Summer Listening
Throughout the summer months the rhythm in our area changes. Many downshift to a slower pace, whether that’s due to congress being in recess, or school breaks. With that comes travel, or perhaps a different pace of life at home. Add to that the heightened need for respite we are all experiencing after the last several years of life in a pandemic. Wherever these summer months take you, I encourage you to attend to your spiritual well-being.
Listening is one of the most basic practices that can enhance our spiritual health – listening to God, listening to one another, listening to what is being said, and what is left unsaid. I confess it is a practice that I must attend to constantly to ensure these “muscles” do not atrophy. Travel and a break from familiar routines certainly provide opportunities for deep listening. Another way in which this listening may take shape is through podcasts that provide new perspectives, or memorable stories. As holy scripture demonstrates over and over again, we are a narrative people!
So, an invitation to those who are frequent listeners of podcasts or audio books is to please share content you find to be spiritually relevant, if you think it would be of interest to others in the community. I will create a playlist to share, in hopes that it might spark a conversation or thoughtful reflection for other avid listeners. I’ll include recommendations in the weekly email updates for those who are interested. If you are away from church during the summer months, you can easily listen to the weekly sermon by subscribing to our feed, either on Spotify or iTunes.
A prayer for the many ways in which we will listen this summer, “May the stories I partake of, and the ways in which I engage with them, make me in the end a more empathetic Christ-bearer, more compassionate, more aware of my own brokenness and need for grace, better able to understand the hopes and fears and failings of my fellow humans, so that I might more authentically live and learn and love among them unto the end, that all of our many stories might be more beautifully woven into your own greater story. Amen.” (Every Moment Holy, Douglas Mckelvey)