Offertory - A Sermon Response

The following poem was sent to us by a parishioner in response to The Rev. Jarrett Kerbel's sermon from Sunday morning (November 16). You may read Jarrett's sermon St. Martin Under Arrest here, and then read the poem below.

OFFERTORY

A homeless person suddenly appeared

before me, chanting in a cloud of steam.

His fervent mumble echoed like a weird

confession; one last effort to redeem

a tattered soul.  He rose up, offered me

his cup, a Styrofoam collection plate,

and pleaded, in a worn-out litany,

for change.  But I was spent and running late;

I turned my head and shunned his outstretched hand.

He nodded slowly, smiled, and backed away—

Would he have used my gift for contraband

or was I witness to a Passion Play?

Such Sacraments can never be complete

When charity and vanity compete

John Tuton

The Practice of Self-Vulnerability

This month is National Blog Posting Month (colloquially referred to as NaBloPoMo) which is a community sustained challenge for professional and personal bloggers to publish one post every day of the month. I've committed to NaBloPoMo on my personal blog for the second year in a row in hopes of tapping into a new level of writing inspiration and motivation. Less than a week into the challenge, I feel like I have instead tapped into new levels of incredulity because I have subjected myself to this challenge again despite the struggles I had last year.

When I first attempted the challenge last year, I assumed that the hardest part would be carving out time every day to devote to writing a blog that I felt was worthy of publishing. While that has certainly been part of my struggle, this year I'm realizing that the actual hardest part is listening. In order to blog successfully and authentically every day, I have to more deliberately listen to what I'm thinking, feeling, and experiencing throughout the day which requires a level of self-vulnerability I didn't anticipate when I decided to take on this challenge.

This unexpected experience is much like what I went through during the Enneagram sessions that Wellspring offered the past two weeks. While I recognized that a certain level of self-work would be necessary to discuss personality types, I didn't expect to have to look that deeply at what motivates some of my most deeply entrenched ways of being. I had mentally prepared myself to be extra attentive to the presenter and to other people in the session but not to myself.

The strange thing that I am learning from the NaBloPoMo challenge along with the Enneagram sessions is that in order to be attentive and even vulnerable with other people I have to be willing to be vulnerable with and attentive to myself. In order to be honest and present with others, I have to practice being fully present with myself.

For me, that means giving myself time to breathe and center myself. It means quietly acknowledging feelings when they arise, even if I’d rather gloss over them. It means praying daily for the patience to be still and listen.

What about you? What does it look like for you to be present with yourself? How do you practice self-vulnerability?

- Angelique Gravely