Labyrinth

I walked the labyrinth at church this morning, more slowly than last time. I noticed that as I entered the labyrinth, I was facing away from the church, toward the busy four-lane road next to it. When I stopped at the center, I was facing the same way, but it looked different. Part of the labyrinth's power is that it symbolizes our lifelong spiritual journey–so even though I was looking at the same road from almost the same place, I had had several minutes to quiet my mind, process what I've been thinking a lot about lately–work issues, parent issues–and eventually I heard the cicadas more clearly than the traffic. From the center I turned around, and there was the church. What would I take back there from the center? As I have mentioned here before I am a lousy Christian–full of doubts, but very happy being part of my  church community. So when I returned to the entrance and looked up, I still had that lightness to my breathing. The labyrinth reminded me to put aside all the abstract doubts and just go sit with a community of real people who really care for each other and the world.

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