dawn sun on morning mist, from the bike path near campus.

And the bright combo of maple leaves and morning sunlight, blazing unexpectedly above mundane cars and parking lot.

And these sparkling dewdrops weren’t on the grass by my doorstep, but close enough – they were in the prairie plantings on the Goshen College campus just across the road.

Mid-afternoon sunlight streaming into my spiritual direction room....

John and I biked out the Pumpkinvine trail for a picnic supper. In the marsh/lake beside the trail we saw three large herons – though they seemed a bit large for herons. And then they started clacking. Sandhill cranes! (I 'm guessing) And a flash of light as one spread his wings and danced.

And as we biked home, evening light and fall leaves, bright reds and yellows. There you go, Frederick!

Early this morning I  read Heidi's Caringbridge blog for the past two days, which held a mix of the hard times of radiation treatment and celebrating life in the moment. I headed out for my usual walk, carrying my camera, just as the sun was coming up.

Here it is again, that combination of light and dark that so often appear together when I become aware of a spark of light, that moment which in some way causes my heart to sing.

As I walked on, it occurred to me that those moments often cluster in transition times. Early morning and late afternoon light create more interesting photos than the full light of day; the change of seasons brings new color; life’s transitions often make us more acutely aware of the gifts of the present. A fall leaf is beautiful, and bittersweet, and precious because it is both.

Returning home, I started noticing a scattering of diamond bright light sparking from the short green grass – morning sunlight hitting the dew on the grass blades. I didn’t bother pulling the camera out. I took delight in the light, but knew I didn’t have the photographic skills to capture it.

I came in to read today’s email and found this Word for the Day from gratefulness.org, a quote from Bengali poet and Nobel winner for literature, Rabindranath Tagore:
For many years, at great cost, I traveled through many countries, saw the high mountains, the oceans. The only things I did not see were the sparkling dewdrops in the grass just outside my door.

I had to go back out and commemorate my grass diamonds, whether or not the photo did justice to it. If you look closely below, you’ll find dewdrops, but the flashes of fire are missing. You’ll have to go out and look for them in the dewdrops in the grass outside your own door. What other sparks of light will you find as you look around your everyday life?

One spark of light flew by too quickly for a photo today. I was standing in the parking lot outside of the farmer's market and looked up just in time to see a flash of late afternoon sunlight on the glossy black plumage of a crow flapping its way south.

Oddly, I notice that it takes effort to notice the sparks of light after a few days of sunshine. With so much light streaming down, I start taking it for granted. I need to store up more sunlit images for the cloudy gray days that will be coming to northern Indiana all too soon.

Here's the one photo I did take -- sun on the grasses beside the parking lot.