Greening

My pilgrimage to Iona and my new poem about Greening.

Photo by Jonny Gios on Unsplash

The time has come for me to go on a spiritual pilgrimage. My wife and I are traveling to a remote isle off the coast of Scotland to spend time in personal retreat. Iona has long been a haven; a destination; a place that pilgrims. have travelled to for discernment, retreat and to renew their souls in the lush beauty here.

People have gone on retreats for thousands of years. They went away—to go in. They found it necessary and knew that the way through—whatever hard time they might have faced—was to go alone and to go “in.” A quaker writer I so love, Parker Palmer, said it best, “The way out is the way in.”

A pilgrimage is a way to go “in” so that one can go “on” with their life—having met the Creator; having drawn near to the Holy and having spent time to ponder, pray and find the way by walking.

A pilgrimage is a way into the soul to find the Creator in our midst. It is a human attempt to “draw near unto God” as the writer tells us to do in his book James in the New Testament.

I am drawing near now because, more and more on my off-ramp from work and ministry, retreats promise the renewal and greening that our souls so need. I’m convinced, more than ever, that retreats, pilgrimages or taking time off to go away is a necessary as our daily bread. In these days of chaos and confusion, going solo—going off and away is really our best opportunity to preserve our sanity, equilibrium and equanimity.

As I’ve written on Substack, I’m in a season of spiritual renewal and soulful re-birth. If you’re new to my Substack—welcome but you’ll need to read backwards to find how week after week for two years now, I’ve shared confessionally with you about my journey. I could have never imagined, that a man at 70 years of age could find his spiritual life so invigorated, alive and restored. I could have never dreamed that after giving and giving and giving, that I would be now given “to” in such an abundant and beautiful way. I’m not special as many of you know. I’m very human. But what is happening is beyond a human explanation.

As I’ve written poems, you’ve been privy to my “greening.” This is the term, “greening” that I’ve landed on to best describe my life as I am aging at this point. The term is not new. I discovered in my research that a Benedictine Sister named, Hildegard of Bingen coined this term in the 12th century. She described an inner transformation of the soul in the midst of the dark ages in which she wrote. She wrote volumes; published books galore; traveled wildly across Europe speaking, founding monastic movements and wrote several volumes on herbal remedies—using what God made on this Earth to keep us healthy and sustain us.

Greening fits. And I am hoping to green for many years to come.

Thus, my pilgrimage with Gwen is here. We leave in a few days. I’ve written here also, how hard this year has been for Gwen with all the challenges of a surgery to totally replace her shoulder and her suffering from traumatic nerve damage from the surgery. She has worked so hard making recovery her full time job. She’s well enough to go with me and excited to join this particular pilgrimage.

Speaking of retreats…

I have very exciting news to share in closing before I offer you my new poem—which will be the lead poem in my new book of poems that will come out in late fall.

During the COVID years, I joined with a dear friend to write a book about how to spend one day alone with God. Peter Ivey and I co-authored, Solo: Creating Space with God. The exciting news is this: the book is now being released as a “hardback” edition. This is important news because a hardback edition gives this book the gravitas, weight and honor it deserves. It is now available and I’ excited to offer it here for the very first time. Here’s the link to read what endorsers have said about SOLO.

Here’s the link to order the book on Amazon. You’ll see the hardback choice as well as paperback and a Kindle Version. I’ll encourage you to order the hardback and to use it and to give it to someone who really needs time off and time away.

Here’s my poem I want to now share with you. This is a deeply personal poem—one that many of you might not understand. You may think “Why is Steve writing this kind of poem these days?” I’m writing all my poems in my new voice as a poet; as a pilgrim and as a witness to the truth as I am seeing it and living it out at this very moment.

I’ve chosen this poem to be the lead poem in my book of poems, titled, GREENING: The Journey of Birth, Life, Death and Renewal

Photo by Ricky LK on Unsplash

This poem reflects how Hildegard of Bingen has offered to me-to us, ways, terms and words that describe the greening process. Some of my phrases are direct quotes from her own words written in the 12th century in what we call the “Dark Age”…but for Hildegard, the Dark Age became the age of greening indeed.

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