Sleeping with Bread: Community

Monday, May 03, 2010

SWB: Speak into reality

Last week I was out of town, and due to my confusion and inability to make my laptop's wireless work, Mary Lue was so kind and kept the bread baking. Thanks to Mary Lue for this! So, here's to this weeks bread...
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Image from www.hbci.com
In my elementary school office, the secretary had a poster on the wall that said something like this,

"Garbage in, garbage out - I'm not a garbage dump so don't leave your rubbish here!"

Above these words was a drawing of a cherubic boy with rumpled hair, big ears, a tattered t-shirt, mo shoes and hand me down overalls. The secretary's poster was a reminder to all that children were important and the way they should be treated and spoken too as treasure, not trash. If people are treated like trash, then they will often reproduce what they are provided. Apparently, by hanging this poster the secretary was doing her best to develop and environment of treasure-seeking.

The voices that we've heard our whole lives have a way of molding and directing our paths. I attended a session at Princeton Seminary last Wednesday at the Youth Ministry Institute called, "From voices to vision." In this class, we addressed the different voices that have built into who we are. The instructor, Gregory C. Ellison II, emphasized the importance of being in and with community when facing these compositional voices. Isolation is not the place to try to face and deal with repeated messages that have or can be part of the foundational structure of who we are. While some of the voices in our lives are affirming, like that of my elementary school secretary, some are "gremlin" like and are only to be dealt with via a team approach. Don't allow yourself to try and deal with such things flying solo. A team approach helps to provide more perspective and support and bypasses the trap of this kind of soul-searching in isolation.

Image from blog: Triangulations.

Sleeping with bread is a place for our "team" to share the challenge and the joy, the loss and the gains, the gremlin speak and the supportive school secretary voices of our lives. As we look to face all the voices together, we come to a place of greater clarity and vision for the future - by the grace of God and with the support of community.

As you share your bread this week in the things you leave with God and the things God gives you to hold on too, know that here in this space we can address the past, asses the present and speak into the future a reality woven with faith, hope and love.

We will do this together, as a community, and as a team.
We will bake the bread of wholeness to foster an environment filled with treasure - just waiting to be discovered.
We will sleep and live with bread.

Monday, November 16, 2009

Beauty from ashes

This last weekend I had the privilege of helping with a local community beautification and clean up project in Jamestown, NY. The group cleaned up debris and painted under a train bridge and then got to work on the start of a mural 12 feet high by 20 feet wide that will be fixed to a central area of the downtown. The mural is the first of what we hope to be many community art projects to help build home-town pride and to help dissuade the graffiti tagging that has been occurring at increasing rate recently.

When the dump truck pulled away from the underpass on Saturday, it was filled to the brim with dirt, garbage and debris that had built up over time. This underpass is located close to our city's high school and many students pass through it each day. This morning, I wonder what their reaction was as they walked through a cleaner, freshly painted path in contrast to what it had looked like prior to the hard work of the volunteers on Saturday?

Sometimes you have to see some dirt and ash in life, before the beauty becomes visible. This comparison of ashes and beauty fits in with our theme of contrast in this Sleeping with Bread practice, I think.

What are the ashes that collected in your life in the last week, and what beauty came our of or in spite of their presence?

"To appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that he might be glorified."—Isaiah 61:3.

Although the examen Sleeping with Bread is a Christian practice, I would hope that anyone who has something to share would feel welcome here. Also, if you don't have your own blog and would like to participate, share your bread in the comments. To holding on to what gives life,
Peace,
Lamont

What is Sleeping with Bread?

During the bombing raids of WWII, thousands of children were orphaned and left to starve. The fortunate ones were rescued and placed in refugee camps where they received food and good care. But many of these children who had lost so much could not sleep at night. They feared waking up to find themselves once again homeless and without food. Nothing seemed to reassure them. Finally, someone hit upon the idea of giving each child a piece of bread to hold at bedtime. Holding their bread, these children could finally sleep in peace. All through the night the bread reminded them, "Today I ate and I will eat again tomorrow." (Linn, Dennis et al, Sleeping With Bread, p.l)

These are the beginning words of a book that introduced me to a practice called the examen. The orphans held on to what nourished them and were thus able to sleep peacefully at night. The examen, based on the spiritual exercises of St. Ignatius, helps a person hold onto what spiritually nourishes him by looking at what is giving him consolation in his life or causing him desolation. It allows someone to express his gratitude to God for the good stuff and turn to him for solace for the bad stuff. It is quite simple. You simply ask yourself, in the last day/week/month what gave me consolation and what caused me desolation.

How do you do it?

Sleeping with Bread is a Monday meme. You can participate in one of two ways: 1) Pick one of the above examen question sets and answer it in the comments section of my SWB post; or, 2) Create your own Sleeping with Bread post. You are welcome to right click on the Sleeping with Bread button and save it to your own computer before uploading into your post. Then, make sure you come back and put the link to your post in the automated Mr. Linky form at the end of the current SWB post. I hope you will join me and my fellow bakers as we Sleep with Bread on Mondays!