A Simple Spring Beginning

Greetings, blessings, and thank you for dropping by my new weblog. I am greatly inspired in this undertaking by Sister Laurel's Notes from Stillsong Hermitage. She's been blogging for a while, and she is both a Canon 603 hermit and a Spiritual Director, which I think is a remarkably encouraging combination. Sister Laurel's example gives me hope that perhaps one day I, too, could serve the Church as a professed hermit, blogger, and Spiritual Director.

Since I know how busy you all are, and I believe an economy of words is part of the eremitic calling, my plan is to publish just one weekly progress note every Friday evening at 5 PM Eastern Time. I will also limit myself to just five paragraphs per post. If you are reading this after receiving my email invitation, please know that I am deeply grateful for all that you have done to support me on the spiritual path. I don't expect any of you to scrupulously follow my updates, but I welcome private comments and questions any time you get a chance to read and reflect on my weekly entries and find yourself with something to say.

Now for some light and heavy spring lifting. I am about to replace the old mattress on my bed, which is full-sized, and it occurs to me that a prospective hermit should restrict himself to a twin-sized bed. Does this sound more like religious adulting or regressive downsizing? Next week I will let you know what I decided to order and why.

That was the light lifting. The heavy lifting is this: I have a wonderful new faith-based psychiatric medication prescriber, and she is thinking that some positive socialization time in a local church could be good for me. I half agree with her, but I am also asking myself if this would be too much cognitive dissonance for an aspiring hermit, especially a sensitive vegan with a psychiatric disability. I can see myself walking from my hermit's cell to a Christian vegan meditation group with sitting cushions on the floor (there is a long and venerable Catholic Zen lineage to talk about as we get further into this), but driving myself in a gas-guzzler to an anti-vegan Church pew? Unh-uh. That is not my charism. It's all I can do to drive my aging mom to the grocery store every Friday morning. I have to pass by a lot of animal products while we shop, and as grateful as I am for the incredible quality of our food system, and for the opportunity to get groceries with my mom, the exposure to the implicit suffering of the planet really hurts my soul. Am I being too sensitive? Am I using my veganism as a defense mechanism to protect myself from mental health stigma, post-pandemic social anxiety and unresolved concerns about organized Christianity? Or is the Holy Spirit leading me deeper into the emotional contours of a genuine eremitic vegan charism? Could it be a blend of all three?

This is where I am as I start out on this new leg of my spiritual journey. Thanks again for your kind attention and please don't be offended if you are one of my many beloved non-vegan family members and friends within and outside the Christian faith. I respect your right to see life differently. We all have unique gifts. I believe God is calling me to love more generously, not judge more harshly. May all of our spring 2025 projects be blessed. “This is what the kingdom of God is like. A man scatters seed on the ground. Night and day, whether he sleeps or gets up, the seed sprouts and grows, though he does not know how. All by itself the soil produces grain—first the stalk, then the head, then the full kernel in the head. As soon as the grain is ripe, he puts the sickle to it, because the harvest has come” (Mark 4:26-29, NIV).