Welcome Back!

The title of this post might be a cheery message to anyone who in vain checks this blog on a regular basis. It could mean to them that their search has finally yielded some results. If the title fits your situation you are welcome to use it!

My intention however was really to welcome myself back. Yes, indeed, it has been a while since I blogged here, and certainly the most prolific time of blogging is now more than a calendar year back.

I am referring to my Lenten discipline of 2010, namely the discipline of writing a blog entry every day (save Sundays) in the season of Lent. I recall near the end of last year's effort that I promised to come back in a while and offer some reflections on the whole experience. Such are the busyness and distractions of life that it took until the beginning of the following Lent to even offer a whiff of such reflection.

Not apologies, just observations...

A while ago I decided that my Lenten discipline this year would be to read my Lenten blog from last year - one entry each day, in the same order that I wrote them last year. At first it sounds much easier, and in reality it probably is, but I suspect that it will also allow me to do the kind of reflective analysis that I had hoped to do earlier. You see I can think back on last year's practice and recall some general themes - a certain ebb and flow that occurred as I walked the Lenten journey. That's part of what I am looking for. I also have a sense that I got off to a really good start last year - with lots of insights and ideas. It will be interesting to me to see if that recollection is mirrored in what I actually wrote. I will also be curious to see if the more difficult times (somewhere in the middle) are reflected by the quality and length of post I did last year.

The view from my office window,
Ash Wednesday 2011

I also promised to add a photo each day in Lent. I'm not sure how well that worked out. I had actually forgotten that part of the plan from last year. As it turns out I have my camera with me today and it is very easy to take a photo similar to the one I used last year. It's interesting to see the difference from one year to the next. It's a bit later in the year this time, but also much colder  - twenty degrees celsius colder! The skyline has changed a bit too! I've been watching the new DIAND (Department of Indian and Northern Affairs) building going up. It's the big yellow thing in the middle of the photo. The yellow is the insulation which they've been adding all around the building for the past two or three weeks (which means of course that the skyline is actually changing every day, if not every hour!)

It is not my plan to do a blog entry every day in Lent this year. Some days I will likely be prodded into responding to last year's entry either by reacting to what I wrote last year, or perhaps heading off on a tangent. I recall having some interesting thoughts and ideas around the whole idea of spiritual practice and spiritual discipline and I am giving myself permission to be more free-form this year - writing some days, photographing other days, being a creative writer on still other days and some days only reading what I wrote last year and perhaps reading some other daily Lenten study resource.

I also know that I will be involved in at least two other spiritual discipline situations in the coming weeks. On Sunday some folks from Yellowknife United Church are going to create a temporary labyrinth on the floor of our worship space and people will be invited to walk the labyrinth. I'm looking forward to it. Following that, members of the congregation have been invited to participate in the document that was put out by Alberta and Northwest Conference related to the "Listening Year" which everyone in the conference has been invited to engage. It contains some spiritual practices which seemed a very fitting connection between the desire of the conference to hear from us while at the same time allowing us the opportunity to engage in spiritual practice. I hope that my insights from last year's blogging discipline might be a helpful addition to the process.

So, here we go, another Lent has begun. I've fulfilled my first commitment by checking out what I wrote on Ash Wednesday last year and here is an entry for day one this year.

By the way, I spent some time today selecting music for the first Sunday worship service of Lent and that too was a helpful thing for me today. I enjoyed reading through some hymn texts and indices in my goal of picking music that would serve us not only for this coming Sunday but in some cases throughout the season.

Lent can be such a rich season. I heard someone say that a few weeks ago and wondered what they meant, and doubted that it would ever apply to me, but I can truly say that after this little bit of hymn choosing, reflecting on Lent, reading what I wrote last year and now writing these few words, I find I am actually looking forward to what the season might have in store for me and us (with that "us" being vaguely (and comfortably) defined!).

Blessings...

Peter