Metacentricities

I was reintroduced to the Rule of St. Benedict recently by a photoessay done by a PSR colleague, published this month in Ochre Journal. It’s a great view of a Benedictine monastery in Idaho, the Monastery of St. Gertrude. One of the most interesting aspects to me of Benedictine spirituality is the concept of Conversatio Morum - which basically means that one is always on a journey of conversion - there isn’t just a moment of conversion. The nuns at St. Gertrude have an interesting interpretation of this:

This promise is a commitment to change within a tradition that is often viewed as static. The balancing of the promise of stability with that of continual change has produced gradual adjustments in the sisters’ understanding of their responsibility to the land. It is also a powerful alternative to the rapid and destabilizing shifts that mark much change in the world today. … True to the process of conversatio morum, the sisters’ focus on the land was not a sudden decision, but a gradual conversion. Building on their history with the land, they realized that their retreats, land stewardship committee, gardens and orchards, and interactions with neighbors built a foundation of care and concern for the land.

It has wonderful photographs, and it’s a great read. Check it out.

It’s almost done. 99% of our stuff has been moved from Shutesbury to Shelburne Falls. We need to take one last trip out there to gather up the remaining odds and ends that we missed yesterday. It rained all day yesterday, which wasn’t at all fun, and we’re in a house full of boxes. And I can’t find anything. And we’re both exhausted, and pretty much out of steam. Now, what comes is the slow unpacking, settling in, making this house our new home. It feels good. We took a walk down to town this afternoon, and spent some time at Mocha Maya’s listening to a great band, called Jo Henley. It’s great to be so close to town, and getting out and doing stuff isn’t this big production - we can just go out the door and walk three blocks. Or, we can spend 15 minutes in the car instead of 25-30 to get to a “big town”. Greenfield, the closest, is a great place, and has just about everything we need.

By the way, the movers were amazing. We figured it was a classical Valley story that we hired movers called “Warrior Spirit Movers” who used biodiesel trucks, and the message on their voicemail ends in “namaste.” They were 3 sturdy, young guys who were nice to be around, were efficient, and really hustled.  And they were reasonably priced, too. We were both saying “thank the Goddess for testosterone and youth.” And experience - they knew what they were doing.

I look forward to seeing how the house takes shape, as we unpack the boxes, put up pictures, decide where to put things, and start really living in the house. It feels nice so far.

As many of you know, I’m a cat person. I’ve had, and lost, a number of cats in my life. Last night, my partner’s cat, who I’d adopted as my own as well, died of lymphoma. We’ll miss all of his quirkiness: his wanting to get on top of us after a shower or hot tub, his “presiding” over our nightly check-ins, his way of getting “tithes” while I was eating chicken or fish. He was such a relational cat, so sweet and loving. We’re burying him here, at the house we’re about to leave in a week, because he loved the woods, and loved being outdoors here. We’ll miss him.

My partner and I have been hatching this plan for months, and it has finally come to fruition. We’ll be starting to teach a series of workshops in November, that we have whimsically named “Girlfriend School”.

Here’s the short blurb from our website:

Our purpose is to help lesbians — and everyone else — have joyful, nourishing intimate relationships.

Our methods are Eastern and Western, spiritual and psychological, ancient and modern.

We believe in the essential wholeness of each person, and offer tools to help you access your own deep reserves of wisdom and compassion.

Our workshops create opportunities to bring greater consciousness to your current relationship, or become ready for the relationship of your dreams.

We’ll be teaching the workshops in Shelburne Falls, at our new home, which has a wonderful studio space that is perfect for this sort of thing.

I’m excited about it. I hope you’ll check it out.

You may, or may not, recall the little tiffle I got into with the folks at Talk2Action last year about the Left Behind Game. What’s interesting is that according to Public Theologian, the makers of the game are threatening legal action against people who speak against the game, because they are coming out with an “expansion pack”.  He says:

Christians should not sit silently while  corporate money-grubbers make a buck out of perverting the Christian faith.  Nor should we sit silently when a game is marketed to children promoting religious violence while American soldiers are dying overseas in the middle of a religious and ethnic civil war. We should not have anything in our possession which would hinder us from speaking the truth about what is happening.  Better to have nothing and be honest than well-off and complicit with evil.

When I wrote my blog entries about the game, I got a silly spammy comments from the game people in my blog. The game hasn’t sold well, and hasn’t gotten good reviews, so that should be enough to get rid of it, finally. It’s a silly implementation of a whacked premise from a series of books that are problematic at best, and certainly not something Jesus would find especially in line with his teachings.

I’ll quote a bumpersticker that I really need to find a copy of: “When Jesus said ‘love your enemies’, he probably meant not to kill them.”