Summer Sabbatical (we return on August 5th) ~ A love note from your online abbess

Dearest monks and artists,

Every summer we try to step back from this wonderful work and take a bit of time off for planning, dreaming, and resting. Sabbath is one of the profound gifts of a generous and abundant divine presence who says that work is good and rest is necessary.

We are so grateful for all the ways this community supports our work in the world and we are eager to listen more deeply in the coming weeks to what new things want to be birthed through the Abbey in the coming year.

We will be taking a break from our weekly love notes and daily quotes and questions starting tomorrow and will return on Sunday, August 5th with more Abbey goodness. You are still welcome to email us (or register for programs) we might just be a bit slower to respond than usual.

I leave you with this poem I wrote about the gift of Sabbath:

Sabbath

Even as the subway car hurtles

into the tunnel and calendars heave

under growing weight of entries,

even under the familiar lament

for more hours to do

a bell rings somewhere

and a man lays down

his hammer, as if to say

the world can build without me,

a woman sets down

her pen as if to say,

the world will carry on

without my words.

The project left undone,

dust on the shelves,

dishes crusted with morning

egg, the vase of drooping

flowers, and so much work

still to complete,

I journey across the long field

where trees cling to the edges

free to not do anything but

stand their ground,

where buttercups

and bluebells sway

and in this taste of paradise

where rest becomes luminous

and play a prayer of gratitude,

even the stones sing

of a different time,

where burden is lifted

and eternity endures.

(first published in ARTS journal of religion and the arts)

May the gift of Sabbath rest be yours in the days ahead.

With great and growing love,

Christine

Christine Valters Paintner, PhD, REACE

Photo © Christine Valters Paintner