Author: robertalanrife

I have spent the better part of my life as a professional musician. Primarily, that has meant the fun and challenging world of church music. Most recently, I have transitioned out of my role as worship and music director for Yakima Covenant Church, Yakima, Washington to global service in Edinburgh, Scotland. I'm a singer-songwriter, liturgist, poet, and writer. I love words. I love to read them. I love to write them. Most of all, I love the many intersections, like a sacramental tapestry, of life, liturgy, literature, the arts, and spiritual formation...oh, and I love haggis.

The politics of light

On By robertalanrifeIn Waxing PoeticLeave a comment

There was a light that burned,

a shifting, settled light – the kind

that changes the room from one

kind of good to a better one.

The moths played in the shade

like winged marionettes parading

their playful dance never far

from the light but choosing

to stay stuck where it only shines

to amuse and titillate, not

where it shines to tease out

shadows and contours of faces.

Above, on a hungry ceiling dwell

other specters, images drowning

in the goodness of this moment.

Seated apart but facing each other

are the comrades of long-lived kindness

still working through the politics of light.

 

Away

On By robertalanrifeIn Waxing PoeticLeave a comment

I looked from the chair beside the window

where the night sky can taste the late hour.

Here the tally of joys and intentions

weigh themselves against the whimpering

sighs of another. Another whose chair

beside another window in another place

sees a night sky pillowed and smooth

and takes what few, rumpled clouds remain,

hiding from the dark, ready for the day.

And, in an eye-twinkle of quickening whimsy –

simply walks away.

Passaging well

On By robertalanrifeIn faith, life together, sacramental living, spiritual formation8 Comments

Our lives are a series of passages. One tributary leads to another, which in turn yields to something else on its way to waterfall or harbor, estuary or eddy. At times we are stuck, unmoving. Or so it seems. To be stuck can actually be a decision not to decide something. Perhaps it’s a slow, deep spot before being sucked back out into the rapids where we easily lose our sense of direction and the not unreasonable expectation that we’ll fly ass over tea kettle into the frothy spray. There are even times when our boat slows almost to a crawl and we find ourselves in the enchantments of a Pirates of the Caribbean style rendezvous with delight. DSC_0019

Whatever the case may be it should be our goal to passage well. That is, when faced with life’s bone-chilling decisions, we learn to listen for the most gracious, compassionate means by which to navigate such. Bad transitions lead to less than adequate skills needed for the yet more difficult passages to come. They also create a sinkhole of insecurity since we’ll just have to face similar rapids again later but with one more failure to our credit.

I turn 50 on Monday. Sorry, just let me write that again to be sure I’m not asleep. I turn 50 on Monday. Numbers. We get so stuck on them. Especially the “decade” numbers that are supposed to magically move us on to newer, higher, greater things than we were meant to achieve in our last, apparently insufficient, decade. So, at 50, what should my “achievements” be? To whom do I speak to discover my rating for my forties? Who hands out the balloons and coffee to the five-decade newbies? It comes either with joie de vivre or woe is me that numbers are wielded with respect to age. Along with the number comes a freight train long derivative connotations, expectations, projections, assumptions, and tongue-in-cheek pathos. Pish posh says I.

I think so little about age related stuff these days. Make no mistake, I’m still vain, overly self-concerned and a bit slower maybe. But the idea that, by this age, I should or shouldn’t be something is anathema to me. I am exactly what, who and where I am. It just…is. Yes, I have goals. Yes, I have patterns and certain expectations both of others and myself. Yes, I have jetsam floating in my wake I wish weren’t so obvious. But, at almost 50, I’m happy with what life has or has not become.

I’m much more interested in being the most surrendered and loving person I can be at any given moment during these passages of my life which only seem to come more quickly all the time. I want to say hello well with a definitive eye to eye recognition of another human being equally as needy as I. I want to say forgive me well, and often, to those who have had the misfortune of discovering just how much of an asshole I can be. I want to hold people’s pain and joy well, that they invite me to do so again and offer similar friendship to me. I want to say goodbye well, with class, grace and compassion. A goodbye that puts a Gospel period at the end of a glorious sentence.

Learning to passage well has many rewards. Fewer regrets I suppose might be one. But, more than that, in the ever-expanding journal of our meandering lives, a clarity of chapter markings brings a satisfaction to the sojourner of adequate closure before moving on to another part of their story. It expresses a sense of poise and, ultimately, denouement to our lives that those whose eyes watch us for signs of the Divine are longing to see. More than anything else, how we transition through the passages of our lives reveals the level of our trust in the unseen God making Godself seen – through us. Through me.

Lord, I pray that I’ve passaged well from my forties to my fifties. Let love and kindness be the obvious characteristics of this next passage, Lord. Let the walls of this tunnel be painted with the handprints of those I’ve loved. May the wake of my boat be littered with the flower petals of other’s lives I’ve been blessed to know. May this aging pilgrim always see the best in others and give them the chances afforded me. It’s how I most want to passage.

I turn 50 on Monday. I can hardly wait.

How about you? What does your current passage ask of you? 

How might God be inviting you to passage well in these days?

Learning his name

On By robertalanrifeIn Life of Rob, Prayers & Liturgy, Waxing PoeticLeave a comment

The ending to all beginnings

 

 

 

 

 

 

When the reprisals of our souls,

too young to love, too small for pain,

repeat their mistaken ventures into

the uncolored light of mistaken journeys,

then it is that the walls whisper

their ghostlike songs of ever after –

sighs of the imperfect.

* * *

Here there are no endings,

only endings of old beginnings

that transform by a refusal

to submit to the indentured servitude

of the hollow and broken,

preferring instead the ancient newness

of Cistine handshakes.

* * *

In the cowls of earth, her ears of stone,

hear fathomless time, tonsured and teased

from her birthplace deep in

embowelled truth whose Name Is.

Encompass within yourself this

faceless sojourner only now

learning his name.

Photo courtesy of my friends and fellow monastic-creatives at Abbey of the Arts. Thanks Christine Valters-Paintner.

Surrender – a prayer

On By robertalanrifeIn Life of Rob, Prayers & Liturgy, Waxing Poetic1 Comment

Here, in this place awash in daylight grace,

I live my entire life on the head of a pin

on which is inscribed a single word:

surrender.

When todays are saturated in

a low, crawling, redeeming sadness:

surrender.

When the all-pervasive pall of a greening grey

removes dead soul-skin and tastes

like eating raw sewage:

surrender.

When the bitter pill of leafless desire

gets stuck in my throat and

stops up anything nutritional:

surrender.

When the wafer thin moments

of happy times bought at another’s expense

rob me of me:

surrender.

When my lover who shares

my bed, my skin, my guts, my hopes,

becomes nothing more than a side dish:

surrender.

When, in convenience, I sidestep

responsibility to another

and choose the busy road of non-involvement:

surrender.

When I’ve surrendered all I am and have,

all I’ve been and will become,

all that was, all that is and all that is not:

surrender.

When I’ve surrendered all,

I gain the one thing,

the Pearl of Great Price,

the Lily of the Valley,

the One who is in all,

who is all

and who needs no introduction because…

my soul knows him.

Relaxing in my humanity

On By robertalanrifeIn Christian spirituality, Christianity, faith, life together, poetry, sacramental living, spiritual formation, the arts4 Comments

75px-TMertonStudy

Lately, I’ve been reading the journals of the late Trappist monk, author, priest and activist, Thomas Merton. He has long fascinated me both as a spiritual mentor and as poet and literary figure. In so many ways he is among those I most seek to emulate. He’s artsy – a poet at heart, which means he’s also moody and can take forever to determine new directions because he “lives in his head” too much. He longs for silence and the contemplative life of solitude but cannot escape the draw of the monastic community and the world at large to whom he is constantly being called. “My first duty is to start, for the first time, to live as a member of a human race, which is no more (and no less) ridiculous than I am myself. And my first human act is the recognition of how much I owe everybody else.”

Merton belonged because he didn’t belong. His life away from the world was how he best loved and served it. He was not cloistered to escape his humanity but to better love and live it. “I am coming to the conclusion that my highest ambition is to be what I already am…We must first become like ourselves and stop living “beside ourselves.”” I, like Merton, have learned best from what I haven’t done well than what I have. By how I’ve failed, not passed. By how truly unremarkable and troublesome I am, not my efficiency and accomplishments. I am failing my way to the deeper realities of my own soul.

Thank you, brother Merton, you are helping me to relax in my humanity.

Oddly, I’m finding Jesus there.

Conversing with Conversations, pt. 7

On By robertalanrifeIn Christian spirituality, Christianity, faith, life together, sacramental living, spiritual formation, UncategorizedLeave a comment

This month at Conversations Journal blog, we were challenged to look at the spiritual formation “movement” to determine if it is actually assisting in any real process of change or not. My answer: yes and no. Read it here.

Conversations-Journal-Logo

Peace, R

Counting life in eggshells

On By robertalanrifeIn Christian spirituality, Christianity, faith, life together, sacramental living, spiritual formation2 Comments

It was September 15th, 1985. I leaned over to kiss the forehead of my father in his final hours about to succumb to cancer. Then, I walked away, never to speak to him again. He died that evening and we never said what needed to be said between us. Our lives remain a mystery to each other. I’ve lived with that since that day.

It was a Sunday afternoon, 1986. My fiancee, Vanessa, and I were in crisis. We were about to mail out wedding invitations the following day. Not only did we not mail them out but we ended the relationship rather unceremoniously. She was living with a coworker by the end of that very week. She died of cancer in 1992. I never discovered answers for any of it…to this very day.

Winter, 2007. I had only begun a few months earlier a brand new ministry in a new town in a new State. I was feeling a little lost and needing guidance. My spiritual director, Jeff (pseudonym), had been a lifeline for me as he walked with me through the choppy waters of change and emotional dislocation. One day, I called him. No answer. I emailed. No response. I texted. Still, nothing. I dropped by his office. There was no sign of him. I even resorted to a handwritten letter I mailed to his church office. Nada. This went on for over three months. There is nothing quite like the feeling of being ditched by someone’s spiritual director…with no explanation…ever. Now, six years later, I still have heard nothing and remain uncertain for the reasons why…to this very day.

Many of us watch from the comfort of our armchair, remote firmly in hand, the horror and tragedy unfolding in Syria. We wag our heads and harumph in quiet disapproval. We discuss it with assumed knowledge of the whole picture from our limited television encounters or at the local coffee shop. We ‘like’ our favorite page of outrage on Facebook with a sense that, in some small way, we’ve done our part toward a better society. And still the dead, dismembered and bloated bodies of somebody’s son, mother or friend float down the river like useless flotsam and jetsam, blanched and featureless like the conflagration which steals them from the world.

The shameful charade of Syrian aggression has left me reeling in many ways. Who knows what interpersonal blockages had been left unhealed? What foul words flippantly spoken, now never to unsay? How many raised voices in anger never to be undone? And the pain of losing someone is exacerbated by the knowledge that such matters were left unresolved. I think of my own family, my friends, my colleagues. What assurances do we have that such sudden losses will leave the needs-to-be-said as unsaid? Are we blindly tripping along in flagrant over-confidence that we’ll simply last forever while not addressing what painfully lingers?

In times such as these, more than anything else take hold of those around you. Love them. Tell them so. Be close to them. Hold your children to your breast and feel their breath. Smell their hair. Feel their skin.

The following prayer was originally posted on my other blog: www.robslitbits.com.

Help me to forgive you, God

Lord, they did not ask for dusty feet

sandaled and sore

to walk over the flesh and bones

of neighbors and friends,

of brothers, sisters and parents.

They didn’t ask to be brought before

someone else’s tribunal on imagined

charges of being what they should not be,

what you created them to be.

They did not seek out this desperation

that found them huddled, fearful and crying.

To see the bloated bodies of fellow pilgrims

floating down the river, under bridges,

stuck and floating on rocks jutting out

and shaking bony fists at you for justice,

is to see a God too small to save.

Or am I missing something, Lord?

I am not smart enough to know

the fancy talk at long, important tables

where cigar-smoking men carve up

the world with a glance and a handshake.

I am not wise enough to understand

how to discern what most is needed.

I am not strong enough not to hate,

nor still enough not to stir up

my anger, my outrage.

Lord, if I am forced to sit and watch

what looks like the refuse of hate-filled politics

paraded before a God with weak arms,

and no stomach to move into the fray;

then, help me to forgive you, God,

if only long enough to dive in myself.

Who knows?

Perhaps we’ll meet each other there.

Friends, whatever it takes, reach out to one another. Close gaps. Say good words. Unsay bad words. Leave offerings at the altar and confront the distances between. Life is far too precious, fragile and short to allow anything to separate what God brings together. If it is in your power, do it. Let us count our lives in the eggshells they are and…love.

Help me to forgive you, God

On By robertalanrifeIn Life of Rob, Prayers & Liturgy3 Comments

I recognize this is not the first of its kind. Others have also shared just such things in the wake of the recent, horrific atrocities in Syria. I feel impotent to change much of this. But I can write. And I can pray. Here, I do both. Join me…please.

syria

 

 

 

 

Lord, they did not ask for dusty feet

sandaled and sore

to walk over the flesh and bones

of neighbors and friends,

of brothers, sisters and parents.

They didn’t ask to be brought before

someone else’s tribunal on imagined

charges of being what they should not be,

what you created them to be.

They did not seek out this desperation

that found them huddled, fearful and crying.

To see the bloated bodies of fellow pilgrims

floating down the river, under bridges,

stuck and floating on rocks jutting out

and shaking bony fists at you for justice,

is to see a God too small to save.

Or am I missing something, Lord?

I am not smart enough to know

the fancy talk at long, important tables

where cigar-smoking men carve up

the world with a wink and a handshake.

I am not wise enough to understand

how to discern what most is needed.

I am not strong enough not to hate,

nor still enough not to stir up

my anger, my outrage.

Lord, if I am forced to sit and watch

what looks like the refuse of hate-filled politics

paraded before a God with weak arms,

and no stomach to move into the fray;

then, help me to forgive you, God,

if only long enough to dive in myself.

Who knows?

Perhaps we’ll meet each other there.

Picture: www.blogs.common.georgetown.edu

A writing thingy for gooder writing

On By robertalanrifeIn Words...always wordsLeave a comment

Anyone who seeks to express themselves through words knows the inherent challenges to such an undertaking. I, along with many others, consider ourselves good “armchair” writers. I work at my craft. I read much to see how the really good ones place just the right words after just right words to build just the right sentence within just the right essay or book or whatever. I have a few favorites, specifically as a blogger, who are inspiring to me. Holly Ordway (be sure to follow her on Twitter) is one of those.

Holly Ordway

Her desire is similar to my own in weaving together the intersections among arts, literature, beauty and truth. She just kinda, does it real good. Her blog, Hieropraxis, is one of the best out there. She has always inspired me. I know you will feel similarly. Kelly Belmonte is another wonderful monthly contributor to Holly’s site. You can read her latest post, “Why writing is not writing”, here.

Peace, R