Abbey Awe | Finding a Thin Place w/ God in a Thick Existence

A thin place is any environment that invites transformation in us, helping us as believers in Jesus to think and see and understand as He does. Any place that creates a space and atmosphere that inspires us to be honest before God and to listen to the deep murmurings of His Spirit within us is thin. ... It is where the dividing line between heaven and earth seems thin ...  + Tracy Balzer, Thin Places

As I've shared before on this blog as well as with many of you I get to call friends and family, the Abbey of the Genesee in upstate New York has become a thin place for me, a haven I get to return to in order to: 

+ re-enter the holy wild, 

+ step into a desert space where I can be silent and 

+ stop to listen for the whispers of the Spirit as I seek to behold the face of the deep again. 

And while Psalm 126 has been anchored into my soul during previous visits, this time, Psalm 134 was my focus during the Fall of 2023:

O LORD, my heart is not proud 

nor haughty my eyes. 

I did not go after things too great 

nor marvels beyond me.

Truly, I set my soul 

in silence and peace.

A weaned child on its mothers' breast,

even so is my soul.

O Israel, hope in the LORD

both now and forever.

I read this again and again in the sanctuary of the monastery at the Abbey of the Genesee between the hours of None and Vespers (2-5:30 p.m.). That sanctuary has become a thin place for me. Tracy Balzer speaks to the necessity of finding such a place to experience peace and solitude for meditating on God's words in the midst of a "thick existence" in her wonderful book, Thin Places:

I find it extremely difficult to pay attention to God. There are too many voices calling for my attention. Too often I am over-committed and have too many obligations. I am tempted by the lure of consumerism and accumulation of things. I feel that the circumstances of my life are out of control. There is just too much of everything. It's as if I have spiritual claustrophobia. Everywhere in my life is a "thick place." ... 

And in such a crowded "thick" existence ... God patiently waits until we make the intentional choice to do some housecleaning and make some space for Him, both in the literal sense of adjusting our physical environment, and in the soul-sense of bringing all our faculties to His attention. Visiting and re-visiting the thin places of our lives is one of the best ways to do this.

The photo above captures some of the serenity and peace I recently experienced during my annual retreat to the Abbey of the Genesee, where once again earth seemed closer to heaven, anamcharas ("soul friends") were made anew or strengthened from previous monastery retreats together, and prayer, silence, and solitude helped bring clarity to some of the clanging of my mind, heart, and life. 

The work to wait and be still is a good one and reminds me of this conversation between the author and a monk in Sue Monk Kidd's When the Heart Waits:

"I saw you today sitting beneath the tree — just sitting there so still. How is it that you can wait so patiently in the moment. I can't seem to get used to the idea of doing nothing." 

The monk broke into a wonderful grin. "Well, there's the problem right there, young lady. You've bought into the cultural myth that when you're waiting you're doing nothing." 

Then he took his hands and placed them on my shoulders, peered straight into my eyes and said, "I hope you'll hear what I'm about to tell you. I hope you'll hear it all the way down to your toes ... 

When you're waiting, you're not doing nothing. You're doing the most important something there is. You're allowing your soul to grow up. If you can't be still and wait, you can't become what God created you to be.

Amber and Seth Haines also capture beautifully in their recent book, The Deep Down Things, why monastery retreats have proven to be essential places for waiting for me, anchors in the storms of my life these past 5 years:

In The Power of Silence, Cardinal Robert Sarah writes of the human need to flee from the noisy world and connect with God. This need is memorialized in the monastic tradition through the Latin term fuga mundi, which means "flight from the world." Of fuga mundi, he writes "It means an end of the turmoil, the artificial lights, the sad drugs of noise and the hankering to possess more and more goods, so as to look at heaven. A man who enters the monastery seeks silence in order to find God. He wants to love God above all else, as his sole good and his only wealth." 

Monasteries are for silence, for finding God and ultimately for discovering love that silences internal turmoil.

+ Amber and Seth Haines 

This post features some reflections from Tracy Balzer's Thin Places on the categories above for anyone who might be curious about finding such a place in this moment in your life. Tracy invites us to:

Listen for the voice of God in your life.  

Ask questions about where you’re seeing God at work.  

Consider all the ways He has met you and sustained you: through prayer, sacrament, the Word, community, the mind, and in special relationships. ... 

Our Christian forefathers and mothers tell us that God is so very near that in some of His creation there is barely a film between Him and us.  

"Surely the LORD is in this place, and I did not know it."

+ Genesis 28:16

 

Thin Places | From Earth to Heaven

Is this place really nearer to God?  

Is the wall thin between our whispers  

And His listening? … 

I am not sure whether there is no time here  

Or more time, whether the light is stronger  

Or just easier to see. 

That is why I keep returning, thirsty, to this place  

That is older than my understanding,  

Younger than my broken spirit. 

+ “Iona” by Kenneth Steven

A life characterized by regular, uninhibited connection with God takes practice and many seasons of what the classical faith writers call “consolation” (a sense of God’s nearness) and “desolation” (a sense of His distance). We discover this in still moments where we can stop, wait, watch, and listen.

God be with thee in every pass,  

Jesus be with thee on every hill,  

Spirit be with thee on every stream,  

Headland and ridge and lawn;  

Each see and land, each moor and meadow,  

Each lying down, each rising up. 

In the trough of the waves, on the crest of the billows,  

Each step of the journey thou goest.  

+ Celtic Blessing  

 

I have seen You in the sanctuary 

and beheld Your power and Your glory. 

+ Psalm 63:2

 

Anamchara | From Soul to Soul

Where is Jesus in my life?  

What is He calling me to? 

What is He saying that I am not hearing? 

I have found that these are questions I cannot answer on my own, for my own subjectivism and personal frailties tend to get in the way of seeing clearly. 

I need a soul friend, an anamchara, 

to bring clarity to the murky waters of daily life. 

These questions above are always asked in humility before each other, before the Spirit of God, and before the Word of God. 

Remember that the soul friend is not one who bestows knowledge and expertise on another, but is instead one who helps another listen to the voice of God in their life: “Lord, help me see her/his heart.”

He who walks with the wise grows wise; 

but a companion of fools suffers harm.  

+ Proverbs 13:20 

Prayer | From Ordinary to Extraordinary

All of our experiences, actions, words, and various combinations thereof can be prayer. This is why it is indeed possible to pray without ceasing. 

The Apostle Paul is not telling me I must talk to God all the time; he is, as Henri Nouwen suggests, telling me to “think, speak and live in the presence of God” all day. 

The Celts learned this concept from the early desert Christians, who practiced anamnesis: the “conscious, prayerful remembrance of God, the continuing sense of God’s presence throughout the day as one works, prays, eats, talks, and rests."

And I pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests.  

+ Ephesians 6:18

 

Silence and Solitude | From Chaos to Clarity

In the end it is the action of God that propels one forward toward Christlikeness. The process of our own spiritual transformation to become new creatures in Christ is a very slow but beautiful process, one that requires stillness and patient waiting. 

Resurrection is always God’s doing. 

Without solitude we remain victims of our society and continue to be entangled in the illusions of the false self. Retreating for a period of time from ringing phones, burgeoning email boxes, to-do lists, and obligations gives God some space to do what He wants to do with us. It helps us remember that the Sabbath was meant to be a day of rest, a time to step away from all that convinces us that we are indispensable to the world and to be assured that we are in the hands of God.

In repentance and rest is your salvation, 

in quietness and trust is your strength.  

+ Isaiah 30:15

Excerpts above from Tracy Balzer's Thin Places

Bonus excerpt from Holy Unhappiness, 

which I also read in the Abbey sanctuary:

"The Theater of God is in the hidden corners," John Calvin once said. The humility of hiddenness is an unfamiliar virtue not only to the ancient Greeks. It is unfamiliar to me. But when I am really, truly quiet, God calls me there. To that secret place, the place where I hear Him whisper: You are always with Me. All I have is yours (Luke 15:31). And it is more than enough. 

+ Amanda Held Opelt

Bonus Abbey Awe + Thin Place Posts: 

+ Abbey Awe | Awakening to New Wonder in Vigils Psalms 

+ Open & Unafraid Psalms in Which No Secrets Are Hidden

+ Being with God: Stillness, Silence, and Surrender

+ Here Is Honest, Messy Holy Ground: Pray As You Can  

+ Be Still and Know That I Am God Pausing Prayer Practice  

+ Facing Death with "Of Gods and Men"

With presence, peace, and many potent blessings in Christ,

Rev. Mike “Sully” Sullivan

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