Spiritual Retreat - Two days of near silence.

The day after I turned in the first draft of my dissertation, I went to stay with the monks at the Society of Saint John the Evangelist monastery in Cambridge for two days of retreat.

The practical conclusion to my writing is that we should value fully embodied discipleship and formation practices as much as we value those which engage our intellect. One of the fully embodied practices I talk about is spiritual retreats.

As a part of my writing rule of life, I included participating in practices of Christian formation, for the purposes of rest and restoration throughout the writing process.

Going to SSJE is was about rest, restoration, putting into practice what I am writing about and to be a reminder that in the midst talking about God, in my writing, that it is important to remember to talk with God as well.

I arrived at 11:30 on Thursday an hour before noonday Eucharist which was followed by a noonday meal, thus I began by joining the brothers at the Lord’s table, as well as around the supper table.

Once I arrived the only words I spoke were the words of communal worship and prayer.

I left my computer at home and only turned on my phone in the morning and the evening.

So my days were structured around communal worship and prayer, morning prayer, noonday Eucharist, evening prayer and compline.

I spent the other hours of my days reading, praying and resting. Some of the ways I prayed were traditional, laying on the bed talking to and listening to God. But I also prayed while putting together a wooden puzzle of “The Girl with the Pearl Earring,” drawing, painting, and journaling.

How does one describe connecting to God, listening to God, being in the presence of God? There is nothing more precious than the quiet presence of God. There is no sweeter joy than hours spent with God. This time can be found anywhere on any day, but when time is set aside, and an appointment is made, God is there waiting for you, ready for you, longing to be with you, just as you long to be with God. When you slow down enough to catch up with God, when you quiet yourself enough to hear God, when you are still enough you are better able to be with God. God is there. God is speaking. God is with you in the stillness, in the quiet.

This is what I did last week. I had an appointment with God and unsurprisingly God was there.

So I went on retreat, where I rested, was restored and was renewed, in the presence, by the presence of God through two days of silence during which God was not at all silent.

First Draft Submission Week: So Many Words, So Little Time

After my last post I worked hard to finish the final two chapters. Which I did. When I submitted the rough drafts of those two chapters, they were quite rough and the whole dissertation was nearly 3,000 words short of the minimum. I got extensive notes back on the first two chapters and less on the final ones. This was not because they were better but because, my advisor said I needed to heed the notes he had made on previous chapters. Generally, I needed to edit better, cite better, and clean up my flow to make the whole thing work together better.

Recently, I have been toting the books I used the most around with me so I can edit on the fly when I need to. I have been doing a little bit here and little bit there whenever I can. I have spent so much of my spare time this past month, going over each chapter slowly fixing grammar, and spelling mistakes. I have also reorganized some of the chapters as well as working diligently to recognize when I pulled thoughts from my sources without citing where those thoughts. At this point I have read so much and have thought about this so much that I have my sources voices in my head, and I use them without knowing I am. This has required me to think about what I have written and then go looking for the source. This then might require me to reread that section of the source material and then properly citing it.

Last week I stumbled upon something new, which has been immensely helpful as I am moving through the tedious work of editing. I discovered that Microsoft will read me my paper while I read it. (I say “stumbled” because I was working on something for church and accidentally hit some unknow “sticky” keys which caused it to suddenly start reading the document I was working on to me.) I know this sounds awful, but it is great. It slows me down while I read, as well as allowing me to hear it. This does several things. First, I can hear those silly typos “it” instead of “is” or “form” instead of “from” the ones that are easy for your eye to gloss over as you read. Generally, I can also hear grammar. It also helps me hear how the sentences and paragraphs flow together, making it easier to spot where my logic is failing or where I am not making my point well. I stop it quite a lot to fix things and to make changes, but it has been immensely helpful in editing. I might try it with my sermons in the future.

Currently I have made at least one pass on each of my chapters. This week I am looking at two new sources to help solidify one of my conclusions, as well as going back and listening to the earlier chapters, since I did not discover this until the final two. I am still about 500 words short of the minimum but believe that I will find those words in the next few days. So this week is for editing and finalizing some rough spots. Then on Wednesday, I will bring all the chapters together with my working Bibliography, put in a title page on it all and send it off.

On Thursday, I am going on a silent retreat to rest, and recoup. And to listen to my own words on participating in fully embodied spiritual formation practices. I will share more about that next week.  

Distracted Writing

 

This is a picture I have on my desk in my office. I painted while on a prayer retreat several years ago. This is a picture of me and God, a picture of a hug, from God. I need that hug today. I am discouraged and struggle to write paragraph, every thought, every sentence, every phrase. Every word is a struggle! It all is coming slowly. It is a slog and I just want them to all be done! (Funny thing, this post is a distraction from my dissertation words and these words are coming quickly)

Last week was difficult, but last week was great! Writing did not go as planned at first and getting every 100 words out was difficult and I struggled to get chapter 4 finished by Friday, which was my goal. There were days when I got hardly anything written and then suddenly they all came out. They flowed and it all seemed to work. And by Friday afternoon. So, when I closed up “shop” on Friday, I was finished with chapter 4, which means that I was one chapter and somewhere in the neighborhood of 7,000 words away from begin finished.

The weekend was a great respite. My sister brought my mother up for a visit. She is staying through next week for my youngest’s birthday. Sunday was strange. It was the first Sunday of my Sabbatical weeks for which I was not away. So I was at Church, but I was not doing anything. It was strange I did not really know what my role was when I was; Pastor Kaza, not in charge, Pastor Kaza not organizing things, Pastor Kaza not leading or speaking up front. I was Pastor Kaza in a pew, participating like a parishioner, but still Pastor Kaza. We had a visitor, so I introduced myself as “Pastor Kaza,” although I did not lead the service in anyway. I know what to do with myself when I am at another congregation, and am not “Pastor,” but I did not know who I was, or what my role was when I was not there to “do.” I guess it is a practice in just being. In seeing our worship and our congregation from a new perspective. This next week I am going to be more intentional and pay attention, see what I can see, learn what I can learn, about us, and about me.

This brings me to this week. It has been a tough writing week. My goal by the end of today was 4,000 words. At the moment I am writing this I have about 1,300. Nowhere close to my goal. I feel like for every 50 words I write I delete 25 and rewrite 25 more. I know part of my distraction is that I have received my first chapter back with the first set of edits and I want to go fix it. As I have written each chapter, I become more and more aware of things I need to fix or change in the previous chapters. So I know my advisor will have seen all that I am already aware of that needs to be remade, rewritten, added and subtracted, as well as having seen things that I have not. So I am writing and distracted and I know I will not finish this final chapter this week as planned. I will work on it in the weeks to come, but I can’t let that go too far, the first draft is due Nov 1. Less than a month and I need to turn in a full, complete first draft. I need these words to come, but they are not, so I keep plugging and hopefully I will get them all finished, sooner than later would be nice.

So I am leaning into this hug today, I need it.

 

Reflections at the end of the First Sabbatical Cycle

 

I have finished my first sabbatical cycle. As of this morning I am back on duty.

What can I say about the last two weeks?

There are the statistics, when it comes to dissertation writing, I currently have chapters 1-2 complete. Although I came into the dissertation writing stage which chapter 2 complete, so I am unsure if that counts. I am so close to finishing chapter 3 I can taste it. My current word total is 23, 057, which is about half of what I expect will be my total. I have some very rough thoughts on the shape of chapter 4.

As I have written I have found this to be the most non-linear on which I have ever worked. When I was working on chapter 1, I kept taking thoughts and ideas and moving them into chapter 3 and as I have been working on chapter 3, I have taken thoughts and see that they need to be put in chapter 4. There are also times when as I am writing I realize that I need a different section in some place but am in the middle of thoughts that need to come after it, so I leave a “place marker” so I can circle back, and finish writing that section later. I cannot even begin to count the number of times, I have move sections or paragraphs around within a chapter. The whole process is mind bogglingly circular, which is unusual for me. Usually when I write, I begin at the beginning and write through to the end. This is generally how sermon writing works. Occasionally, I will leave a place marker for the introduction, knowing I will have a better introduction, when I finally come to the end and know exactly where the whole is going, but that is the extent of any circular, non-linear work I have done previously.

I find the process fascinating, when I am able to step back and see in my head all the twists and moves the words, paragraphs and sections have made, and the process feels freeing. I told someone this past weekend something to the effect of, “I have 23,000 some odd words all next to one another, but currently they may not be in the right order.” Which elicited the laugh I had hoped for, but I am unsure if she realized how serious I was. It is an interesting thing to me, that I might have all the right words written but that I may not have them all in the right order. I am also curious how my general writing will improve from participating in this particular way of writing.

Other than the actual writing, I think the sabbatical went well. I found ways to rest, ways to draw close to God and participated in a specific practice of spiritual formation. I did what I set out to accomplish. If I focused on the “accomplishment” then the question to follow is whether I am getting the “results” I wanted or needed.

But I think this is the wrong way of looking at things. My sabbatical cycles are not about accomplishments and results. I think since the root of sabbatical is sabbath, it can’t be about what I do, what I finish, what I get done. I know there are things that must be done, that must be completed, accomplished and there are results that will come of that, but a sabbatical, even a writing sabbatical can’t be about that. I wonder if it is “about” anything.

I entitled this blog, “Resting and Writing.” Almost on a whim, but I did debate, briefly, on whether “writing” or “resting” can first and I decided “resting” came first.” The writing comes out of the resting, I suspect that only in resting, in pausing in finding Sabbath, will I be able to write well. So, this week, I prayed, I made tea, I took walks, I listened to God, and I sat in my office, and I wrote. Only in resting, in relying on God, listening to God’s voice, and allowing my research to be distilled through the deep waters of reliance on God, will I ever even know if all the words are finally in the right order.

And so, what can I say about this first Sabbatical cycle? I can say that I rested, and I wrote.

End of the First Week; A Backpacking Pilgrimage

 

One of the disciplines my program requires of us as we went into our dissertation writing was to create a rule of life to guide us through the writing process. A part of this rule of life included a plan for selfcare and for participation in spiritual formation and spiritual disciplines. I appreciate that the seminary is not merely concerned with us completing our degree, but also helps us to not do so at the expense of our personal or spiritual well-being.

As an act of pilgrimage, and self-care, this past weekend I went backpacking with my dear friend Melissa. An activity I included in my rule of life, although it is something I would have done either way. Nine years ago, Melissa and I decided that we would go backpacking for the first time. Every year since then, except 2020 and last year when she had COVID and I had a concussion we have headed into the woods with everything we needed for three days and have come out two to three days later. . . mostly intact. The first year it seemed like a crazy, wild thing for the two of us to do. But now we know what we need to do to prepare, each of us know our roles in the preparation process and what we are supposed to bring. Outside of a phone call in which we each confirmed what was going into our packs as we each packed them; we really did not need much communication on what each of us needed to bring.

Things were a little different this year. Usually we conduct a through hike, we enter the woods at one point and exit at another, either bringing two cars one at each end or leaving one and then arranging for a drop off or pick up to save gas and allow us to travel to and from the trip together. This year we entered and exited at the same location. This was also the first year we have hiked in Massachusetts. Every year before we had hiked in Vermont. To be precise we hiked along section of the Long Trail (LT) in Vermont, along the path in which it coincides with the Appalachian trail (AT). Since we were in Massachusetts this year, this means we were not hiking the LT/AT this year, but simply the AT.

All those are minor differences between this year’s trip and all the other trips we have taken previously. The big difference was that we backpacked two miles in, and set up a “base camp.” From there we went on a two, day hikes, without our 25 pound packs, merely carrying day packs, containing the food and water we needed for a short hike instead of the “everything” with which we had hiked in. So, a few pounds each instead of the whole 25. This is called slack packing, something we had never done before.

On Saturday morning we parked our car in an AT parking lot in North Adams, MA. North Adams is a lovely little Massachusetts mountain town, which is home to artists co-ops and MCLA, a small liberal arts college, to which my eldest applied but chose not to attend (choosing instead to attend MassArt). Once we had our packs on and our boots properly laced, we put our backs to Mt Greylock which was to our south, the tallest mountain in MA. Since it was Labor Day weekend, we did not want to have anything to do with that crowded mountain, which is a favorite of day hikers and were instead heading north, to hike up the smaller and less spectacular East Mountain.

Although two miles would take no time, if we were walking around the city, two miles, on a trail that heads steadily up a mountain with packs on the backs of two middle aged women, who although being experienced backpackers are not in “backpacking” condition, since we only go once a year and had not actually been on the trail for two. It took us a couple hours to get to our planned camping location, which was a designated campsite with two tent platforms and a privy. We chose one of the two platforms on which to set up camp, but ended up moving in the morning because we could not stand the distinct smell of urine near our tent. either it was in exactly the wrong proximity to the privy or its previous resident did not see fit to go all the way to privy making his own privy directly off the side of the platform.

Once we had set up camp and loaded up day packs with water and food, we continued our hike up East Mountain, enjoying the views from the top and continued to the MA/VT border, where we rested, took pictures and said, “Hello.” To our old friend the Long Trail.

Two things I was not prepared for when it came to slack packing, the first was how glorious it felt to head out from the camp with only a day pack on my back. It felt like nothing. I felt free. We could move more easily and hike so much faster. Although at times either of us or both of us would maneuver around or under over something, as if we had a large 25-pound pack on our backs. This always ended in us erupting into gleeful laugher when we realized that the careful moves one takes when hefting around everything you need for three days, are completely unnecessary and a little ridiculous when only carrying a day pack. We hiked quickly, enjoying the beauty of the world around us, as well as the feeling of literally having the weight of the weekend removed from our shoulders.

Not only does the lack of weight allow for quicker easier hiking, but because we were able to hike quicker, we were never at risk of not covering the required number of miles to make it to a planned camping location. Although we hiked more miles that first day, than we had ever covered on a first day of hiking, we still made back to camp with more than enough daylight to make dinner and relax before we lost the light and turned in. In years previously there were times when we overestimated the number of miles we could comfortably cover in a day and had been racing the sun to get to a place we could set up camp. Not once this whole weekend did, we feel as if we needed to push on when we were struggling, or that we could not stop as long as we liked to enjoy a view, or eat a snack. Knowing that we were heading “home” at the end of the hike allowed us some amount of leisure. Although we were hiking faster than we usually did, we went faster while taking our time. When your burden is lighter you are able to take your time and are still able to cover more ground.

The second thing which caught us off guard, was what it felt like to hike up to the beginning of the LT greet it and walk away. When you are backpacking, the trail with its blazes, become a second companion. For seven backpacking trips the white blazes of the AT/LT (both use the same white blaze to mark their trial) had marked a friendship we had with this trail which I had not quite realized. Prior to approaching the border, we had taken a side trail up around the top of East Mountain to a lovely lookout location and then back to the AT. Along that trail we followed blue blazes, as soon as we turned, I noted them, thinking how strange, we have never purposely turned away from the white blazes, in favor of blazes of any other color. This was the first time I made note of how it felt to be hiking a different path.

Since AT uses the same white blaze as the LT/AT, even once we had rejoined the AT, I had not noticed the absence of my friend the Long Trail, until I greeted her and then left her behind. When we chose to not continue along the LT, for this trip, concluding the LT would take us further and further from home, meaning that we would end up spending too much of each trip traveling to and from the trail, cutting into our actual trail time, I did not anticipate missing the idea of being on the Long trail and missing her as a companion but I did, and was a little sad, as we turned our backs to her and headed back to camp the were already calling, “home.”

The interesting thing about greeting the trail and turning back was that we had actually never seen the beginning of the LT before. We had begun our first hike that first year a few miles north of the MA/VT border and headed north toward Glastonbury Mt, the trail between the place we had put our car that first year and the VT/MA border was unknown to us. When we said, “Goodbye,” to our friend and headed back south, we decided that we would see her again. Next year, we would put our car in the same lot we had put it that first year, put our backs to Glastonbury and join our friend and come back to the MA/VT border, so we could say that we had walked with the whole length of the trail during which the AT/LT are joined.

The second day, we did a loop hike up around Pine Cobble. We enjoyed a beautiful, although difficult, hike which began and ended with us sitting on the rocks of a cobble, enjoying the sun, the breeze and the local wildlife. It was a lovely leisurely hike, which brought us back to camp several hours sooner than I thought it would, and yet we enjoyed the relaxing pace of the day and did not feel the need to invent more hiking than we had planned.

On the final day, we packed everything up, put all 25 pounds minus the food we had eaten back on our backs and headed down the mountain. When we reached our car we cleaned ourselves up, put on fresh clean clothes, did our best to not look and smell like we had been in the woods all weekend and went in search of brunch, which we found in the lovely little town of Shelburne Falls, after which we joined the Labor Day crowds and walked along the Bridge of Flowers, which along with a glacier pothole falls, is Shelburne Fall’s claim to fame. After which we ended our pilgrimage by heading home.

Although backpacking involves many hours of talking, as well as many hours of silence, allowing both Melissa and I to internally and verbally process what is going on in our lives and although this trip allowed me to process quite a lot having to do many things in my life, as well as my dissertation, I think I will leave processing all that for another day.

First Writing Week

So first of all I have a Dissertation Office. It is a dedicated space separate from my Pastoral office, or the office I keep in the parsonage. I asked my leadership for the use of a small unused office tucked away in the basement of the church building. It is lovely.

I set it up over the course of the Summer. It has all the books and articles I have collected from my research. It has a tea kettle a selection of teas, some snacks. It also has plants and art. It brings me joy. I can hole up in here, play music and write.

I love it.

 I have already taken a couple of writing days in it and truly is a writers retreat. 

For my dissertation I am using Kosuke Koyama's Water Buffalo Theology as a lens to examine what it means to be fully embodied persons as opposed to being divided person as we in the west often think of ourselves. I am looking at the ways in which the assumption of a unified person influences his writing and then seeking to see how understanding ourselves as whole person changes how we see spiritual formation and discipleship in the West.

I posit that divided people, live divided lives, form divided institutions (congregations and denominations) and ultimately have created a divided Church. Coming to a more unified understanding of ourselves could possibly allow us to mend the division we have created and continue to create. I am also beginning to wonder what ways we can live into fully embodied discipleship and spiritual formation.

I think about this especially since most of our discipleship is education of the mind. It is almost as if our minds, our inner selves, our "spirits" are the only aspect of our humanity which can connect to the Divine. If we truly are unified beings, created by God as unified beings, then discipleship and spiritual formation must engage our whole beings. Discipleship for the disciples surely did not happen in a Sunday School classroom, around a table with books and learning materials. Jesus disciples by living and doing, as well as teaching.   

When it comes to spiritual formation. The term is truly misleading. I am sure none who study or write in this field think the of the “spirit/soul” as something separated from the rest of a person, much less think of the “spirit/soul” as the only part which can truly connect with God. But oftentimes we act as if this is the case; as if our soul/spirit or mind are the part of us in relationship with our savior. We call it "spiritual formation" after all. And yet, we enter into relationship with God with our whole beings; our inner most, as well as our outer most selves. But this not because all “parts” of the human are equally able to connect with the Divine, but because we are unified beings. We cannot think of being shaped and formed our in our spirits or souls. We are not formed in in the ways of God, unless we are wholly formed, fully and completely shaped, changed and transformed by our creator. We must come to think about formation of the Christian person, Christian Formation if you will.

 

I come into this first week with my first and third chapters well underway, my second chapter, my lit review, already complete, having done it as the semester project for my final Spring semester.

This week I spend much time reading editing, changing, moving paragraphs and reorganizing my first and third chapters. I envisioned a world in which each of the five chapters would be about 10,000s words. I knew chapter two what a bit shorter than this, but figured that gave me some wiggle room in my other chapters.

As I have come to end of this first week I have about 5,000 words in chapter 1, and well over 11,000 words in chapter three, in total I currently have nearly 23,000 words, which puts me not quite at halfway. I don’t know how many of those words are actually usable, but I firmly believe in the work I have done to get them all written.

This first week does bring me to some thoughts. I am writing a D Min and I have struggled throughout my research to see the firm practical conclusion my dissertation needs. My program encourages an artifact but it is not required, but a D Min does need to conclude in concrete practicality. I thought about creating a podcast to inform and teach, but my advisor has continually steered me away from that idea, for very practical reasons. As I have been working on things over the course of the Summer, I have thought about writing a devotional. I have in fact been writing down devotional ideas as I have been re-reading Water Buffalo Theology (for the fourth or fifth time). All this have never felt right.

Some of the thoughts I have written above are actually newly forming ideas, which have come as I have been working this week. I am thinking about fully embodied Christian Formation (spiritual formation). How can we encourage people to not merely seek to shape and form their “minds” or their “spirits” but their whole persons. Allow all of who they are to be engaged in active, intentional formation. In fact some aspects of “Spiritual Formation” already do this, but what if it was an intentional move in the field. Forming whole persons in to fully participate in the Kingdom, shaped and formed by their creator, their Savior. This makes practices such as Pilgrimage, Retreats, and fasting which engage more than just the “spirit” and the “mind” just as vital, as Bible study, prayer, journalling and devotional life. It gives new ways for us to explore the ways in which we are shaped and formed by the giving and receiving of hospitality, as well as charity, both the physical and monetary. When we are whole, all that shapes and forms us comes together to bend us and form us into the likeness of Christ.

This unity will also shape and change the institutions Christians form and in which they participate, perhaps allowing us to envision what a united congregational life might be, what unity in our denominational structures could mean and perhaps dream of what unity in the whole of the Church could look like. What would the Church be if we truly were a unified Body as Paul envisioned us?

 

 

 

Hybrid Sabbatical

 

I have been with my congregation for 14 years now, which means this is the year I am due for my second sabbatical. In my branch of the Christian Church we are eligible to receive a Sabbatical every seven years we are with a congregation (there are provisions if you move congregations). For some reason it crept up on me, surprised me. I only realized it when I was putting together my end of year reports saying I had been here 14 years. So unlike last time when myself and my congregation began preparing 18 months ahead of time, we have not prepared, planned or imagined together what Sabbatical would look like at this juncture in our congregational life, much less had I thought about it in terms of any other aspect of my life.  

Taking a Sabbatical when you are a small church pastor is not always easy, convenient, practical, or ideal. When it is your sabbatical year and your dissertation writing year collide with congregational transitions which make it difficult to take an extended leave from your congregation, that is when your highly imaginative, wonderfully talented, and compassionate people say, "No, pastor it is not alright for you to simply forgo your Sabbatical." I love it when the people of God speak up for the health and wellbeing of their pastor!

And then together we reimagine a Pastoral Sabbatical.

What we came up with is a Hybrid Sabbatical plan. In which instead of taking a three-month Sabbatical, I will take series of Sabbatical weeks, two at a time. The purpose of these Sabbatical weeks is to encourage me to have dedicated writing time for my Doctor of Ministry in Spiritual Formation dissertation, while allowing others to take over the bulk of my Pastoral duties. I am also to take time to rest, relax and draw close to God during these weeks. For this end I am scheduling into these weeks a backpacking pilgrimage, a silent retreat at a monastery, time to spend with family, time to rest and relax and of course entire workdays solely dedicated to writing my dissertation.

As far as I know this is a unique way of participating in a Pastoral Sabbatical. We will see if it works, if I am able to accomplish what I need to accomplish; writing, relaxing, drawing close to God, drawing deep of the deep spiritual wells so that I may be rejuvenated as a whole person and able to bring that rejuvenation into all other aspects of my life, as a pastor, as a parent, a daughter, a wife and a friend.

Join me on what will be an interesting journey and a grand experiment.