Tag: christianity

pilgrimage, Prayer

Still walking with Werburgh….and the Risen Christ

Dr. Jennifer Fox Eades

This post is written a week after my last walk….a long walk to Marple and back. And perhaps it was too long? It certainly left me with bruised toes and a need to work out how to better protect my feet on a 20 mile hike. And perhaps it left me with a bruised ego too…..hence the time lag between walking and reflection. Somehow I thought I could do this without struggle, without pain.

But the day AFTER my overly long walk, I was planning ANOTHER pilgrimage, this time with Year 6 at St John’s Primary School, Bollington. The children want to walk a Bollington pilgrimage as part of saying goodbye and marking the end of their time at primary school. And a wise and articulate 11 year old girl said, ‘It can be hard work. Pilgrimages ought to be hard’.

And of course, she is right. Pilgrimages ARE meant to be a struggle, are meant to tax us, physically, mentally, spiritually. Because it’s when we are challenged that we grow.

And my walking is being done in the season of Easter. As I explained to children at St John’s and Bollington Cross this week, Easter is a LONG festival, it lasts 7 Sundays, ending on the feast of Pentecost on 24th May this year. And I have been walking it with Werburgh and, a little unexpectedly for me, with a new sense of the presence of the Risen Christ.

Ian Mobsby, in his reflection for the Sixth Sunday of Easter speaks of letting go as a contemplative practice….letting go of certainty, letting go of needing to have clear answers, letting go even of our images of God. https://postsecularcontemplative.substack.com/p/easter-week-6-10-16th-may-reflection?r=50siwv&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&triedRedirect=true

I agree. That has been my experience. About 20 years ago, after being profoundly wounded by people in the church, I felt called to let go of everything I believed about God. And it hurt. And I felt a sense of loss, of bereavement. I mourned the faith I had let go of.

More recently I found myself unexpectedly back in church and even on the path to ordination. Yet I also found myself letting go of Jesus. It was not that I stopped believing in the Trinity, the kind divine community at the heart of Christianity but the White Jesus, the Colonial Jesus, the dominating, powerful macho Jesus proclaimed in a riot at the Whitehouse and used to wound and hurt my black and disabled and LGBTQI+ friends….I felt called to let go of him. Not really knowing if another Jesus would turn up…..

And again, I felt lonely. Again, it hurt. Again I mourned the relationship I had let go. But I just wasn’t sure who Jesus was anymore. It was hard, listening to friends in chapel singing about this Jesus I didn’t think I recognized anymore. Intellectually I knew Jesus hadn’t gone anywhere but he felt …..absent.

And then, again unexpectedly, this Easter, the Risen Christ has been with me once more, walking the canal paths, sitting with me in Ian’s beautiful meditations, somehow there once more. And I feel a profound comfort and a sense of being healed, of being held.

The spiritual life IS a pilgrimage. And I know I, at least, need to let go of the idea that this pilgrimage is, or ought to be easy. Ought not to hurt. Because sometimes we get bruised toes. But always, always…..felt or not…….the Risen Christ is with us. Amen.

pilgrimage, Prayer, Spirituality

Walking with Werburgh 5: A crowded towpath or You’ll never walk alone

Dr. Jennifer Fox Eades

In these post Easter weeks, I am continuing to walk whenever I can in preparation for my June pilgrimage. And this morning, on the way to church along the Macclesfield Canal, I was reflecting on two things. Firstly, I had been reading Ian Mobsby’s blog on the text for this Sunday, the 1st after Easter. It’s John:19-31, where Jesus appears in a locked upper room, first to most of his disciples, but NOT Thomas and then a week later, to Thomas as well.

And Ian notes that the Risen Christ comes not into strength or victory, but into fear, into confusion and uncertainty, into anxiety, into the locked room of our ordinary and often muddled lives. The Risen Christ, Ian writes, ‘moves into the very heart of what they and we are experiencing’. You can read Ian’s blog, Contemplative Christian in a PostSecular Culture here https://postsecularcontemplative.substack.com/p/breathing-peace-through-locked-doors

And what I was noticing, as I walked along, was that I tend to think I OUGHT NOT to feel that anxiety in my chest or that grumbling irritation in my gut or that sudden inexplicable sadness that wells up unexpectedly. I tend to think I should rid myself of such feelings – be somehow more serene, more together, a more calm and confident version of myself. Surely, at my advanced age, and after SO much therapy and SO much self-work, I’m somehow past these emotional squalls?

But today, in the light of Ian’s words, I wondered how it would be if instead of trying to rid myself of that tight ball of anger/fear/sadness in my chest – and often I find it’s all three rolled into one – I saw that as the very place, the very room where the Risen Christ arrives, unannounced and says ‘Peace be with you’. I wondered how it would be if I effectively welcomed my emotions as the place where Christ dwells?

And as I mused on that this morning I noticed that the anger/fear/sadness didn’t go away, precisely. But I began to experience them a little differently, to be curious about their source and their potential, to wonder about Christ in the middle of them, not scolding me for feeling them, but breathing on them and me and blessing us, in all our muddle and confusion.

And my second thought was that, just as the Risen Christ comes and stands in the locked rooms of our lives and travels ahead of us into Galilee, so he walks besides us all the time. As do a lot of other people……

Last Tuesday I did a long walk in company, for a change. Part of my family and I walked through Rainow and along Kerridge to White Nancy and breakfast at Waterside Cafe before heading home along the canal. Now, as an introvert, while I LOVE walking with other people, I actually find it easier walking alone – I can go at my own pace, stop when I please. And certainly, most of my rambles and my planned pilgrimage will be solitary.

But of course, my walk isn’t solitary at all – or at least, a Christian worldview asserts that my walk is not solitary. And increasingly, that is my faith, that is my experience. I am ALWAYS walking in company.

This morning, and every morning, the Risen Christ is both before and beside me.

And I consciously place myself, through my prayers, in the company of the ‘kind divine community of the Trinity’ (Butcher 2022), Mother, Son and Holy Spirit.

And as a Franciscan I am always walking in company with St Francis and St Clare of Assisi.

And on this pilgrimage I have specifically invited both St Werburgh and St Chad to come along too.

And as I age I have more of a sense of the community of my own personal saints always alongside me – my mum, my dad, my beloved grandmother Nanny Hubble.

And I walk as a prayer with and for the people in my life now, my lovely family and friends, the churches I serve, St Oswald’s, Bollington https://stoswaldbollington.org.uk/ and St Peter’s Macclesfield https://stpetersmacc.org/; my Alexander colleagues, my church colleagues, the countries and causes I care about and more……

Somehow they are all there on the towpath. It’s quiet and peaceful and solitary – and crowded, full of an unseen presence. They are all there, in the locked room of my heart, in the midst of my grumbles, anxieties and sadnesses, beckoning me onwards, beckoning me outwards, beckoning me to unlock the door and take each step as a prayer of thanksgiving for all that is, all that I’ve been given, all that I am and will be. Introvert or not, I am always in company with others and I thank God for that. And I thank God that, together, they all whisper, ‘Peace be with you’.

A walk in company – photo by my son-in-law

Nichalos Herman/Brother Lawrence of the Resurrection, Practice of the Presence, A Revolutionary Translation by Carmen Acevedo Butcher 2022, Broadleaf Books: Minneapolis

pilgrimage

Walking with Werburgh 3

Dr. Jennifer Fox Eades

“Creator of all, have mercy on us

Jesus bearer of our sins, have mercy on us

Spirit of grace and truth, grant us peace”

The prayer above emerged in the course of a 12 mile walk this morning along the Macclesfield Canal as I prepare for my June pilgrimage along The Two Saints Way. 6 miles one way, 6 miles plus breakfast on the way back ( I left early, to catch the bird song!)

And what I realised I had done was to craft a trinitarian prayer. The Holy Spirit can seem the poor relation of the trinity – She is mentioned far more rarely in our Christian prayers and liturgies than the other two persons of the trinity, traditionally God the Father and God the Son. And I make no apologies for prefering to gently balance the overwhelmingly masculine language of protestant Christianity by naming the first person as Creator, whatever the theological arguments against it (and there are many! There always are!)

One of the books I have been reading this Lent is a beautiful new translation of a spiritual classic, the Practice of the Presence of God by Brother Lawrence (a 16th century friar). This translation is called Practice of the Presence and is by Carmen Acevedo Butcher

Butcher speaks of the ‘kind divine community of the Trinity’ that weaves throughout the friar’s teaching as a bedrock of Christianity, a ‘healthy threeness’ often somehow missing from theology and church language.

So I am choosing to prepare for my pilgrimage in conscious company with that kind, divine community, as well as with St Werburgh and St Chad and my Franciscan friends, St Clare and St Francis.

And as I prayed I began to wonder who, exactly I was praying for? And indeed who I was going on pilgrimage for in the first place?

And at the start of today’s 12 miles I found I was praying for people I know and love – my own family and friends and the people of St Oswald’s, Bollington whom I have been privileged to serve and to grow to love these past 3 years. And then my prayer widened ….and I realised I was praying, too, for the wider world, and asking Jesus to bear the structural sins of inequality and poverty, war and racism, sexism and homophobia.

And then my prayer widened still more. Last night I was attending a Lent Course with my sisters and brothers of the Third Order https://tssf.org.uk/ which you can find here https://www.spiritoffrancis.com/europe/,. And we were asked what the land, in this case of Europe, asks us to remember truthfully. And perhaps because of that I found myself, this morning, praying for the land I was walking upon and asking the Creator to have mercy upon Mother Earth and Christ to bear the sins that we inflict upon Her and the Spirit to bring peace between humanity and the rest of creation, as well as peace between people and nations and peace to the heart of every human.

And I pondered, too, on the purpose of my pilgrimage. At a simple level it’s a kind of retreat, time out to mark the end of my ‘training curacy’ and the beginning of…..whatever the future holds. But I began to see, as I walked and as my prayer widened, that I would be walking and praying and letting my walking BE prayer for many people; for my churches, St Oswald’s, Bollington https://stoswaldbollington.org.uk/ and St Peter’s, Windmill Street https://stpetersmacc.org/; for the schools and carehomes I have worked with, for the diocese of Chester in which I serve https://www.chesterdiocese.org/ ; for our nation and the nations of the world and, yes, for Mother Earth itself on whom I will be walking .

St Francis understood the relatedness of all people – and all things. He called all humanity Sister and Brother but he extended that relatedness and mutual dependence to all of creation.

I hope to quietly, prayerfully, do the same.

And did I mention that the porridge at Waterside Cafe https://www.facebook.com/cafewaterside is REALLY good?

pilgrimage

Praying Creatively with St Francis’ Canticle of the Creatures

Dr. Jennifer Fox Eades

Most high, omnipotent good Lord (Our Kindest Grandmother Adored), To you be creaseless praise outpoured, And blessing without measure. From you alone all creatures came, No-one is worthy you to name.

My Lord (God) be praised by Brother (Sister) Sun, Who through the skies his (her) course does run, And shines in brilliant splendour. With brightness he (she) does fill the day, And signifies your boundless sway.

My Lord (God) be praised by Sister Moon, And all the stars that with her soon Will point the glitt’ring heavens. Let wind and air and cloud and calm, And weathers all repeat the psalm.

By Sister Water then be blessed, Most humble, useful, precious, chaste. Be praised by Brother (Sister) Fire; Cheerful is he, (she) robust and bright, And strong to lighten all the night.

By Mother Earth my Lord be praised; Governed by you she has upraised What for our life is needful. Sustained by you though every hour, She brings forth fruit and herb and flower.

My Lord (God) be praised by those who prove In free forgiveness their love Nor shrink from tribulation. Happy, who peaceably endure; With you Lord  (Mother) their reward is sure.

By Death our Sister praised be, From whom no one alive can flee, Woe to the unprepared. But blessed be those who do your will And follow your commandments still.

Most High omnipotent good Lord (Our Kindest Grandmother adored) To you be ceaseless praise outpoured and blessing without measure. Let every creature thankful be And serve in great humility.

The Canticle of the Creatures is a hymn that St Francis wrote near the end of his life. It expresses his sense of the profound sacredness and inter-connectedness of all creation. I love it and sing a version of it more or less every day, and have done so for nearly 15 years. And I do so – creatively. I quite deliberately play with the words. Because, like most God-talk throughout history and round the world and in all traditions (and all faiths) it assumes that the Holy is male and exclusively names God as He.

Which, at this point in my life and my spiritual path, I find …..unhelpful.

So, generally, I change the genders of Brother Sun and Sister Water – sometimes they are Sister Sun and Brother Water. Playing with the genders gently challenges the stereotype that men are always strong and in control and women are always gentle and pure!

I play with the opening.  ‘Most High Omnipotent, good Lord’ becomes  ‘Our Kindest Grandmother Adored’. Someone once asked me which woman ‘imaged’ God for me and I knew at once that it was my beloved grandmother. For me, God is not an omnipotent, royal male (God isn’t female either, of course, God is all genders and none). So I lean on that powerful, personal image in my own praying of the Canticle. In the version above my own adaptations are in bold type. You can make your own!

But I sing this version of the canticle while I walk, or run or cycle in God’s good creation.

I began playing with prayer creatively as a young mother of three children. To carve out time alone was sometimes, frankly, impossible so I learned to pray – with my children. I committed prayers to heart so I wasn’t reliant on books and I would sing or say my prayers with them as I went about the work of the day.

It was a very practical decision.

Years later, I committed the Canticle of the Creatures to heart so that I could sing it on my daily run, and still fit in silent prayer before breakfast, caring for my family, working part-time, studying and helping to lead a church. Again, it was a very practical decision.

Now I have more time available I continue to pray creatively, playfully – and now it is a theological decision. And the version I sing is a theoological decision, too.

Humans, made in the image of a creator God are creative at their core. It is never a question of ‘are you creative?’ but ‘how are you creative?’ And I suspect that most, if not all, people of faith are creative in how they pray and when they pray and where they pray. Yes, there is tradition and that can be beautiful and wonderful. And then there is how we practice that tradition – which will change each time we pray because we pray as embodied creatures whose bodies and lives and environments are changing moment by moment.

I have always prayed creatively but if I am honest I have often felt slightly guilty for doing so. Am I praying ‘properly?’ I have asked myself and even, ‘is this allowed?’ 

Now, I have spent 15 years singing about the Spirit of God incarnate in Sister Sun and Brother Water, Mother Earth and our Grandmother God. I have spent 15 years letting the words of the Canticle sink into my bones with each step as I have run, walked or cycled on our Mother Earth.

And after 15 years I am learning to let go of the guilt and to enjoy my God-given creativity. I am learning to accept that I really am a woman made in image of our creative Mother or Father or Grandmother God – and to be thankful.

Questions for reflection

How are you creative?

Is there an activity in your life you don’t currently see as prayer that you could see as prayer? How might that activity change if you did?

Can you learn by heart – and play with – a part of the Canticle?

A version of this article first appeared in Issue 26 of Little Portion, The Magazine of the Third Order, Society of St Francis, Spring 2025.

My book, Embodying Prayer (2024) is published by Christian Alternative Books

pilgrimage

A woman of peace

Dr. Jennifer Fox Eades

This has been a week when the world has felt full of angry voices and violent actions. It is a week when those of us who work for peace and kindness and care in our world and in our church have been shocked anew by stories of violence and abuse.

It was a week when, bruised and bewildered by the news of my church’s shame, I wondered what on earth I could say to an assembly full of beautiful children and their equally beautiful hard working teachers.

And as I knelt, early on Wednesday morning, in front of an icon of St Clare, it shone in the light of my candle and I knew what I wanted to say. I knew how I wanted to be. So let me tell you her story……

“Clare was a woman of love, a person of prayer and a person of peace. And she always remembered that she followed Christ, the Prince of Peace.

But the times she lived in were not peaceful times. Men of war, men of violence, meant that life was often dangerous for ordinary women and children and men.

And a story is told about St Clare of how, one day, an army of violent men came to attack the little town of Assisi where Clare lived.

And instead of running away and instead of fighting back, St Clare remembered that she followed Christ, the Prince of Peace. And she went into her little church and brought out a  box. And in that box there was a small piece of the bread and a tiny drop of the wine that Christians eat and drink when they remember Christ, the Prince of Peace.

And Clare held that little box and she just stood – and remembered. She remembered all the women and men and children in the town of Assisi. And she remembered Christ, the Prince of Peace. And she remembered that the men of war she could see before her were also children of God.

And on that day, for some reason, the men of war turned back. Some people say they were scared of this little godly woman. I’m not so sure. I think that on that day they, too, remembered peace and remembered that they were children of God. And I think they chose – and it is always a choice, to stand and remember peace and love for themselves.”

So today, sisters and brothers, (and everyone, of any faith, who is reading this IS my sister and my brother) in the face of the violence and injustice and sheer nastiness that can happen in our world I invite you to stand – not to flee and not to fight – but simply to stand for peace, to stand for justice and love and kindness and compassion. And please remember that you – and everyone you meet today – is an infinitely precious child of God.

May She bless you and may She keep you and may She give you Peace.