A friend from our time at St Andrews has just published a book of his poetry. One poem called “Ripples” stood out in particular this morning, and so I dragged out some images and layered up my reflections in visual form. I have used this as the image for this post, and it is also further down the page. In the book he discusses how the words found him, as well as him finding the words. This relationship with meaning, and the character of the relationship, got me thinking. Religion is often represented as a top down attempt to communicate correctness to the unlearned or disobedient. For many however it is a way to respond to insights, to hold together the thousands of reflections and insights that make up experience. What does this combination of exploration and discovery reveal about the character of the creator?
The Quartz project is largely an attempt to work collaboratively to help people find ways to express their spiritual feelings.
I write about helping people to enter into their full heritage, or #SensingSpirituality, but these are all simply ways to describe that basic urge to relate, to communicate – using words if necessary. Finding words is a creative act, because you are choosing those particular words to express a thought.
The process shapes us too in looking, learning to see, we change. This is whether it is a metaphorical “looking” for tokens that other people can read and interpret, or actual looking and noticing things about our environment.
There is a long running thread of thought received into the Christian tradition that this process is present at the heart of creation. Proverbs 8 describes the presence of Wisdom as a master worker, or little child, playing with the creator. It also describes the creator delighting in this play at the same time as describing the limits of the sea. So not only is the creative process present, but it is also an act of joy. A struggle sometimes, but there is a joy built in and waiting to be discovered. As if it is a pebble in a pond rippling out throughout time. Source and destination. God “chancing it” and also sure of winning whatever way the dice land.
If you are interested in reading more poems from the book, here is where you can find it.
Find the “lost and found” on Etsy
This poem from the book stood out this morning. I have made a visual response to it. The picture of a cross surrounded by rings of fire and water, combined with the symbol for anarchy is one which has been with me for a very long time. It is a challenge for me to live to, and a challenge I believe the loving creator calls creation to respond to.