My
nephew, Justin Bell, the son of my sister Valerie and Steve Bell,
finished his Masters of Divinity at Fuller Seminary, then went on to be
the only theological student on record to receive a Peter Stark
Master’s Degree in Film Producing from the University of Southern
California. He did some student interning at Imagine Entertainment, Ron
Howard’s production company, and ended up with a job working for Ed
Saxon, the Academy Award-winning producer (for the film The Silence of the Lambs)
just as they were ramping up production on a new movie. The director of this film was Sam Mendes, who won an Academy Award for American Beauty.
Start-up work is generally entry-level, gofer kind of stuff; but it’s
something for a recent film-school graduate to step into the producing
responsibilities (albeit assistant level) of a film in progress. Away We Go, staring
John Krasinski and Maya Rudolph, was Justin’s first professional
cinematic job. He even received screen credit, Justin Bell, Assistant to the
Producer. Believe me, for a new player in the Hollywood
arena, this is a pretty big deal.
So I e-mailed Justin when I noticed an editorial in the October 26 USA Today
newspaper, with the headline ‘Holy’
moments surround us. In it, the author, Dean Nelson,
director of the journalism program at Point Loma Nazarene in San Diego,
makes the point that holy moments are not only experienced in church or
religious functions, but they occur in all of life. The tagline reads:
“You don’t have to be religious to know that there’s something bigger
out there, often in plain sight.” He beautifully contends that we
should observe the days’ events through the prism of sacramentality.
(Quite a lovely editorial for a national newspaper, actually.)
As evidence, he cited moments in two films, The Shawshank Redemption
and Away We Go.
Nelson focuses on the moment near the end of the last film (a section I
knew Justin had worked with in a script rewrite). “Haven’t we all been
part of conversations where they somehow take on a deeper dimension,
even though it’s just two people talking?” the writer asks. He
continues:
“It’s as if the two (or more)
people tapped into something much bigger than themselves. It happened
toward the end of the movie Away We Go, where the couple … expecting a
baby, make promises to each other. But because of the camera angle from
above, it is clear that they are making those promises to the universe
as well. It’s both private and cosmic. Watching it, I thought of the
sacrament of confession. And haven’t we all had meals with friends or
family where there was another level to that experience, and we didn’t
want to leave the table because of that additional Presence? I’ve had
Eucharistic moments at picnic tables, restaurants, kitchens and the
beach.”
I know exactly what this writer is talking about. In fact, one of the
driving motivators of my existence is to hunt down, seek out, be aware
of, find and celebrate this numinous quality in as much of my life as
is possible. And like any discipline, the more I practice, the more it
becomes an active facility in my living.
These kind of moments dot Scripture accounts. For instance, when the
prophet Elisha was at Dothan, the King of Aram sent men to capture him
(because he revealed the whereabouts of this army to Israel’s king). “He sent horses and chariots and
a strong force there. They went by night and surrounded the city.”
This obviously was an upsetting sight to the servant of the prophet,
but Elisha prayed, “‘O,
Lord, open his eyes so he may see.’ Then the Lord opened the servant’s
eyes, and he looked and saw the hills full of horses and chariots of
fire all around Elisha.” 2 Kings 6, NIV.
Surely, this was a holy moment observed by someone as dim-eyed as the
rest of us normally are.
Two weeks ago, I received a phone call from my daughter-in-law Angela.
Our son Jeremy and she frequent the local public library, which is
within walking distance of their new home. They sign out intriguing
DVD’s for free—“Mom, they’ve got great documentaries. You need to check
them out.” “Hey! We got complimentary museum passes from the library!”
Two Saturdays ago, the West Chicago Library and the Park District
sponsored a free dance in the high-school auditorium. “Do you and Dad
want to come? They have a dance band, but they’re also offering free
swing lessons. We have to sign up now at the checkout counter. Come
on—it’ll be fun.”
OK. OK. When any
of your adult children thinks it would fun to do anything with you,
my rule of thumb is: YOU BETTER GO.
Please understand that David and I are dance-deficient. It was a big
“forbidden” in both of our ultra-conservative church pasts. I can dance
swing a little if I have a good partner who doesn’t mind me counting
under my breath, Step-step-rock
step-step; step-step-rock step-step. And there is some
improvement in that I am landing on the right foot going into turns and
whirls as well as coming out of them—Whew! So, I
broached it to my husband, saying, “I really think we need to go” and
was amazed that my body-rhythm-challenged husband acquiesced.
Come that Saturday night, we found ourselves in the high-school
cafeteria with an amazing assortment of local folk (in addition to our
son, daughter-in-law, 2-year-old granddaughter and 3-month-old
grandson). We were welcomed at the door by an official committee member
(librarian, perhaps, or library board member), given an American-flag
lapel-pin (?), walked past the shy group of high-schoolers—all dressed
up (!) in dancing clothes, both guys and gals. We commandeered a small
table, noticed the white-haired couples, the college-age kids, and
shortly after arrival, were invited onto the dance floor while a
teaching troupe introduced us to swing patterns. I was concerned for
David, who is not an awkward man but who regresses to the awkwardness
of junior high at moments like these. So I kept a watchful eye out for
him as our instructor shifted us around the circle from partner to
partner.
But David was game; after all, his 2-year-old granddaughter was wigging
and jazzing all over the place without any evidence of
self-consciousness (oh, to be an extroverted 2-year-old again). Perhaps
a certain freedom came due to the clumping habit of the high-schoolers;
an awkwardness behavior well remembered even by those of us in our
sixties and seventies. Perhaps it was because my extremely inept
dance-lesson partner was about 16, had never danced before and didn’t
have a clue which foot to move first into which step. “I think you will
do really well,” I said to encourage him. After all, I am 67—I can
certainly lavish these benefices on an emerging man-guy. “Really?” he
responded, sounding amazed. “Yes, I think you have natural rhythm and
you should learn really fast.” Perhaps, because we were surrounded by
stumblers and stompers and learners, we became more relaxed—step, step, rock-step, step.
By the time the band straggled in and begin to play live swing music
(we had been practicing to a CD in a boom box), we were warmed up.
Others, real and proficient dancers, came to the floor—a white-haired
man, trim and sure and grace-footed, swung his plumper partner around.
Eliana scrunched into a toddler’s version of “getting down” with the
music, interspersed with great bursts of running when we adults had to
chase after her and corral her to keep unsuspecting dancers from
backing up and tripping. (It is amazing how fast a little half-pint can
move!)
“Oh,” Jeremy Mains said. “That’s one of my students from a 300-level
Spanish class.” We watched a young man, wearing a brimmed fedora, turn
a young woman, dressed to the dancing nines, around the floor. Jeremy
is an adjunct professor at Wheaton College. “His parents were
missionaries in Vietnam. He’s a really nice kid.”
At the next break, we greeted this student. “So. How did an MK learn
those kinds of moves?” I started. Then after introducing myself as his
professor’s mom, and after Jeremy explained he had gone to high school
in West Chicago (and I slipped in the fact that my son had been voted
“best dancer” in his class and this was disparaged by the additional
fact that it was only “house dancing” during those years), I heard the
missionary kid say, “I learned most of it by watching YouTube.”
So at this point, stomping around the dance floor (or rather off to the
edges where David and I counted our steps, and Angela finally swept her
babies out to the car and home to bed, and Jeremy coached his Dad and
Mom on stepping in and out of swing turns), this sacramental melody
actually began to hum alongside the African-American middle-aged woman
who crooned the lyrics to slow dance songs into the microphone, and who
had said as one of us chased Eliana again, “Now, you can move that
baby, but don’t you take her away from the music.” Another harmonizing
began (was I the only one who heard it?), alighting like an anointing
on the teens and the youngsters and the mid-lifers and the single woman
who had “come just to watch” and on the grandparents, some who moved
like in a dream and some who sort of pushed-pulled themselves across
the floor, and on all those of us with a rhythm-restricted religious
upbringing, on the moms and dads and sons and daughters, and on the
dance teachers. Our hearts lightened to its soft loving beat; we warmed
to each other, we laughed freely.
Here was the musical benediction: It wound its way out of the trombones
and the saxophones held in the hands of band members, down through and
around the tapping feet of the straight-backed professionals and the
stumbling and bumbling newbies. This
is life, it sang. God’s
great gift given to those, worthy or unworthy, who reach out to receive
it. As the poet e. e. cummings wrote, “The eyes of my eyes
are opened.” And the Scriptures say, “Those who have ears to hear…”
Every artist knows these moments, every poet—but it is also a gift
given to those of us who are commoners, but those of us who want to
see. The benediction settled in my soul, and I was filled with a kind
of supernal love for all of us in the room. A sort of sweetness, a
reality going beyond the reality. As the writer in USA Today
explained, "You don't have to be religious to know that there's
something bigger out there, often in plain sight"—if we only have eyes
of the soul to see.
Here we were, a slice of middle America in the exceedingly
unpretentious cafeteria of West Chicago High School. Here we were,
Anglos and Hispanics, intergenerationals with backgrounds of different
ethnic and work experiences. Here we were, strangers dancing
together—with a 2-year-old zooming around the floor and a baby nodding
sleepily in his carryall chair. Here we were, my white-haired husband,
stiffly moving into the steps and twirls defying old fundamentalist
downstate conservative prohibitions. Here we were along with the
awkward 16-year-olds and the MK who had studied dance on YouTube. Here
we were with our American-flag lapel-pins and a buffet table of soft
drinks and minimalist finger-foods provided by the public library. Here
we were as the band played and the black singer crooned Sentimental Journey.
Here we were as the older couples smoothly glided across the floor and
some obviously really good dancers began to strut their stuff. Here we
were and God had somehow graced our togetherness with His Presence and
His love.
In that moment I
could feel how God feels about us all the time whether we are in church
or out of church. The writer is right, all moments can be religious
moments—even for the non-religious. God’s loving-kindness, goodness and
heartfelt compassion are available to all. “I say we are wound with
mercy round and round—as with air.”—Gerard Manley Hopkins.
How do we get to that place where our covenants to each other are
also something beyond our individuals selves, where there is a
recognition that life is bigger than we know, that Christ is with us in
the “breaking of the bread”?
We start where the prophet Elisha started with his servant. We begin
with a prayer: “Open my eyes, Lord, that I might see …” Then we go
looking; we go into the world listening. We write down the moments when
the veil of non-seeing parts; when our ears recognize the higher ranges
not normally heard. We look at a world far greener that we knew it to
be, the skies bluer than blue, the people sweeter and more lovely than
we had ever recognized. The warriors in fiery chariots surround us. The
wind carries descants; the world is in a chorale of continuous
antiphonal call. We are in the holy.
And God bends low, whispers to our soul, Good job, kid. You’ve earned a
screen credit: Karen Mains, Assistant to the Producer.
Karen Mains
ANNUAL ADVENT 24-HOUR
RETREAT OF SILENCE
The
registration fee is $120 for Wednesday/Thursday or $125 for
Friday/Saturday. The
last day to register is November 25. Please register with
our volunteer registrar, Melodee Cook, at the following e-mail address:
If you are new or bringing a
friend who is new, the fee is $90 each for
Wednesday/Thursday and $95 each for Friday/Saturday.
Theme:
Prepare Ye! Time:
Check-in begins at 4 p.m. on December 2 and December 4. (women only) Dinner is
at 6 p.m. Silence Begins at 9 p.m. Wednesday/Friday (men and women), and ends at 3:00
p.m. Thursday/Saturday. Ending:
We try to end by 4 p.m. on Thursday and Saturday. Place:
The Bishop Lane Retreat Center in Rockford, IL.
The Lord seems to work each year in remarkable and lasting ways in the
lives of many. He seems, for reasons beyond our knowing, to enter with
us into the silence. Don’t miss this opportunity to become still and to
listen in our increasingly busy, noisy world.
This year, because of increased stress for so many, Laurie Mains,
a board-certified, licensed clinical massage therapist, will give
upper-neck and back massages. Laurie’s fee for short neck-massages
(15-, 20- and 30-minute
sessions) will be posted with the materials
you receive upon registering.
WHAT OTHERS HAVE SAID ABOUT THE
ADVENT RETREAT:
“I wanted to thank you for the wonderful advent retreat. I was a
first-timer and came to the retreat with two friends who had both come
in past years. I came with the desire to meet the LORD and you provided
a wonderful atmosphere for me to focus on him. In my walk with the
LORD, I spend a lot of time caring for others in a variety of ways, and
I was yearning for a time for ME! When I’m with the women at my church
I’m in a ministry-mode. … I loved sitting in front of the windows,
looking out at God’s creation (thanks for the beautiful snow and the
deer!) and meditating on the scriptures about his delight in me! By
mid-morning I could feel a weight being lifted from my spirit and I
left feeling refreshed! Thank you so much!” —another hungry soul
Karen Mains is offering an
eight-month, twice-monthly teleconference training for people who have
always wanted to write, have written before but are now stalled. We
will begin in February 2010 and go through October. The conference
calls will be one hour long. This will be a personal mentoring
opportunity with no more than 12 people per training team.
During these eight months, Karen will walk Wannabe (Better) Writers
through the principles of writing personal memoirs—this is a form that
Karen’s writing has taken in many of her articles, blogs,
e-newsletters, and in some of her 24 published books. The cost will be
$40 a month ($20 per conference call) or $320 for the eight months (16
sessions) of coaching.
For an e-mail copy of the prerequisites required to attend this course,
the goal of the telementoring process, the curriculum for the 16
conference calls, and more details about payments, e-mail Karen at:
(Karen ran a test
teleconference session last year, was amazed by the process, and is
jazzed by sharing her learning and experience as a published writer
with people who are serious about their work.)
Reminder!
The Soulish Food e-mails are
being
posted biweekly on the Hungry Souls Web
site. Newcomers can look that over and decide if they want to
register on the Web site to receive the biweekly newsletter. You might
want to recommend this to friends also. They can go to www.HungrySouls.org.
Karen Mains
"Here was the musical benediction. ... This is life, it sang. God’s great gift given to those, worthy or unworthy, who reach out to receive it.
Every artist knows these moments, every poet—but it is also a gift
given to those of us who are commoners, but those of us who want to see."
Book Corner
The Sacrament of the Present Moment By Jean Pierre de Caussade
This
is considered a classic on the topic of living with God during the
ordinary moments of everyday life. Written in the form of lectures, de
Caussade was the spiritual confessor for the Visitation nuns in Nancy,
France in 1729-1733. This small books invites all to reach for
saintliness by accepting God’s imminent guidance in whatever happens,
especially in the seeming minute, trivial or non-extraordinary
occurrences of the passing days.
If you don’t have a copy,
or have not read the book, it is a must for building a library on the
contemplative life. It emphasizes the need to develop a quality of
silence, of learning to hear, then being obedient to that inner voice
“that speaks to every individual through what happens moment by moment.”
Another-Book Corner
Holy Fools By Matthew Woodley
We also would like to recommend a book released last year, Holy Fools: Following Jesus With Reckless Abandon
by Mathew Woodley. The concept of the holy fool is an intriguing state
that many writers have examined. Dostoevsky, for instance, developed
this concept in his masterpiece, The Idiot. Woodley, a pastor on Long
Island, applies this “fools” motif to Christians following Christ in
radical ways. The subtitle says it all. Many of these concepts have
been covered in many other places, but Woodley’s writing is fresh, his
thinking original, and his use of the “holy fool” as a lens through
which to consider one’s discipleship is excellent. Put this one right
on the shelf with de Caussade’s Sacrament. It would make a great discussion book for a reading group.
