Mining the Now

by Chris Koellhoffer, IHM   March 1, 2026

I do appreciate the seasonal stillness and contemplative time that winter has been arranging for some of us, but perhaps you join me now in a growing desire for greening and rising and new life. Soon, those of us in the Northern hemisphere will be on the alert for the chirps, warbles, honks, and whistles of returning geese and robins. Soon we’ll be scrutinizing every tree and birdhouse for signs that our feathered friends have taken up the arduous task of nest building. We’ll marvel at the magic they weave from twigs, leaves, dried grass, dryer lint, and whatever building materials might welcome a new generation.

This time of year I ache with an envy of all things avian that I trace back to a childhood experience.  Every spring we would drape strands of colored yarn on our clothesline in the back yard. That act was an open invitation to our Baltimore Oriole neighbors who would swoop down and snatch a strand of yarn to bring back to their nest. Over and over, back and forth, until the hanging pouch would reveal its weaving of sunshine yellow, bright orange, and deep red. The hanging was high enough to be safe from predators and more than high enough to be out of my reach. That was the ache, you see. I wanted to be there. I wanted to be composed more of feathers than of earth. I wanted to feel myself in communion with the wind and soaring free. How about you?

As we greet our returning feathered neighbors, we may feel our own flightlessness more keenly. Could there be a bit of Icarus and Daedalus in us, longing to fly ever nearer to the heavens and shake off whatever fetters and holds us earthbound? Do we sometimes dream of trading our human skeleton for hollow bones and the experience of liftoff? Have we found ourselves yearning to tilt our heads back just for a moment like a laughing gull or a crow surveying the world below, ecstatically announcing our place in the kin-dom of the sky?

At times in our lives, we may especially feel the heaviness of gravity’s pull and long for weightlessness, for flight, for movement upward and beyond ourselves. I read all of that as an expression of our profound hunger and thirst for something larger than we are. While our limited language can’t fully articulate our desire, we hear echoes in St. Augustine’s prayer, “You have made us for yourself, O God, and our hearts are ever restless until they rest in thee.” We were created by God for God and can find true peace, purpose, and our authentic home only in the divine. What we come to know is that the hunger and thirst we feel for God is actually a sign of the Holy One’s first longing for us. The desire we feel is a mirroring of God’s deep desire in our own hearts.

Could it be that this Lent, with the grace of the Holy One, our intention and practices might serve as wings that guide us forward and upward? That our longing for flight might find expression in a growing intimacy with the Holy One and a liberation from all that stands in the way of a deeper relationship with the divine? May each day of this season move us closer to God’s dream for us, for our feathered friends, and for all creation.

Takeaway
Sit in stillness with the Holy One.
You may want to place before you a feather, a nest, or an image of a bird in flight.
Share with the Holy One your desire to fly unfettered from anything that stands in the way of a deeper relationship with the Holy.
Then open your arms and your heart, and fly!

Featured Image: Gary Bendig, Unsplash; Himanshu Tiwari, Unsplash

NOTE:
I appreciate your holding in your prayer all who were part of the Retreat in Daily Life at King’s College during the entire month of February. Thank you!

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by Chris Koellhoffer, IHM     February 15, 2026

Many years ago, I fractured my ankle. How, you may wonder? Oh, not the usual trip, slip, or fall for me. Instead, in keeping with my love of dance, I was doing the polka. In sandals. With energetic leaps and kicks. Ultimately landing on the side of my left foot. But it’s not really the foolishness of dancing in inappropriate footwear that I want to write about. It’s what came after.

I was prescribed a boot so that I could walk without significant pain. That’s when a morning ritual became a daily practice. I discovered that wearing my boot (it was clunky and hard to miss) attracted constant attention in the form of offers to help, to hold doors and carry packages, to give up a seat on the subway, to glance my way with a knowing nod. All that, although I was not really in any significant pain.

My first and permanent learning was an immediate and deeper empathy for anyone I encountered who had a visible sign of mobility challenges: a cast, a wheelchair, a cane, a walker, crutches. This led me into a more meaningful way of getting dressed each day. As I fastened my boot with Velcro, I prayed for everyone I would meet who had no visible sign of the physical, mental, or spiritual challenges they carried. You know them or may be among them: those who greet each day with burdens known to them alone, who summon their courage in the face of constant physical or emotional pain, who struggle to keep hope alive, who resist despair, who continue to be the face of Love in our world even when no one else is aware of their suffering. I intuit that is all of us at some time, a gathering of the wounded, the lonely, the longing to belong and be heard, the grasping for meaning and for purpose.

And as someone who has helped with the distribution of ashes on Ash Wednesday and who has gazed into the eyes of those who approach, I’ve had a glimpse into what the Holy One already sees and knows: our deep desire to return to God with all our heart, a longing so profound it has shaken me to my core. No matter what is unfolding in our lives present or past, no matter if we carry shame or regret or failure to love fully or to be the people we know ourselves called to be, Ash Wednesday offers a gentle reminder to move closer to home with the Holy One who in Jesus experienced the brokenness of the human condition. To name our longing and go deeper. To walk though this Lent prayerfully and in the company of a tender, welcoming God. To notice the invisible boots of brokenness we are each wearing. With the grace of the Holy One, may we all inch closer to healing and wholeness this Lenten season and far, far beyond.
May it be so!

Takeaway
Sit in stillness with the Holy One.
Name any personal suffering or brokenness you’re carrying at this time.
Picture your burdens as an imaginary boot or as a mobility device you may use.
Place your burden(s) down.
Picture the Holy One scooping them up, carrying them, and walking beside you in the days to come.
Ask the Holy One to help you and others move forward with grace.

Featured Images:  Unknown source; Rohit Choudari, Unsplash

NOTE:
Blessings of Ash Wednesday and the season of Lent! May we hold one another and our beautiful yet wounded world in prayer as we journey together through this season.

February 16-27:
Please keep in your prayer the faculty and staff of King’s College in Wilkes-Barre, PA who are engaged in a continuing Retreat in Daily Life during the month of February. It’s my privilege to be one of the guest directors for this retreat. Thank you.

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by Chris Koellhoffer, IHM   February 1, 2026

Perhaps it’s the deep freeze many of us are living through this winter that got me remembering a telling line in “The Guardian.” In this film, Coast Guard rescue swimmers do the unthinkable: jumping out of a helicopter when they locate persons struggling to survive in the frigid Bering Sea, and then swimming distressed persons to safety. It’s a mission fraught with danger and even more complicated when there are multiple lives calling to be saved at the same time. What do you do, wonders a young recruit, when there’s more than one person crying out for your attention, calling for your rescue? How do you know which person to save first? The senior instructor replies from his lived experience: “You save the ones you can for as long as you can.”

As a spiritual director, I might also add: you assess the big picture and you listen–to the Holy One, to your own body, your energy, your abilities, as you’re also attuned to the elements and the critical human needs before you. And then, with trust in the Holy One, you move into some aspect of offering your own life-giving presence. As much as you can. For as long as you can.

For the Coast Guard rescue swimmers, this is the actual work of saving a human life. But don’t we often wish that we had this power in all aspects of our lives? To save those we love from illness or injury or hurt or failure or injustice or worry or (add your concern here). We know that one of the great learnings of a maturing spirituality is owning our inability to save others and acknowledging our reliance on the Holy One. We also acknowledge that it is God who heals and that this same God calls us to be conduits of that divine healing.

But getting back to the question the Coast Guard recruit posed. In the realm of working for a more just and inclusive world, we can often feel overwhelmed by the multitude of voices crying out for our attention. Where do we begin? To whom do we listen first? These days I’m returning to the wisdom of Sister Amata Miller, IHM who many years ago published a reflection on “Some” and “All.” She noted that no one person can possibly respond to every single issue of justice calling for our attention and action. Believing we can do so seems both unhealthy and crazy-making to me.

But this does not let any of us off the hook of our moral obligation to pray and act on behalf of persons who are poor, vulnerable, oppressed, and to actively create a just and equitable world. For example, in the unfolding struggle in Minneapolis and in many other places, some might be called to be present as protesters; some to shop for frightened immigrants afraid to leave home; some to offer transportation; some to create signs and songs of resistance; some to respond with letters, texts, and phone calls to elected officials, denouncing social sin and announcing the good news of the Holy One’s unconditional love for all. All of us holding the suffering of our neighbors in prayer and intentionality, breathing peace and compassion into wounded places. All of us called to a practice of living in ways that move forward the Holy One’s dream of a more just, inclusive, and welcoming world. Micah 6:8 lays out clearly what the Holy One requires of All: to act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with our God. In our practice of the Some and the All, how are we, how am I, how are you, being called to advance God’s dream?

Takeaway
Sit in stillness with the Holy One.
You may wish to place before you a globe or an image of suffering anywhere in our world.
Give your full attention to the wounds you see and ask the Holy One to reveal to you the some and the all that are your call at this moment.
Pray for the grace to incorporate this into your daily practice.

Featured Images:  Hennie Stander, Unsplash; Jon Tyson, Unsplash

NOTE:
February 2 – 27:
Please hold in your prayer all who will be part of a Retreat in Daily Life taking place at King’s College, Wilkes-Barre, during the month of February. I’m serving as one of the guest directors for this retreat.

February 14:
Please also hold in your prayer my IHM congregation as we meet on February 14 in prayer and conversation in preparation for our upcoming elections.

As we celebrate Valentine’s Day, I’m grateful for your continual prayer and support of my blog, Mining the Now, and for all the ways you carry love and compassion into our beautiful yet wounded world. Thank you!

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Enter your email address in the space provided and then click on “Subscribe” and follow any prompts. When you receive an email asking you to confirm subscribing, be sure to confirm. Otherwise, you won’t be subscribed to future new blog posts, and I don’t want you to miss even one!

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by Chris Koellhoffer, IHM    January 15, 2026

Perhaps by this date, the decorations have been taken down and stored, the holiday place settings washed and carefully packed away. Perhaps the tree, if real, has been recycled or planted. Perhaps the house or the apartment feels a bit bare in the aftermath of the Christmas season. Welcome to Ordinary Time, or as I like to call it, the Extraordinary Ordinary, the invitation to live with awareness and notice the revelations coming into our lives day after day. The call to notice both the tender and exquisite beauty of our world and the hardness of heart that calls for conversion. I imagine it has always been this way.

As a star gazer, I find myself still focused on those travelers from the East. I’m left wondering, why is it that the Magi seemed to be the only ones who noticed the announcing star? In Matthew’s Gospel (Matthew 2:1-18), the high priests and religious scholars of the city knew that the Messiah was predicted to be born in Bethlehem. Yet they saw no brilliant light in the midnight sky. Neither did Herod, who was surely always on the alert for any perceived threat to his throne. Only the wise ones, who were practiced in gazing at and interpreting the showings of the Holy One, evidenced the spiritual insight needed to fully see. Until these wise ones who knew how to gaze at and interpret the heavens arrived, it was business as usual in Herod’s kingdom. Surely the Magi had no hint that their inquiry, “Where can we find and pay homage to the newborn king of the Jews?” would set in motion an eruption of insecurity, jealousy, and rage in Herod and his followers, so violent that it spilled over into the brutal slaughter of the Innocents. It seems somehow out of place in the Christmas narrative, doesn’t it?

Yet the story of what followed the Magi’s joyful visit resonates with me and I imagine with many in our world during a holiday season. Over forty years ago my brother’s family lost Brett, a toddler the same age as the little ones cut down in Bethlehem. He died very unexpectedly the day after Christmas and was laid to rest on the feast of the Holy Innocents. We couldn’t miss the contrast in the children’s cemetery: Teddy bears and toys, signs of holiday cheer, displayed on the graves of the little ones. The only sounds, our collective anguished weeping as Rachel and all of us refused consolation. Even after all these years, there is always a tinge of sadness somewhere in holiday events. I wondered at that time, I wonder still, how the Magi’s unbridled Christmas joy gave way to a similar grief when news of Herod’s cruelty eventually caught up with them at home. Light and shadow journeying together in their lives, as it often does in ours.

So as we move into the Extraordinary Ordinary time of 2026, may we continue to celebrate the presence of Emmanuel, God-with-us, who came into the world of his time, a world that was broken by oppression, violence, heartache, and exclusion. A world that at the same time rejoiced in the presence of the Prince of Peace, the Promised One who inhabited our human condition and who will never, ever, abandon us in whatever season of the heart we may find ourselves in this new year.

Takeaway
Sit in stillness with the Holy One.
Reflect on your experience of any recent celebrations of this season.
Give thanks for all that brought you joy.
Be gentle with yourself and all others for whom the season holds contrasting emotions.
Share with the Holy One whatever lingers in your heart as you move into this new year.

Featured Images: Trân Toàn, Unsplash;  Zac Ong, Unsplash

NOTE:
Blessings of 2026 to you!
Be assured of my profound gratitude that you are following Mining the Now and that we are going into this new year in the company of the Holy One and one another.
Know that I pray for a new year filled with peace, hope, and good health for you, for all those you love and cherish, and for our world moving forward in both light and shadow.

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by Chris Koellhoffer, January 2, 2026

Blessings of the New Year to you! As we move more deeply into the days, weeks, months that make a year, I’m thinking this morning of the practice that in Ignatian spirituality is known as repetition. Repetition (repetitio) in this sense involves a deliberate return to a prayer experience such as a meditation or a scripture passage we’ve prayed with before so that we might deepen our understanding and discern God’s presence more fully. In repetition, we give earlier insights and movements of the soul a second or third listening. This returning helps us to mine these spiritual experiences and offers us a way into a fresh noticing of the Holy One at work in our lives and in the world around us.

It’s been my writing practice to excuse myself from creative writing during the Christmas holidays, and this is where repetition comes in. I’ve reviewed some earlier blog posts of the past few years and selected one that I believe still speaks to us in a timely way. Written on December 29, 2023 and originally published December 30 that year, the post highlights a story that is, sadly, still continuing today in a world that is both beautiful and broken. But it is not without hope for a better year to come, a hope that endures beyond a calendar year.

Please substitute “2026” for the year in the original text as you return and revisit, “How to Leave This World.”

Featured Image:  Claudio Schwarz, Unsplash

 

by Chris Koellhoffer, IHM   December 21, 2025

If you’re reading this post, you probably already know that I’m a lover of words. The  sound of them. The feel of them on my tongue. The music they make when poetry is spoken aloud rather than read silently. I appreciate the way words coax me to put my own hungers on a page in full view of anyone who might discover them. I notice the courage words demand from me when I sit at my laptop and prepare to launch them out into the universe, where I pray they’ll receive a tender hearing.

This may explain my delight when, as a younger writer, I first noticed the opening sentence of John’s Gospel, “In the beginning was the Word.” (John 1:1) I was impressed, thinking the Evangelist and I were very much in sync with our shared emphasis on the primacy of words. I learned that this was actually so much bigger than my limited vocabulary. This was and is the Word that encompasses all desires, every longing of the human heart. This Word was and is the embodiment, the enfleshing, of the Holy One’s unconditional love for each of us.

On this fourth Sunday of Advent, this Word makes an appearance in an antiphon traditionally used for evening prayer: “For when peaceful stillness encompassed everything and night in its swift course was half spent, your all-powerful word from heaven’s royal throne leaped down from heaven…” (Wisdom 18:15).

Can we hear urgency, longing, and something like a holy impatience as if the Word simply could not wait even one more second to be among us? And when this Word entered our time and place, the name chosen for us to call the divine is Emmanuel, God with us. Not ruler, sovereign, or any other title of power that might intimidate us or keep us at a formal distance. Instead, the Word becomes a name that speaks of closeness and accompaniment. The Word chooses intimacy. The Word takes on our human flesh, our human condition. The Word inhabits a name that’s invitational and relational: Emmanuel, God with us. God with us to convince us beyond any doubt that within us and around us and all throughout our world is where the Holy One chooses to be.

It is exactly that Word who “became flesh and dwelt among us” (John 1:14). The MESSAGE Bible opens up a fresh understanding of what those familiar words call us to in this translation: “The Word became flesh and blood and moved into the neighborhood.” Sit with that for a moment. Mine the layers of meaning and implication.

If we gather this Christmas in song, in worship, in celebration, around a table set with love or beside a Nativity scene, let us remember Emmanuel, dear neighbor, God with us. Let us recognize and open the doors of our homes and our hearts to this Word who has moved into our neighborhood. Let us find the Holy in every person and place in our world, especially in those places where love is in danger of being extinguished. Let us welcome our kin here and now, everywhere, and at all times. May it be so!

Takeaway
Sit in stillness with the Holy One.
You may want to place before you an image of the Nativity as well as a representation of people from a culture other than your own.
Where might you find Emmanuel in this Christmas season?
Welcome the infant Jesus into your corner of the world and thank him for being born among us once again.

Featured Images:  Noah Black, Unsplash; Chris Koellhoffer, Nativity set from Mexico

NOTE:
Wishes for a peaceful celebration of Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, or however you mark this holy season. Thank you for all the ways you welcome the Holy One into your everyday life.

Know that I’m grateful for your prayer and support as I struggle to find words to send out into the universe with each post of  my blog, Mining the Now. Thank you for meeting my words with tenderness and welcome. I look forward to being with you once again in the new year to come and far beyond.

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Enter your email address in the space provided and then click on “Subscribe” and follow any prompts. When you receive an email asking you to confirm subscribing, be sure to confirm. Otherwise, you won’t be subscribed to future new blog posts, and I don’t want you to miss even one!

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by Chris Koellhoffer, IHM    December 7, 2025

One of the side effects of living through an often frigid and icy winter season is its impact on roads and highways. Sooner or later, we’re almost guaranteed the appearance of the dreaded pothole. Small indentations, not so bad, but larger holes can puncture a tire or seriously damage an axle. I speak from the firsthand knowing of one who has encountered and lost the battle with just such an unwanted opening.

So imagine my surprise when, on a human rights delegation to Haiti in 1995, I was among a dozen people crammed into an old van as we drove painfully slowly up the steep climb towards Cap-Haitien on the north shore of Haiti. There were no guard rails on this narrow road, which was barely wide enough for a single vehicle to proceed. No guard rails, but definitely potholes so large they could easily have swallowed our entire van with room left over. What to do? How to proceed?

Suddenly, a band of ten-year-old boys leaped in front of us. With shovels in hand, they yelled at our driver to stop, and then with great excitement and gestures explained their mission. The boys, hoping to earn a few Haitian gourdes to feed their families, wanted to go ahead of us all the way to Cap Haitien, filling in the potholes before us as we traveled. I smile still, remembering what it was like to encounter an Advent scene in the middle of February.

So this season whenever I hear THE MESSAGE translation of Luke 3:5-6, quoting Isaiah 40:3-5, I’m back on that road to Cap Haitien:

Prepare for God’s arrival.
Make the road straight and smooth,
a highway fit for our God.
Fill in the valleys, level off the hills,
smooth out the rut, clear out the rocks.
Then God’s glory will shine and everyone will see it.

Advent calls for just this sort of faithful labor and creative reimagining. As we gaze at our world that is both beautiful and broken, where might we notice the “holes” of incompleteness, the forgotten but needed soul work, the openings to forgiveness and repair? What are the “valleys” in need of filling—with gratitude, with more engaged prayer, with deeper hopefulness? What rough edges or hardness of heart needs smoothing to move us towards a softer, more tender welcoming of the Christ Child present in everyone we encounter? With the grace of the Holy One, are we ready to get out our shovel to dig and fill in what is lacking? Oh, may it be so, this Advent and always!

Takeaway
Sit in stillness with the Holy One.
You may want to place before you a shovel, a hammer, or some other symbol/image that speaks of repairing and restoring our world.
Begin with your own heart as you reflect on the suggested questions in the reflection above.
Ask the Holy One, the source of grace in repairing and restoring, to help you with filling in any empty soul spaces that you may notice this holy season.

Featured Images: Matt Hoffman, Unsplash; Tomoe Steineck, Unsplash

NOTE:
Part of the story of my Haitian encounter was excerpted from Advent Here and Now, a booklet of reflections for each day of Advent that I authored in 2010.

Thank you for your prayer for all who were part of the Advent evening of reflection at Our Lady of Mount Carmel Church in Ridgewood, NJ, December 4. Special thanks to the Women’s Cornerstone members and members of the MOMS group who shared their wisdom and insight so tenderly and generously. It was a homecoming of sorts for me to return to and pray with these dear friends of many years.

December 8: Please remember in your prayer my community, the Sisters, Servants of the Immaculate Heart of Mary (Scranton) as we celebrate our feast day on December 8. You and your intentions are always in our hearts and in our prayers of gratitude.

To automatically subscribe to receive new posts from Mining the Now:

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Enter your email address in the space provided and then click on “Subscribe” and follow any prompts. When you receive an email asking you to confirm subscribing, be sure to confirm. Otherwise, you won’t be subscribed to future new blog posts, and I don’t want you to miss even one!

*NOTE: If you are trying to subscribe while using a mobile phone, you may have to take another step. As you look at the blog post, there should be 3 horizontal lines at the top right of the page. Click on these lines and you’ll be taken to what’s on the left hand column (on a laptop or PC). Scroll down and follow the directions at * above.

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by Chris Koellhoffer, IHM   November 23, 2025

I imagine God’s dream for us as abundant life for everyone, no exceptions. Before I moved to the Scranton area in 2010, I knew that Friends of the Poor (now joined with the Catherine McAuley Center) was sponsored by my Congregation of the Sisters, Servants of the Immaculate Heart of Mary (Scranton), and founded by Sister Adrian Barrett, IHM in 1986. That the mission of Friends of the Poor (FOP) was to ease the burden and enhance the quality of life for all those living in poverty. That it brought together in friendship those who have the desire to give with those in need of assistance. Still, I was unprepared to imagine what that dream might actually look like in real life.

The Tuesday before Thanksgiving in 2010, I volunteered to be among hundreds of FOP volunteers. We assisted in ways great and small to bring to reality an annual Thanksgiving dinner planned, prepared, and served by Friends of the Poor, who, incredibly, had no RSVP to inform them of an expected number of guests. The Scranton Cultural Center opened its doors and over fifteen hundred (now many more) friends in need and friends alone for the holiday surged into a grand ballroom decorated for the season. Every table was draped with a white cloth and holding roses in a bud vase, along with a bowl of chocolates for sharing. Musicians on stage filled the hall with notes of hospitality and joy. Words of welcome, gratitude, and grace formed a prelude to the feast. As a volunteer server, I spent the afternoon squeezing between tables to carry plates heaped with a hot Thanksgiving meal to each guest, later ferrying a second meal boxed to go for our friends.

When there was finally a lull in serving, I climbed up to the balcony to survey the scene below. I gasped. Because looking out from this perch, I saw enfleshed in the hall below me the embodiment of the Holy One’s dream for our world. I saw strangers from differing backgrounds and experiences all brought together by the desire for a meal and the desire to belong to something greater than themselves. I saw a movement toward the deepening community and spaciousness of heart for which we all long.

So whatever table we might be gathering around this Thanksgiving holiday, wherever the conversation leads us, may we remember the significance of the table and its symbolism as Joy Harjo imagines in “Perhaps the World Ends Here”::

The world begins at a kitchen table. No matter what, we must eat to live.
The gifts of earth are brought and prepared, set on the table. So it has been since creation, and it will go on.
We chase chickens or dogs away from it. Babies teethe at the corners. They scrape their knees under it.
It is here that children are given instructions on what it means to be human. We make men at it, we make women.
At this table we gossip, recall enemies and the ghosts of lovers.
Our dreams drink coffee with us as they put their arms around our children.
They laugh with us at our poor falling-down selves and as we put ourselves back together once again at the table.
This table has been a house in the rain, an umbrella in the sun.
Wars have begun and ended at this table.
It is a place to hide in the shadow of terror. A place to celebrate the terrible victory.
We have given birth on this table, and have prepared our parents for burial here.
At this table we sing with joy, with sorrow. We pray of suffering and remorse. We give thanks.

Perhaps the world will end at the kitchen table, while we are laughing and crying, eating of the last sweet bite.

Takeaway
Sit in stillness with the Holy One.
Imagine the kind of table gathering you hope to create not only for holidays, but for every day.
Ask the Holy One to help you set your table with patience, with gratitude, and with largeness of heart.
Then invite the Holy One to sit down and eat with all who are gathered.

Featured Images:  Stefan Vladimirov, Unsplash; Nathan Dumlao, Unsplash

NOTE:
Blessings of the Thanksgiving holiday to you, to those you love, and especially to those who are without safe gathering spaces or food or table or home at this time: the people of Gaza, of Ukraine, of South Sudan, and every area of our world struggling with food insecurity.

Please hold in your prayer all who will be part of:
December 4
Advent Evening
Women’s Cornerstone
Our Lady of Mount Carmel Church
Ridgewood, NJ

May we meet the season of Advent ahead with openness of heart and a listening spirit.

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by Chris Koellhoffer, IHM    November 9, 2025

It may seem like sacrilege for a writer to admit that sometimes, there really are no words. Sometimes, the sheer weight of what we carry is beyond the limits of language or verbal skills. Sometimes, the only way to express our burdens is through sound, the subtle announcement of a deep, prolonged, expressive sigh.

Spiritual directors, counselors, therapists, and many others are trained to notice the significance of words as well as what is underneath the words, or what might be present but unspoken or not yet named. And lately, I’ve been noticing a whole lot of wordless messages being sent out into the world around me. Among them:

The mother with toddlers sitting in her shopping cart, telling the little ones, “No, we don’t need that right now. Let’s put it back.” Sighing after she speaks, discerning that the cost of even basic food items is beyond her family’s budget.

The man pumping gas into a truck that’s essential for his work as he watches the digits climb higher and higher. His sigh might reveal a worry that he can’t sustain the cost or the pressure of his job for much longer.

The activist pouring energy and passion into efforts to shape a more just and inclusive world, then stepping back to evaluate what difference those choices might have made. Sighs of wondering.

The hospital room where a family member accompanies a critically ill patient. When we step outside, she looks at me, shakes her head, and sighs. Her exhale communicates weariness of body and heaviness of heart as she struggles to hold onto hope.

After becoming aware of the frequency of sighs I’d been encountering in everyday living recently, I was particularly primed to take notice when I came across these words of the prophet Muhammed: “Let him groan, for groaning is one of the Names of God in which the sick man may find relief.” Ah, I thought, that’s it: groaning and sighing as the Names of God. Sometimes, no words are necessary.

What a hopeful and consoling spin this puts on our response to being paralyzed by despair. Or broken by pain. Or overwhelmed by the cruelty of the world. Or frustrated by our inability to save others. Or mired in the quicksand of our meager resources.

What grace to imagine that when we have no words, when groaning or sighing is the only avenue of expression available to our souls, we are actually praying the name of the Holy One who never abandons, who accompanies us always. May we take notice of these sounds, these attempts by our breath. May we recognize and name them in ourselves and others. And may the God who is endless love and unlimited compassion hear in our groaning and our sighing our deepest prayers.

Today might hold an invitation to notice how these wordless Names of God are being breathed into the world within us and around us and to attend to the words of the Guatemalan poet and activist Julia Esquivel:

“When it is necessary to drink so much pain,
when a river of anguish
drowns us,
when we have wept many tears
and they flow like rivers
from our sad eyes,
only then
does the deep hidden sigh of our neighbor
become our own.”
(“The Sigh” from “The Certainty of Spring”)

Takeaway
Sit in stillness with the Holy One.
Let out a groan or a sigh as an expression of any anxiety or unrest you hold in your heart.
Repeat this as many times as you desire, trusting that the Holy One hears your cry and is responding.
When you are ready to move on, bow down, give thanks, and inhale deeply.

Featured Images: Daniele Levis Peluse, Unsplash; Falaq Lasuardi, Unsplash

NOTE:
Blessings of the Thanksgiving holiday to all who celebrate. No matter what is unfolding in our lives, may we find many reasons for gratitude. May we listen attentively to all that is shared aloud and honor whatever we continue to hold in the silence of our hearts.

Especially at this time of year, I offer my profound thanks for all the ways you support my ministry of words in my blog, Mining the Now. Happy Thanksgiving!

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by Chris Koellhoffer, IHM   October 26, 2025

Right now in the Northern hemisphere, one season has come to an end while another is just beginning. For perennial flowers, it’s nearing the deadline to surrender and let go. Time to shapeshift and move on. Black-eyed Susans read the calendar first, blanketing the ground with a golden carpet. Next door neighbor echinacea noticed and proceeded to fade its bright pink petals to a somber, dusty rose. Out in the yard, the cheeks of squirrels bulged with a harvest of fallen acorns, while leaves were leaping to the ground. Overhead, geese have been lining up in formation, flapping their wings as they travel to Southern neighbors. Knowing what’s to come, I long to join them.

With a chill in the air, all seems as usual. Except for the lilac bush. What should show only leafless twigs after blooming a bright purple in the spring was now sprouting something out of turn. White flowers! In late October! Clearly, someone had missed the memo or turned the calendar pages incorrectly. Was this the one member of the created world that had not mastered the art of knowing when it’s time?

So I wondered until I learned that drought and excessive heat can cause a lilac bush to bloom out of season, first forcing the plant into a dormant-like state. We had experienced several summer weeks with extremely hot weather coupled with rainless days. Once cooler temperatures returned, the lilac responded to new information that it was safe to come out of hiding and open prematurely. What seemed to be a misreading was actually something different: an attentiveness to the reality of the season, sort of like Mary Oliver’s description of trees that had been badly battered by a hurricane but refused to give up:

“toward the end of that summer they
 pushed new leaves from their stubbed limbs.
It was the wrong season, yes,
but they couldn’t stop. They
looked like telephone poles and didn’t
care. And after the leaves came
blossoms. For some things
there are no wrong seasons.
Which is what I dream for me.”

There are also seasons for our own life decisions: the direction of our calling, the choice of a life partner, consideration of a new employment offer, thoughts about relocating, choices of a school for our child, deciphering medical possibilities so we can settle on a course of treatment. No decision, not even the smallest, is without consequence.

I often note that in these larger life discernments, there are three frequent experiences:
Discernment may be messy, with moments of consolation and desolation.
Discernment may be confusing, as we struggle to truly listen to God at work amid our own mental gymnastics.
Discernment will always involve the companionship of a loving God who will never abandon us, no matter what.

When we discern, we bring ourselves in prayer before the Holy One. We pray to be attentive to what will lead to peace and to fulfilling God’s designs for our life and the good of the world. We gather the necessary information to help us make a thoughtful choice. We seek counsel from a spiritual director, a wise expert, or a trusted friend. We notice what draws us, what we’re leaning towards, what attracts us about a possibility. We also notice what we resist, since both of these are pieces of information. We put everything in a pot on the back burner and let it simmer. Each time we receive new information, we add that to the pot and give it a good stir. As we move forward, we keep checking that pot simmering on the back burner and notice what’s coming together. As we draw near a decision, it’s helpful to try our leaning on, like a piece of clothing, and observe how it fits and how it feels if we proceed in the direction of our attraction. We trust in the Holy One’s presence and timing.

Vivian Amu notes that, “Results may take a long time to come to fruition when we embark on a discernment journey, but believe that God will never stir us the wrong way. That is God’s promise of assurance and hope.”

May it be so for all who at this moment are stirring the simmering pot and searching for a way to live in the place of love that the Holy One offers. We are with you!

Takeaway
Sit in stillness with the Holy One.
Open your hands, palms up.
Hold in your palms a choice, an issue, you may be considering.
Ask the Holy One to accompany you and enter into your reflection.
Stay with an open mind, an open heart, and notice what comes.

Featured Images: Jakob Owens, Unsplash; Nathan Dumlao, Unsplash

To automatically subscribe to receive new posts from Mining the Now:

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