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Landscape” Or“Portrait” Versions WINTER 2019 ISSUE 1 BEGIN READING CONTEMPLATION AND PARENTING A PUBLICATION FROM THE CENTER FOR ACTION AND CONTEMPLATION We set out to create a digital publication that Table of contents elements can navigate to felt like it was in print. We heard from many of specific chapters. you that the experience of sitting down with a cup of coffee and reading about your beloved Alumni community was preferred. So, we Will take you back created this format to resist distraction and to table of contents invite attention. If you’re reading on a desktop 07 or laptop, expand the “landscape” version to full screen and turn off your notifications; or if an iPad or tablet is handy, enjoy this most CONTEMPLATIVE PRAYER AND book-like of reading experiences in either MEDITATION the “landscape” or “portrait” versions. The back to table of Table of Contents is clickable, allowing easy contents navigation to every section of the quarterly. Killing the Butterfly: Writing and We’ve also included a link to return to the Transformation by Elizabeth Jarrett pg. 02 TOC on every page, so it’s easy to find your Andrew 07 way back. Hyperlinks are in red type and underlined; click these to open webpages in Introducing Icons to Children by your browser. We hope you enjoy this new Kathy Hendricks 09 format. If you have any questions, please email us at [email protected] and we will help as A NOTE ON FORMATING A NOTE soon as we can. Peace, CAC Design Team Ancient Nest (poem) by Leigh Schickendantz 11 All social media icons will link straight to that platform. 05 18 EDITOR'S NOTE CONTEMPLATIVE COMMUNITY Letting Go by Mike and Emily 07 Schweppe 18 Parenthood Contemplated by Kirk CONTEMPLATIVE PRAYER AND Drake 20 MEDITATION Tending the Seed of Community (peer Killing the Butterfly: Writing and group report) by Kerri Power 20 Transformation by Elizabeth Jarrett Andrew 07 24 Introducing Icons to Children by Kathy Hendricks 09 CONTEMPLATIVE SOLIDARITY TABLE OF CONTENTS TABLE Ancient Nest (poem) by Leigh Sacred Journeys and Barmen Today by Schickendantz 11 Susan Stocker and Roy Hoagland 24 Hope in Focus (photo essay) by 12 Steve Pavey 26 CONTEMPLATIVE STUDY 30 Parenthood as a Hermit’s Cell by DEBONEE’S FILM CORNER Dani Walker Kreutter 12 Spider-Man: Into the Spiderverse The Universal Christ interview with reviewed by Debonee Morgan 30 Fr. Richard Rohr 14 31 ALUMNI REMEMBRANCES OF FR. THOMAS KEATING 33 ALUMNI NEWS 34 CAC NEWS TABLE OF CONTENTS TABLE 05 Dear Living School Alumni, this. Dani Walker Kreutter (’18) writes about parenthood as a hermit’s cell; Kathy Hendricks During the last few months, Thomas (’17) offers alumni the powerful contempla- Keating’s radiant smile and luminous eyes tive practice of teaching icons to children. Fr. have been etched on my heart. The intention Richard Rohr shares about his new book The of our contemplative prayer and living, as Fr. Universal Christ (forthcoming March 5), the Thomas taught, is to consent to the presence scope of which can surely change how parents of God. My first introduction to Centering parent, but its reach is both far more and also Prayer in hospital chaplaincy training used nothing less than our most intimate relation- the tried and true Contemplative Outreach ships. The sub-title boldly affirms How a For- instructional brochure, which read “Choose a gotten Reality Can Change Everything We See, sacred word as the symbol of your intention to Hope For, and Believe. back to table of consent to God’s presence and action within.” This month, I’m thrilled to share with contents EDITOR'S NOTE EDITOR'S Each of us, in our own unique circumstances, you a new format for the Alumni Newsletter. faces this prayer and sometimes terror-filled In a recent survey, we heard that the Alumni pg. 05 decision to consent to God—or to deny, Newsletter truly means something to you. postpone, repress, or ignore Love’s always- The majority of readers report that a thematic available invitation. Fr. Thomas shines as one issue is compelling and that you value a wide who said “Yes” to God with all of his heart, variety of topics and voices, from alumni soul, strength, and mind. Toward the end and faculty reflections to reviews of books of the newsletter, several alumni share brief and films, inclusion of art, poetry, and more. remembrances of how his presence and work We also heard that most of you appreciate impacted their lives. video and audio recordings, but nevertheless One theme circling through this news- prefer a slower, text-based reading experience letter edition is contemplation and parenting. primarily on your computer. If there’s one area in which reality humbles CAC Creative Director Nicholas Kramer me to consent to Christ’s gentle presence, it is and Graphic Designer Izzy Spitz have crafted something special for us, an interactive inspiration from Fr. Richard’s forthcoming PDF that we’re calling the Living School book on the Universal Christ; our focus will Alumni Quarterly. In addition to an updated be “Nature: The First Bible.” I invite your design, an inviting reading experience, and a submissions of articles, personal reflections, navigable style, the contents of the newsletter poems, photographs, and more along this are now organized around the Living theme, and along any other themes, too! Send School Rhythm of Life areas: Contemplative them to [email protected] by April 8. Practice, Contemplative Study, Contemplative Community, and Contemplative Solidarity. Yours in “Yes” to divine presence, We’re hopeful that this will continue to editor’s note serve as a significant resource for the alumni community to learn, share, and connect. back to table of I welcome any and all of your suggestions contents and submissions. How is your Rhythm of Life going? How did your integration project turn pg. 06 out? What mystic is inspiring you? How do —Mark Longhurst (’15) you “keep on keeping on” a contemplative path, even in the midst of struggle? The theme of the next newsletter in May takes 07 Killing the Butterfly: Writing butterfly” making a breeze around her head: and Transformation This book I have not yet written one word of is a Elizabeth Jarrett Andrew (’18) thing of indescribable beauty, unpredictable in its patterns, piercing in its color, so wild and loyal in The morning of November 9, 2016, I woke its nature that my love for this book, and my faith up to the news of Donald Trump’s election in it as I track its lazy flight, is the single perfect and heard with unequivocal clarity how I joy in my life. needed to respond: You must teach writing. Here is creative potential cultivated to the Admittedly, I’d been teaching creative writing point of bursting. We all have this capacity. as a spiritual practice for twenty-five years, It’s in our nature because it’s God’s nature. so the calling didn’t come out of the blue. When Patchett “can’t think of another stall, back to table of But a few months prior I’d started the Living when putting it off has actually become more contents School, and now I had a new understanding painful than doing it,” she plucks the butterfly that our fundamental purpose is to manifest from the air and presses it against her desk. fully the love present within creation, and that pg. 07 AND MEDITATION “There, with my own hand, I kill it. It’s not contemplative practice is a trustworthy means. that I want to kill it, but it’s the only way I can In my back pocket I had a tool for meaning- get something that is so three-dimensional making, truth-telling, growing in compassion, onto the flat page.” Then “everything that being of service, exercising surrender, profound was beautiful about this living thing—all the listening—for dismantling the destructive, color, the light and movement—is gone. What dualistic tensions harming our country. I knew I’m left with is the dry husk of my friend, the CONTEMPLATIVE PRAYER PRAYER CONTEMPLATIVE a sneaky, secular way to practice contemplation broken body chipped, dismantled, and poorly that’s wildly accessible, at least to anyone who reassembled. Dead. That’s my book.” writes. In the language of the Rhythm of Life, I When under Cynthia’s guidance we knew what “was mine to do.” Creative writing read Jacob Boehme, I immediately thought can be a transformational practice. From that of Patchett. “In order for outward and visible day forward, I would teach it as such. creation to emerge, the divine must undergo The author Ann Patchett does a a compression into somethingness, and this marvelous job of describing how writing entails a passage through the ‘fiery’ matrix of plunges us into the kenotic dance. An idea for desire and its frustration.” Writers of every a novel, formed over months, is “an oversized stripe know this. Beginners assume the page. We’ve pinned our hearts on key that unlocks creation. they killed the butterfly because they an idea, insubstantial and fleeting, For decades I’ve been tickled by didn’t know better, but that’s not the and bear the awful consequences of Canadian novelist Margaret Atwood’s case; it’s just how creation happens. substantiating it outside of ourselves. statement that writing “is a naming “The journey from the head to hand In the writing world, “practice” of the world, a reverse incarnation: is perilous and lined with bodies,” means getting your butt in the chair the flesh becoming word.” Now I Patchett says.
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