The Celtic Monk

HOPE Is there a difference for you between a wish, a hope or a dream?  I know I sometimes use those words interchangeably in a fanciful way:  I wish I was going on vacation... I hope I am going on vacation... I am dreaming of being on vacation! But when matters are more serious, or even grave...do I still use these words as if they meant the same thing?  I wish I didn't need surgery... I hope I don't need surgery... I dreamt I did not need surgery?  [I have no surgery planned]  No, I don't use these words in the same way when speaking of something more consequential, more serious. In a conversation yesterday with sister spiritual directors, one of them related something she'd heard over the weekend and that she was still in the process of unpacking and wondering about.  Her little something also captured my attention so, that it bubbled up first thing this morning.  At a conference from which she's just returned, the speaker offered this seemingly simple

John Main Seminar  2011 in Cork   Laurence Freeman/Kathleen Weller Dear Ones, Earlier this August, I attended the 2017 John Main Seminar.  We were hosted on the campus of the University of St. Thomas in the museum district of Houston, Texas.  People travelled from Venezuela, Trinidad, Australia and beyond to attend. I  still   have much to unpack from the week; much to yet ponder. The seminar began with a four-day guided silent retreat with Laurence Freeman (Benedictine) who is the Executive Director of the World Community for Christian Meditation.  He led us through short talks on finding our way to the "inner room" in our meditation.  Citing Scripture, the practice of Lectio Divina, and the images of the Rothko Chapel, Fr. Laurence made a compelling case on how we may be led into stillness and silence. A silence we practiced 6 times a day for 25 minutes each sitting.   What I want to share is more experience and interpretation than information.  It so happens tha

The tale of two…   Charles Dickens Two roads diverged in a yellow woods…    Robert Frost “In each of us, two natures are at war – the good and the evil. All our lives the fight goes on between them, and one of them must conquer. But in our own hands lies the power to choose what we want most to be we are.”   …    Robert Louis Stevenson Dear friends, It's been a long time since I've posted.  I hope by the end of this one, you'll realize it was better for me not to have been writing these past several months.  Thanks for hanging in there with me via emails, texts or FB.  Kathleen             I have never in my life felt so strong a tug at the center of my being as I have since the 20 th of January, 2017.   To say that I have lived my adult life as apolitical is kind.   I’ve never been staunch in my leanings towards one party or the other.   And truth be told, I am not now.   I’ve resisted the many Blue offers that have come my way.             Becaus

Dear Friends,         Every once in a while, I get stopped by an image.   Most often, I am reading or looking for something else when such an image seems quite simply to call my name.   It insists I pay attention. It says, “look here,” or “this is important.”   or “I’m what you were looking for.”           At least that’s what the image above said to me--when I saw it.   Yet I didn’t stop.   Because of course I was too busy. It’s December for heaven’s sake.   There are concerts and teas and parties and gifts to be bought and wrapped.   There’s traditional food to be made and cookies.   Don’t forget the cookies.         Yet this particular image was persistent, so as is my habit I simply hit COPY and SAVE and it ended up in my bottomless folder of images that try to speak to me.   The ones I save for someday. And some of them have been there a long time!         But as I read the first Chapter of John she called to me again, and I went to that folder with all those images

Dear friends,          For more than half of the voting public of these United States, it has been a rough week. My FB page is filled with disbelief, tears, rage, and horror expressed from across the nation— folks who are somewhere between uncomfortable or outright afraid.            I’ve read too much already.   Said too much already about this election.   I went from a sleepless Tuesday, to a tearful Wednesday, to an angry Thursday and a numb Friday.   By Saturday I felt like those drivers who slow down to see the crash…I just couldn’t stop watching, listening.   I woke up for the 5 th night in a row at 2:00 a.m. staring at the ceiling, my mind racing.   And I thought to myself, "think of something beautiful.   Picture something beautiful."            So this is sad, but for the longest time I couldn’t.   I couldn’t pull up an image in my mind of one sunrise or sunset.   I couldn’t find image of (one of all the photo’s I’ve taken) trees, or paths or birds.

        So as I sit down to write, I’m a little bleary eyed from staying up to watch the final two games of the World Series where my long-suffering Cubbies finally brought it home .         But as the photos and comments continue to fill social media, it occurs to me that there are lessons in this historic win for all of us--lessons we may sense but have not put into words.  So I have a quartet of options—you likely could add a few of your own.   ·          The plan was new.   ·          The key players are young.   ·          The leaders prepared. ·          The playing field, hostile. PLAN.   If you were listening, you heard over and over again that Theo Epstein was trying something new.   Building from nothing (indeed 108 years without a championship is pretty much that). He did not look backwards to a glorious past…to old ways, old rules, old outcomes. He was writing a new chapter looking forward and creating a never-seen-before path and future.