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by Chris Koellhoffer, IHM    May 25, 2025

I am reminded every time I fly that I am Christ. Permit me to explain. With twenty letters comprising my first and last names, my full name doesn’t fit on a boarding pass. So to accommodate the space, my name prints out as “Koellhoffer, Christ.” Christ. Wow! That’s who I am.

Seeing that I am Christ bestows a certain awareness on me and makes me feel that I travel wearing the mantle of the Holy. It also intensifies my sense of identity and prompts me to wonder: Am I seeing like the Holy One? Listening as the Holy One does? Does my presence feel like God’s blessing to those I encounter?

While not everyone sees their name listed as Christ on a boarding pass, every one of us is called to wear the mantle of the Holy One. To put on the mind of Christ, to incarnate, with God’s grace, the Holy One’s way of being in the world. In Prayers for People Who Say They Can’t Pray, Donna Schaper urges, “Let us find the sacred deep within the ordinary, in the sweetness in our coffee and the bread on our table. Let us never miss a chance to praise what is good…”

This is such a simple practice, isn’t it? But imagine how rich our day might be if we followed this. We might begin by gratefully savoring that steaming cup of coffee or our steeping tea or whatever beverage helps us to greet the next twenty-four hours. Our first cup may offer us a chance to sit with the Holy One in stillness and offer thanks for that space. Perhaps we greet the morning sun with Mary Oliver’s thanks, “Hello, sun in my face. Hello, you who make the morning…” (“Why I Wake Early”). From those simple beginnings, we might continue our awareness as we prepare ourselves or our children for carpooling or catching a bus or the day’s sports activities. If we include in our morning routine a few minutes of listening to headlines, we might integrate onto our prayer the news we hear of the world’s suffering.

Perhaps we commute to work, drive or walk or board a train. A wonderful opportunity to pray the Metta, blessing ourselves and sending that blessing to all our fellow commuters and beyond. If we notice travelers’ faces worn with worry or full of exhaustion, we might breathe compassion and strength to them. Perhaps words of thanks if we have meaningful employment or work that feeds our spirit.

A pause for a coffee break at work or as we catch our breath and tend to the needs of our home may lead to another moment where we express thanks for the food we have and for the nourishment of relationships that feed us in other ways. Conversation around the dinner table may also nourish, restore, and support us.

And at day’s end, we might find a few minutes to reflect on what we have seen or heard or felt this day, and how the Holy One has been part of our mindfulness. All of these pauses or moments of reflecting are ways of noticing the ordinary and giving thanks for the hidden gifts it holds.

It’s all about intentionality. Perhaps we may recognize something of our own way of praying and a kindred spirit in this whimsical prayer-poem from Steve Garnaas-Holmes:

   Ink
God, I was trying to write you a prayer
but the ink leaked onto my fingers,
the words all over my hands,
and I tried to wipe them off
but I got the words all over me
and then whole sentences got smudged
onto everything around me,
onto the world and wouldn’t you know it,
there’s no more ink left in my pen,
and I think I’ve lost the prayer entirely,
except I keep seeing it
on every tree and wall and person and headline,
and even the streets are smeared with it,
and even the clouds at times seem
prayerfully inky, and at night—
well, all I see is the ink of my prayers.
But my thoughts
have no more words
so

Amen.

Takeaway
Sit in stillness with the Holy One.
If you’re praying at dawn, ask for the grace of awareness to notice the “ordinary” parts of your day and to receive them gratefully.
If you’re praying at day’s end, review what has come into your life this day and notice your awareness of how the “ordinary” has been a gift for you.

Featured Images:  Clay Banks, Unsplash; Marcus Dan, Unsplash

NOTE:
Thank you for your prayer for all who were part of the guided retreat I offered for the Dominican Sisters of Amityville, Long Island, this past week. I’ve just come home from the retreat but I’ll be savoring the gift of their prayer, presence, and hospitality for quite some time.

For those who are relaxing or traveling, have a safe and renewing celebration of the Memorial Day holiday. Let us remember the sacrifices of the many we commemorate this day.

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by Chris Koellhoffer, IHM   May 10, 2025

In the 13^th century, the poet Rumi, who lived in what is now Afghanistan, must have been outdoors and breathing in this season when he observed, “Spring, and no one can be still, with all the messages coming through.” Oh, Rumi, you are so right on!

At this moment in the Northern hemisphere, our eyes are feasting on a riot of pink on the cherry willows, the greening of baby asparagus and red leaf lettuce, and the brave lineup of tulips as they burst into watercolors. And our ears? Such delight to be awakened at dawn not by the harsh cry of an alarm clock but by the singing and chanting of our feathered friends. Chirps and trills and warbles and whistles, so much to chat about as a new day begins.

I’m more intentionally taking in the sounds of this season since I had to purchase a new smart phone to replace my dying one. Once I got over the shock of a replacement’s cost, I discovered some good news: that with an upgraded operating system, I could at last subscribe to the Merlin Bird ID app. Developed by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, this free app makes bird identification accessible to everyone and offers various features like photo and sound identification. A user can be outdoors or sitting near a window with the app open and can eavesdrop on avian conversations. This practice opens us to wonder and encourages our desire to listen contemplatively, to live with awareness, and to be fully present to the world around us.

In Chant, Katherine Le Mée notes that this practice aligns with spiritual teaching, which “has always pointed to the fact that everything in creation has a sound, its own unique vibration.” She writes that when we try to live as conscious listeners, we “may perceive more and more of what the universe is saying to us by the simple act of listening.”

If you, like me, have an intimate relationship with the created world, you may find additional delight in now being able to address our winged neighbors by their proper names. “You’re sounding especially chipper today, Mr. Cardinal,” I might say after hearing that distinctive whistle. Or “Oh, Ms. Crow, what’s all the excitement about?” after some boisterous caws. This way of intimate and focused listening to the avian world might seem a logical next step if you, like me, already greet our bird neighbors’ relatives in the floral kin-dom by name whenever we meet one another.

So here’s a question to carry with us into the season of spring, or really into any and every one of the four seasons: What might be some of the messages you are hearing, seeing, noticing in creation in your corner of the world? What might our feathered and petaled friends be telegraphing to you about new life, fresh perspectives, and the deep yearning encoded in our spiritual DNA?

Takeaway
Sit in stillness with the Holy One.
You may want to sit or walk outside and simply listen to the voices of the natural world.
Notice the singing of birds or the gentle sway of petals in the breeze or the refreshing scent of mint.
What might the Creator be saying to you through your senses?
Share that with the Holy One, and give thanks.

Featured Images: Joshua J. Cotten, Unsplash; Austin Chan, Unsplash

NOTE:
Mother’s Day blessings to all mothers and to all who give their lives over to nurturing, encouraging, supporting, teaching, and loving life at every level.

We pray also for blessing and wisdom for our new Pope, Leo XIV, as he enters into his ministry as a newly elected global pastor.

May 18-23:
Please hold in your prayer safe travel and blessings for all who will be part of a guided retreat I’m leading for the Dominican Sisters of Amityville, New York. Thank you!

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by Chris Koellhoffer, IHM    April 27, 2025

Don’t you just love it when your heart and mind make associations for you, seemingly without any effort on your part, and then later present clear connections in ways that surprise you? I recently had the privilege of spending a precious four days with my older brother who lives in Florida and my sister and her husband who were visiting nearby. During dinner on my first night, we reminisced over stories of how our parents found one another. Mom, who grew up in the coal mining region of Northeast Pennsylvania and had a serious boyfriend there, moved to New Jersey with her sisters after high school to find work. There she met our Dad, and as she told us, “he was a lot more fun than my boyfriend back home.” So it was that all of us grew up in the suburbs of northern New Jersey.

We might call that Providence. Or grace at work. Or an accident of birth. But the reality of that landscape has so clearly shaped me and all my siblings. It invited us to freely explore the wilds of the natural world around us. It led us to embrace what today we might call creation spirituality: a profound knowing that every flower, every bit of greening, every furry, finned, and feathered neighbor is our kin, and we relate to them as such. Those formative years are responsible for the reality that we pray best, yes, we’re at our most contemplative, when we’re next to a body of water, preferably the salty and wave-tossed kind. The seeming accident of the place where we were born and raised gave us a childhood that wasn’t perfect, of course, but that was largely peaceful and absent of fear, a beginning that encouraged curiosity and cultivated beauty. I grew up owning that privilege and praying, “I want everyone to have what I have.”

After my few days in Florida, I spent Easter with another sister and her family. As we sat around and gazed at the deeply loved little toddler among us, I thought of the tribe of nieces, nephews, grandnieces and grandnephews I love dearly. Yes, I was oozing Easter joy and gratitude from every happy pore, remembering the promise of the empty tomb, the impossible good news, the incredulity of the disciples finding confirmation in the appearance of a risen Jesus.

Then I drove home and watched the evening news. My return to this practice was as sudden a jolt as listening to the Nativity Scriptures followed three days later by the abrupt and brutal Gospel account of slaughtered, innocent boys two years and under: Rachel weeping for her children. The contrast between what I was born into and where so many of the world’s fragile little ones are trying to survive looked back at me as if written in boldface and with exclamation points. Toddlers in Gaza crushed under rubble. Babies in South Sudan whom famine has robbed of the energy to cry. Both globally and closer to home, little ones struggling to escape abuse. I gaze on the suffering of the innocent, now deeply aware of the blessings of being born into my time and place, and once again I pray, “I want everyone to have what I have.”

Our place of birth is a mystery over which we have no control. I weep for every child whose life is untouched by love, who is constantly wounded by words or actions, whose only experience is the terror of war or the uncertainty of conflict. I wonder aloud to the Holy One: why them and not me? What I hear in response is that we’re called to fall on our knees in profound gratitude for whatever undeserved gifts have come into our lives because of our early beginnings. To recognize and name grace at work if we’ve known a catalog of caring parents, thoughtful teachers, faithful mentors who never gave up on us. To give our lives over in love and service to help move the Holy One’s dream of abundant life for all a bit closer to fulfillment. To be engaged in “good trouble,” working towards a more just and inclusive world for those who do not have what we had. To be people of resurrection who desire to be about all things rising, the rising of everyone, everywhere, with no exceptions, as Jan Richardson prays:

For all things rising
out of the hiddenness of shadows
out of the weight of despair
out of the brokenness of pain
out of the constrictions of compliance
out of the rigidity of stereotypes
out of the prison of prejudice;
for all things rising
into life, into hope
into healing, into power
into freedom, into justice;
we pray, O God,
for all things rising.

Blessings of this season! What might you hope to see rising in yourself or in our world at this time?

Takeaway

Sit in stillness with the Holy One.
In your imagination or with a photo, revisit the place of your birth and childhood.
What memories present themselves to you?
For all that raises up joy, give thanks. For all that rises as wounds, ask for healing.
Entrust to the Holy One whatever is in need of rising to new life in you and in our world.

Featured Images: Robin Lyon, Unsplash; Salah Darwish, Unsplash

NOTE:
Please join me in prayers of profound thanksgiving for the life and witness of Pope Francis. May his memory inspire us to care for all creation, especially the most fragile and vulnerable among us.

April 26 – May 2

Please hold in your prayer my safe travel and all who will be part of a guided retreat I’ll be leading for the Dominican Sisters of Grand Rapids, MI. Thank you.

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by Chris Koellhoffer, IHM     April 13, 2025

Several weeks ago, I spent a graced weekend presenting to and reflecting with a community I had journeyed alongside as a young adult. In my early thirties, after years of praying that was honest, after soul searching that was often painful, messy, and confusing, I made the difficult discernment to leave my original community and transfer to the Sisters, Servants of the Immaculate Heart of Mary (IHM – Scranton). That decision-making of forty-two years ago merged with the recent weekend in ways that were confirming, surprising, and full of the tenderheartedness of homecoming.

Since then, I’ve been holding the image of doors in my heart. The doors we’re afraid to open. The doors that won’t budge or that lock us out. The doors we’re prompted to explore. The doors that swing wide in welcome.

It can’t be coincidence that right now in the Northeast, spring is bravely opening doors of liberation. Forsythia bursting into sudden gold. Narcissus and Grape Hyacinth fearlessly poking their heads up through still cold soil. Robins and Cardinals warbling songs of hope to welcome the sunrise.

All these signs of courageous breakthrough lead to one of my favorite Lenten days, Holy Saturday. Sandwiched between the utter grief and darkness of Good Friday and the glory and hope of Easter morning, this Saturday that we call Holy is all about waiting. Waiting in the uncertainty of the tomb. Waiting in stillness. Waiting for a stone to be rolled away. Waiting and discerning next steps once that door has opened wide.

I’ve always felt that Holy Saturday’s significance is overlooked in our longing to get to resurrection. After all, isn’t this where we spend most of our lives, this space between loss and hope, this not knowing what’s behind Door #1, this wondering if our lives given over in love are really making a difference for the well-being of our family, our neighborhood, our nation, our world?

To all our neighbors who at this moment are buried in the tomb of numbing grief, who feel overcome by utter despair, who are paralyzed by fear over next steps, who are crushed by heartache or disappointment: please know that you are not alone. We are waiting with you. We are holding you in our heart and prayer. We are standing with arms wrapped around you in the cold and dark of this place.

Together, let us proclaim that sin and death will not have the last word. Together, let us refuse to be intimidated by the heaviness of waiting or the weight of the stone blocking the way to a fuller, freer life. Together, with the grace of the Holy One, on this day or surely on some graced day to come, let us roll away the stone and greet the dawn. May it be so!

Takeaway
Sit in stillness with the Holy One.
Reflect on any door not yet opened in your life.
What does this door look like? sound like?
How do you feel sitting on this side of it?
Share this with the Holy One.
Then ask for courage and strength to move closer to the fullness of God’s dream for you.

Featured Images: Alexey Demidov, Unsplash; Marcus Dall, Unsplash

NOTE:
Every blessing to those who have observed Ramadan or who will be celebrating Passover or Easter. Wishing you whatever freshness and newness of life you long for at this time.

Please hold in your prayer:

April 26 – May 2
Safe travel and blessing for all who will be part of a guided retreat I’m leading for the Dominican Sisters of Grand Rapids in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Thank you.

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by Chris Koellhoffer, IHM   March 30, 2025

Ice on the windshield again this morning. The winter that seemed unending in Northeast PA still manages to have a bit of a grip on my part of the Universe. I could be grumbling about the inconvenience of defrosting and scraping (a tendency I’ve indulged in many times this season). But on my better days, I gaze at the natural world around me and wonder what hidden messages I’m meant to uncover.

What could Earth be saying through its friends: ice, snow, frigid mornings? The last gasp of winter reminds us to explore what we also might be clinging to and reluctant to let go of. What we’re missing if we focus only on the elements that irk us, like the necessary extra minutes required to clear a frozen windshield or to put on thick layers of warm clothing. What if we approached these experiences more as an act of learning, of care and well-being, and less of an annoyance?

As resilient spring dares to make a comeback these days, I’m committed to paying close attention. After returning home from serving as a guest director for a directed retreat in the early days of spring, I was stunned to notice and realize that, since the beginning of time, the natural world has been practicing repetition, something that is often also a practice in directed retreats. In Ignatian spirituality  “repetition is the return to a previous period of prayer for the purpose of allowing the movements of the Holy One to deepen within the heart.” So we might go back to a Scripture passage, a movement of the heart, or a significant experience, we might listen and look again, see what more might be unfolding, and mine the deeper meaning of things.

How, I wondered, have I never before noticed that the
kin-dom of plants and all things green and growing has been practicing this repetition for far longer than we can imagine? How, pushing up through the layers of dead leaves piled on them as winter frost protection, are clusters of mini jonquils, bunches of eager crocus, tribes of brave daffodils. How they seem to joyfully trumpet we are here, we are here, we are here, over and over again. Returning is what they know. Repeating is what they do, every spring. Same faces, but a new season.

What stories they must gather from their time in the Underland! Oh, if only we cultivated eyes to see and hearts to notice, to pay attention, to mine for the deeper meaning of this flowering, repeating, ever new and ever fresh revelation.

Takeaway
Sit in stillness with the Holy One.
If you live in the Northern hemisphere, you may wish to walk outside, bask in the generous sunlight, and notice the new life around you that is returning and repeating.
If you live in the Southern hemisphere and are witnessing the coming of autumn, you may want to spend this time looking for life that is surrendering to the repetition of sleep and burrowing deep.
What might you intuit from what your eyes and heart notice?
Share this with the Holy One and ask for a repetition of whatever grace you most desire.

Featured Images: Ales Maze, Unsplash; Chris Koellhoffer

NOTE:
Thank you for your prayer for all who were part of the Assembly of the Sisters of Christian Charity in Mendham, NJ last weekend.

Now may I ask you to hold in your prayer:

April 7-8:
Travel and a Lenten day of reflection that I’ll be leading at the IHM Conference Center in Bryn Mawr, PA. Thank you.

Another thank you:
To “Gally” Galligan III, a follower of Mining the Now, who wrote after I published “The Practice of Rafting” and I suggested listening to Ben E. Cook’s version of “Stand by Me”:
Here’s what Gally offered:
“After reading today’s from you, I could not help but remember a version of this great song. You may be familiar. It is sung by various street musicians and others from all over the world and there is a video of it as well. It is inspiring…You may want to check it out. “Stand by Me: Playing for Change”
Thanks for this wonderful addition, Gally, and here’s the YouTube link for anyone who would like a listen: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Us-TVg40ExM

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by Chris Koellhoffer, IHM    March 16, 2025 

Although we didn’t have the term, “creation spirituality,” when I was growing up, I realize in hindsight that that’s exactly what my parents nurtured in my siblings and in me. A softness toward every creature. A sense of caretaking. A commitment as serious as being a big sister to my younger sisters and brother.

No surprise, then, that I’m predisposed towards tenderness for every plant and animal. And that I capitalize their names in acknowledging their being. Perhaps you, like me, have a hierarchy of sorts explaining the mystery that draws you towards certain creatures more than others. High on my list: every dog I’ve ever met, with a special leaning towards Golden Retriever, Border Collie, German Shepherd, and “mutts.” Donkeys, mini and standard, with their ruffled coat and that full-throated, enthusiastic, honking way of saying hello. Orcas (please don’t call them killer whales) forming permanent pods of visible kinship, belonging, and care for their family. And how about the clever Crow and his fascination with all things shiny and sparkling? The generous Peony sharing her perfume and the comforting Crocus and Pussy Willow assuring us that spring is near?

But it’s what I recently I learned about another favorite, Otter, that I want to get around to sharing. Perhaps we’ve seen photos of how they seem to cling to one another while resting. Besides rating high on the cuteness factor, there’s a sound reason behind this behavior. Otters hold hands in sleep to prevent themselves from drifting apart in the water. This behavior is often called “rafting,” as it keeps them safe and connected while they’re floating. It’s a behavior that’s especially important when currents are extremely strong, rough, and threatening to their safety and well-being.

I’ve been thinking about what a beloved practice rafting could become for us, both literally and figuratively. I suggest it might be a spiritual practice essential for surviving and thriving in our time and place. Rafting in prayer links our fervent pleas with people of good will, with the holy ones in our universe. Rafting gives public witness to solidarity, underscoring that there are steps for justice we might hesitate to take as individuals but wouldn’t hesitate to move into with the collective, with someone standing next to us. Rafting invites us to link arms and draw courage from people we respect and trust. It emboldens us through nearness to the resistance, bravery, and commitment of others.

So when we fear we might become the hate or indifference we see around us, let us hold on to one another. When we long to be persons of compassion and mercy towards our vulnerable neighbors, let us hold on to one another. When it appears that our individual and collective actions to foster the Holy One’s dream of abundant life for all people are not effecting immediate or significant change, let us hold on to one another. When our trust in the slow work of God (emphasis on slow) grows shaky, let us hold on to one another. Holding on challenges us to transform our holy rage at injustice into focused action for a more loving and inclusive world. Holding on invites us to grow our spaciousness of heart, to breathe in softness and breathe out fierceness.

We begin by entering into deep, inner soul work. We link arms and lean on one another for support and encouragement. We pray to bring closer to fullness the Holy One’s dream of a world that welcomes everyone, no exceptions. In all of this, we hold on tight to and are held on tight by the Holy One who remains beside us always. With tenderness. With understanding. With extravagant and endless compassion. With a love that knows no limits and has no end. May it be so.

Let’s keep on rafting!

Takeaway
Sit in stillness with the Holy One.
You may want to sit with your palms upturned.
Imagine holding hands with a person in our world who is paralyzed by fear or letting go of hope or overcome by despair. Grip their hand tightly.
Play a piece of music that resonates with solidarity. (Suggestion, “Stand by Me,” composed by Ben E. King, Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller, and performed by the Kingdom Choir), or another piece of your choice.
Ask the Holy One to hold on tight to you and to inspire you to hold on tight to everyone in our beautiful yet wounded world.

Featured Images:   Ken Conger; Aman Shrivastava, Unsplash

NOTE:
March 21-23

Please hold in your prayer all who will be part of the Assembly of the Sisters of Christian Charity in Mendham, NJ. This Assembly I’m facilitating was postponed because of inclement weather in February, so your prayers have continued to accompany us since then. Thank you.

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by Chris Koellhoffer, IHM    March 2, 2025

If you know me, you already know that I’m not inclined in the direction of the penitential. So it may seem a glaring contradiction when I declare that Ash Wednesday ranks as one of my favorite days on the liturgical calendar. Permit me to explain.

I was excited the first time I was to serve as a minister of blessed ashes on this day. I had heard there were several predictable experiences for those who distributed ashes: the line to receive ashes would be seemingly endless and the people in the line would be mostly unfamiliar and unknown. Still, I was totally unprepared for what happened to me the first time I served in this ministry.

“Return to God with all your heart” was the rhythm of the day. I prayed to be a welcoming presence, especially to any strangers awkwardly coming forward. I tried to gaze into every face with the tenderness I imagined the Holy One gazes at each of us. It was what I saw looking back at me that utterly shook my soul and has haunted me on every Ash Wednesday since.

When I peered into the face of the first person I signed with the cross, I anticipated the customary countenance of the “regular” worshippers who received the Eucharist on Sundays. This was not that. This was a desire so intense that I gasped. Caught my breath. Not only the first face I met but on face after face after face. Longing was as transparent as if each person wore a neon sign announcing it. No matter that I hadn’t met most of the people lining up and knew nothing of their stories. I saw newborn hope. Felt the weight of past mistakes cast off by the chance of turning things around. Imagined earnest and whispered promises. Witnessed faint remembrances of childhood prayers. Gazed at a sea of faces wearing the names “Sincere” and “Longing” and “Hopeful” and “Returning” on their foreheads. I knew myself to be in the presence of the Holy and simply wanted to bow down.

I was shaken not only by a palpable immersion in the sacred but by a brief glimpse into what the Holy One sees at every moment in our midst. How we dare to come forward and hold out our wounds, our shame, our failures, and still receive an embrace. How we take one step closer and then fall several steps away but still are never let go. How our intention to live lives of more engaged prayer and right relationship with God and our neighbors doesn’t always align with our daily practice, but the affirmation of our faltering efforts still remains. How there is nothing that can ever permanently separate us from the heartbeat of unconditional Love. Still.

So yes, Ash Wednesday is coming and it signals a new beginning. May we find ourselves in readiness to return to God with all our hearts. Today and always. Over and over again. Still.

Takeaway
Sit in stillness with the Holy One.
Reflect on your deepest desire for this season of your life.
Share your hopes with the Holy One.
Ask for the grace to be the face of Love for every other face you gaze at today.

Featured Image: Zulmaury Saavedra, Unsplash

NOTE:
Blessings on the Lenten journey at its beginning and far beyond. Whatever your faith tradition, I can think of no soul work more critical at this time than helping to bring into being a world that is more just, peaceful, and inclusive. Thank you for your efforts to do that. May this be so!

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by Chris Koellhoffer, IHM   February 16, 2025

True confession: during the winter months where I live, I might be mistaken for a hibernating bear. I resist going outside once the Northern hemisphere has tilted away from the sun and daylight quickly transitions to darkness. I bury myself under mounds of blankets, including a heated layer, in the cave of my bedroom. And when I must leave the comforting insulation of my den, my movement is more of a lumbering than the light sauntering of summer walks. More carefully, more mindfully, more slowly, that’s the winter pace, ice or no ice underfoot.

As I name these winter noticings for myself, I wonder if you might join me in naming some of the graced invitations the season of winter provides. To savor, instead of a quick glance followed by a hurried moving on to something else. To rest, paying attention to the rhythms of our bodies rather than pushing on against overwhelming fatigue. To contemplate, welcoming the gift of a pause or the happy surprise of time for stillness. To forsake the neighbors, Hurry and Rush, and instead make friends with Linger and Abide.

The Buddhist spiritual leader Thich Nhat Hanh authored a series of mindfulness essentials, five small, slim books that might be welcome reading for this season of burrowing deep. They are all “How to” titles: How to Sit; How to Relax; How to Love; How to Eat; and for our focus, How to Walk. The “how to” on walking is deceptively simple:

“The first thing to do is lift your foot.
Breathe in.
Put your foot down in front of you, first your heel and then your toes.
Breathe out.
Feel your feet solid on the Earth.
You have already arrived.”

Try this and notice how it dramatically slows your pace as you enter into each deliberate movement. Mindful, unhurried walking has a significant place in many spiritual practices, including prayer, pilgrimage, walking the labyrinth, walking meditation, all accompanied by intention and awareness. The slowness of mindful walking might be done in the name of our ancestors or neighbors who had to walk with sorrow or who were forced to march or to migrate. We might walk for those for whom movement of any kind is restricted because of pain or mobility issues. We might choose to walk tenderly, our feet kissing Mother Earth, to repair the harm she has suffered.

In his wonderful book, Surprises Around the Bend: 50 Adventurous Walkers, Richard A. Hasler profiles a variety of walkers including naturalists, poets, teachers, pilgrims, seekers, prophets, and social reformers. He notes that Dorothy Day discovered that when she could not pray in a traditional manner, she could pray while she was walking; that it was not until St. Teresa of Calcutta walked among the poor that she really knew how she felt; that an anonymous Russian pilgrim walked across Russia’s vast expanse, memorizing the Jesus Prayer and being transformed; that Gandhi’s 1930 trek across India on foot to protest a salt tax on his people became pivotal in their quest for independence; that Harriet Tubman walked to freedom to escape slavery in Maryland and then she marched right back over and over at risk to her own life to rescue many others.

And what of us? What motivates each of us to walk? Exercise, health benefits, contemplation, time spent in the natural world, immersion in wonder, a chance for clear-headed thinking? Whatever lures us into a gym or to the wide world outside our door, may we walk mindfully, prayerfully, tenderly on this earth. And if we’re unable to walk, may the movement of our hearts carry us mindfully, prayerfully, tenderly as we accompany one another into this fast-paced world.

Takeaway
If you’re able, you may want to walk this Takeaway; if not, sit in stillness with the Holy One.
If you’re outside, breathe deeply and be attentive to your surroundings. What do you notice? feel? see? hear?
If you’re inside, play some movement music (Suggestion: “In Beauty We Walk” by Ian Callanan or, if you’re feelin’ groovy, “The 59^th Street Bridge Song (Feelin’ Groovy)” by Simon and Garfunkel). What do you notice? feel? see? hear?
Name what you are present to and what is moving within you.
Give thanks to the Holy One for all that touches your heart and inspires you to move with tenderness and compassion through our world in the days ahead.

Featured Images:  Brian Mann, Unsplash; Brett Jordan, Unsplash

NOTE:
Thank you for your prayerful remembrance of all who were to be part of the Assembly of the Sisters of Christian Charity, February 8-9. Your prayers were very powerful and so were the elements of ice and snow! Because of hazardous driving conditions, the Assembly was postponed until March 22-23, so your prayers have moved forward to that date. Thank you!  

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by Chris Koellhoffer, IHM   February 2, 2025

What exactly is a home? A structure? A place of welcome? An incubator for relationships? A shelter from storms both literal and figurative? A center to nurture and honor and keep safe loved ones, pets, memories, and mementos? Or is home, simply put, wherever the heart is?

Altadena. Malibu. Pacific Palisades. Pasadena. We can keep adding to the litany of places, of lives lost or missing, of homes forever disappeared in fire-torn Los Angeles, in fire-ravaged California. We grieve for the thousands who have been displaced, for the many whose belongings have become mounds of ash. We weep with those whose sense of home has been destroyed, charred, or forever altered and shaken.

In “Portraits of a Deeply Meaningful Life,” Stacey Lindsay reported on a unique and artistic way to give those facing the loss of their homes “a tender well of love.” She noted the work of Jordan Heber, who has drawn from this well by painting images of homes as they once were before the wildfires and gifting those works of art to devastated homeowners. Her efforts have been replicated by Asher Bingham, a portrait artist in Los Angeles, who’s also sketching homes that have burned down. “Since I can’t donate to every GoFundMe that makes me cry,” notes Bingham, “I draw. And keep drawing.” Fellow illustrators, art students in Seattle, and a myriad of people volunteering to help with administrative tasks have joined the creative efforts to bring solace to some of the devastated homeowners.

In standing with all whose sense of home has been destroyed through natural disasters like wildfires, floods, or earthquakes, we also hold in tenderness and prayer those whose homes have been obliterated by fire raining down from the sky in bombings: Aleppo, North Gaza, Khan Younis, Rafah, Dnipro, Lviv, Kharkiv, and so many other places in our world where the sound of weeping accompanies the loss of home.

We remember the heartache of refugees and migrants who might have longed to remain in the familiar places they called home but whose dreams were upended by threats of  imminent danger or life-crushing poverty or political instability. In “Home,”  British Somali poet Warsan Shire reminds us that the suffering of people far away could become our own overnight, could threaten our sense of safety and well-being. She pleads with us to understand,
“that no one puts their children in a boat
unless the water is safer than the land…”

Speaking as a refugee herself, Shire admits that her desire to return home can’t be fulfilled because
“home is the mouth of a shark
home is the barrel of a gun
and no one would leave home
unless home chased you to the shore…”

For all for whom the home they loved is no more, Jan Richardson (©Jan Richardson. janrichardson.com) offers “Blessing Where A Life Was Made,” excerpted here:

Bless this place
and the life
left behind—
this emptiness
that is not empty,
this absence
that is not void.

Bless this place
that knows full well
what was made here,
that wears
the mark of it
always,
imprinted forever
by what passed by
in its intricate,
astonishing grace.  

We know that all of us live together as neighbors for whom Jesus promised to prepare a place (John 14:3). What then, are we called to do, how are we called to be, in the in-between times? Even though we may be hundreds of miles away from someone else’s story of sudden homelessness, how might we be present to those who mourn for homes that are no more? What does home mean for them and for us?

Takeaway
Sit in stillness with the Holy One.
You may want to place before you a globe or an image of people who are suffering loss.
Gaze at the image, and notice what you see and feel.
Breathe out your compassion to all who long for the welcome and safety that is home.
Share with the Holy One your intention to be present to and hold in tenderness and prayer God’s suffering ones.

Featured Images: Mantas Hesthaven, Unsplash; Zoltan Tasi, Unplash

NOTE:
February 8-9:
Please hold in your prayer all who will be part of an Assembly of the Sisters of Christian Charity in Mendham, NJ. I will be with them to lead reflection and contemplative dialogue around the  work ahead: becoming agents of healing for one another and for this world so beloved by the Holy One. Thank you.

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by Chris Koellhoffer, IHM   January 19, 2025

Sometimes it seems as if the Holy One has to deliver more than a gentle nudge to get our attention. This was my experience recently when several forms of household breakdown or domestic disintegration occurred within the space of one week.

I’ve been living in my sunny apartment for fifteen years now. Most of the donated furnishings have lived here far longer than I. Some, like the sheer voile curtains on the many large windows, have witnessed occupants come and go over several decades.

Recently, when I could no longer ignore their dusty appearance, I took down the living room curtains and washed them. When I removed the curtains from the washing machine, an unexpected epiphany: the curtains were now shredded into dozens of small particles. (I’ve learned since that three years is the average life span of voile. Who knew?) But at that point, confident in my unknowing, I proceeded to then wash the kitchen curtains. Disintegration once again. And as often follows, not long after I purchased and ironed and replaced all the window coverings, my ancient iPhone showed signs of a serious decline. Can you guess the rest of that story?

Everything, including things that disintegrate, can be food for soul work. Gratitude is a spiritual practice that extends even into our connection with the inanimate world. When multiple objects break down or cease functioning unexpectedly and simultaneously, we’re led to ask, what’s happening here? What’s underneath the falling apart? Aside from the practical need for replacements, what are we meant to notice, pay attention to, and learn?

We normally don’t give much thought to the simple possessions that surround us. But with prayer and reflection, we may discern from the shredded curtains or the worn-out phone that some of our familiar ways of doing and being have completed their purpose in serving our needs. With their collapse, we may notice something shifting in us, in our perspective, in the way we move through the world, in our awareness of all that is around us day to day.

But before we discard these no longer useful inanimate objects, one more step: let’s thank them for their service, voicing gratitude for all the ways they have filtered sunlight or opened us to beauty or carried the voices of people we love over time and distance. With the poet Pat Schneider, let’s savor and appreciate the ordinary companions of our everyday living:

The Patience of Ordinary Things

It is a kind of love, is it not?
How the cup holds the tea,
How the chair stands sturdy and foursquare,
How the floor receives the bottoms of shoes
Or toes. How soles of feet know
Where they’re supposed to be.

I’ve been thinking about the patience
Of ordinary things, how clothes
Wait respectfully in closets
And soap dries quietly in the dish,
And towels drink the wet
From the skin of the back.
And the lovely repetition of stairs.
And what is more generous than a window?

Is there anything breaking down or nearing an end or calling for a fresh look in your life at this moment? If so, what might it be inviting you to reflect on at this time?

Takeaway
Sit in stillness with the Holy One.
You may wish to place before you a simple implement of your every living: a cup, a plate, a kettle, a spatula, a placemat, and more.
Reflect on the object’s patience and the “kind of love” it shows you day after day.
Promise that going forward you will use it gently and with awareness of its service.
Give thanks to the Holy One for all the living and inanimate creation that serves you.

Featured Image: Laura Rivera, Unsplash

NOTE:
As I write, I’m painfully aware of the thousands of people displaced by wildfires in California. Added to the terrible loss of life is the loss of home and safety and a sense of well-being, with not even the smallest memento salvageable. To all who are bereft, please know that our Mining the Now community holds you in prayer and in tenderness as we breathe compassion and healing energy to you and to all of our suffering neighbors throughout the world.

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