Vic Thiessen offered a reflection on the recent film, The Life of Chuck, and all the ways that a series of ‘coincidences’ in his life keep pointing to the deep significance of our connectedness and how God’s role in those connections underlines the meaning of life and death.
During our second breakfast service, SCC’s writers circle shared pieces of poetry and prose spanning a spectrum of styles, topics, and emotions. It was a rich and tender morning full of vulnerability and love. Then Jacob Rose closed the morning with his song, Hold Your Head Up High. SCC’s writers circle is open to anyone — we meet on the 2nd Tuesday of each month at 7pm.
Jess reflects on the deep human longing to know we’re not alone in the world, and the ways church communities have been a source of love, security and support throughout her life. She shares stories of experiencing divine presence, and explains why she wanted to pass this onto her children even as her own views of God were shifting.
Marilyn shares about the shocking deconstruction of faith as they knew it in the first century. The rules changed with the new covenant. We have been trying to figure out what that means ever since. She shares from her own story of faith and belief transitions how she has thrown the baby out with the bathwater sometimes. Her hope and challenge to all of us is to continue to learn how we can hold a beautiful space of diversity built around some core shared values, and remind each other of the beautiful healthy parts of our faith journeys we don’t want to let go of.
Walter shared some reflections on the lectionary readings from a couple of weeks ago, especially the encouragement of Jesus to focus on being “rich toward God” rather than wasting time on things that don’t matter. Lots of poetry (Rilke and Rumi) were a part of the encouragement to listen to our deepest loves and longings in order to remember what matters.
This second breakfast we had a time of sharing summer recommendations for music, films and books. Walter and Vic Thiessen shared a few recommendations and Jan McPhee shared an Andrea Gibson poem alongside recollections of growing up with Andrea and their family in Calais, ME. Things also got a bit sidetracked with Jan recounting her becoming a viral sensation for her “We love you Canada…” sign at the International Festival parade (see power point), with many positive emotional responses.
Jess invites us to imaginatively join her sitting on a rock in the sunshine next to a lake as she shares some of the things she’s been thinking about this summer, and, in doing so, she encourages us to notice the world around us and to continue the act of living amidst all that tries to separate us from life and each other.
In relaxed “summer sharing mode,” Rachael brings a random collection of things: a book she loves, news about her upcoming move, a poem, and wisdom from two beautiful humans who passed away this week – poet Andrea Gibson (d. 14th July) and environmental activist Joanna Macy (d. 19th). A thread weaving through them all is the call to let the co-existing beauty and pain of life and the state of our world keep on breaking us open to more love and interconnectedness, daring to trust that this is in itself a big part of the solution we need.
A huge need in people’s lives is to feel a sense of belonging. Jess, Lorna and Janell all share various stories where they have seen or felt this sense of belonging exist. They acknowledge its meaningfulness and how its goodness can trickle outward beyond an individual’s immediate communities. They further reflected on how communities of belonging create a dwelling place for God’s love and peace.
As we intentionally grow community together Marilyn encourages us to each reflect on how we can both give and ask for support – asking each other questions about what would be most supportive and reflecting so we can invite others to care for us.
