Faculty Devotion- May 1, 2025

 

video link for Faculty Senate Devotion 5.1.25

Below is the text of the reflection I shared at the beginning of Faculty Senate today. It was a good process for me to write this as part of my closure as I say goodbye to this place and consider both the joy and the pain in this community where I’ve been for the last 13 years. 

Happy May Day! 

I had the opportunity to begin a CPE program through the Spiritual Care department at Harborview during my sabbatical winter quarter.  

During our week of orientation, our supervisor gave the best definition of spiritual care that I've heard as "with-ing."  It is about being with people--- no matter what they are going through. 

I asked one of the other chaplains named Zach pictured here with me on Ash Wednesday at Harborview what keeps him coming back and without hesitation, he said, "It keeps me soft, grounded, and tender." 

This is one of my favorite quotes from the beloved Father Gregory Boyle who founded Homeboy Industries in Los Angeles, the largest gang rehabilitation and re-entry program in the world.

This ideal has been easier said than done- given the many painful stories I've encountered at Harborview, but it's a posture I aspire to. 

This quote from Tish Harrison Warren has resonated deeply with me in my work as a chaplain and also here at SPU. 

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There have been so many ways that I've seen the crossover of the work at Harborview to the work we all do here at SPU. 

This is the art of "with-ing." 

In this difficult time that we have found ourselves in here at SPU, we have been challenged to refine our work of "with-ing" with our students and with one another. 

Wendell Berry is a farmer, writer, and environmental activist who has served as a prophet in our day and has been a veteran of grief in the work of creation care. 

In his poem called Manifesto: The Mad Farmer Liberation Front, he wrote, "be joyful though you have considered all the facts." He also ended the poem with the lines, "practice resurrection." 

Following in Wendell Berry's footsteps, I am inviting us to a practice together of blowing bubbles. 

Based on the beautiful liturgy called A Liturgy for the Ritual of Morning Coffee from Every Moment Holy, I pieced this liturgy together about blowing bubbles for us in this time here at SPU. 

So, for those of us who are leaving and for those of you who are carrying this community forward, may this brief liturgy help us all to keep us soft, grounded, and tender in the coming days. 

I invite you to blow the bubbles you received when you came in

 as I read this for us for our closing prayer.