Sunday Rest
In September I started up a new monthly mindfulness and meditation evening, called ‘Sunday Rest’ with the aim of engaging those who are open to exploring spirituality and mysticism but closed to institutional church and structured religion (a bit like me!). It seemed natural to link the themes for each month with Celtic Christianity, which takes inspiration from creation and the natural changes in the seasons. I also feel that in our ever-changing, fast paced and technology-rich world we have in many ways lost touch with nature, both physically, emotionally and spiritually. And this extends even down to the food we eat, where every type of fruit and vegetable is available to buy all year round, regardless of whether it is ‘in season’ or not. We spend most of our time in sheltered buildings with artificial heat and light, and travel from place to place inside enclosed vehicles, again one step removed from the outside world.
But as human beings we have an innate yearning - some might say God-given need - to spend time in amongst the natural world. Nature has the ability to refresh, sustain, energise, revitalise, soothe, mystify and inspire us, which is why most people will say that the place where they feel the most relaxed, the most calm and peaceful, is in nature – whether at the beach, in the woods, up a mountain, or just in their own back garden.
So Sunday Rest was born, providing an uninterrupted hour of peace and quiet, a moment to press pause on all the competing demands and distractions of life and just ‘be’, in an atmosphere of stillness and calm. September’s theme was all about ‘change’ – linking with the changing seasons from summer to autumn, reflected in the changing colours of the leaves and the cooler temperatures of the days. The resources included a mindfulness exercise using a leaf, a poem about the autumn, Celtic prayers and reflections, and inspirational quotes about change from many different sources including Gandhi, Einstein, Rumi, Buddha and the Bible. People were also invited to reflect upon the following questions:
What have I accomplished over the summer and what changes am I about to face?
How do I feel about these changes? What would help me to embrace/welcome the changes rather than resist/fear them?
What do I need to let go of in order to allow room for new things to begin?
“Spiritually, if we are to make space for the new, we need to embrace rest and renewal, almost like brushing away the fallen leaves of the soul to clear a path for what will come.” (from ‘The Celtic Wheel of the Year’ by Tess Ward)