As I write, it is snowing in Mankato! Just a little, just enough. It’s gray, and the tree in front of my window is holding onto some brown leaves, rattling in the breeze. Winter is not my favorite season, but winter affords a time of pause that I do love. Nothing much needs to grow in our winter season. Nothing much needs to be lively and lush. It is a time of quiet and reflection, a pulling inward.

We go into the dark to find the light, to re-kindle the light. We move into quiet so that we might feel the still soft voice within us affirming our sacred existence and our worth. We settle into the quiet dark to still the voices, internal and external that might judge us and rank us and pull us away from our dynamic and evolving being. In the words of re-wilding specialist Brigit Anna McNeill, “true freedom comes from accepting with forgiveness and love what we have been through and vanquishing the hold it has on us, bring the golden treasure back from the cave of our murkiest depths.” Winter is a “time for the medicine of story, of nourishment and love.” It is a time to re-visit the mystery of living, the mystery beyond all the good explanations and bad descriptions and indifferent narratives.

Enjoy the time of pulling into your warm homes and warm selves, reconnecting and relearning and reclaiming, and unburdening—returning to your most vital self and the vitality of those you love and those with whom you share this beautiful life. The Jesuit priest Teilhard de Chardin reminds us that “We imagine the Divine as distant and inaccessible, whereas in fact we live steeped in its burning layers.” You are holy, you are part and particle of the divine. May you remember this, as you also remember you are loved, you are worthy, you are welcome, and you are needed. May you feel it so, today and every day.

Looking forward to seeing you soon, even in church!

Blessings and best wishes, Rev. Rita