Reading for formation
Henri Nouwen’s Can you Drink the Cup? is among the half dozen or so classic books of Christian Spirituality that I've read and pondered regularly for years. Call it my devotional canon. Such reading isn't informational but formational and transformational; these books, along with Scripture, nourish my theological imagination, sustain spiritual passion, recall dissipated affections to a new focus, touch me in those deep recesses of love and hopefulness about myself.
Sometimes folks ask how I get the time to do all the reading I do. Here's part of the answer. How we love God and follow faithfully after our Lord will be different for each of us, as different as we are from each other. Not everyone finds reading brings them closer to God—though I think more could. But I am persuaded that good pastoral care includes among its goals enabling and encouraging our community to think, reflect, read and learn together of the wisdom to live for Christ faithfully and well. Many don't read deeply and slowly because no one has ever helped them make the connection between such reading and the way they view the world, their faith and the essential connections between our understanding of the world, our knowledge of God, our prayers, and the quality of our Christian faithfulness.
Time for reading, time for work, time for the people at the heart of our lives, time for sleep, time for serving others, time for music, exercise, eating, TV—but in the end much of what we do with time comes down to choices, preferences, priorities and life circumstances. Some of the great Christian spiritual teachers had a fixed habit of 15 minutes a day for slow reading of classic spiritual texts. These Christian spiritual teachers approached their reading of classic texts with a 'give us this day our daily bread' urgency. They knew they needed nourishment, strength, energy, and they felt and befriended their hunger as a necessary inner reminder that they are not self-sustaining, or self-propelled or capable of growth without food.
Food for the heart, the imagination, the conscience, the mind - food for thought, food for energy, food for strength, and thus, food to live. And for a quarter of an hour a day, week on week, month on month, year on year, they made time to slow down and wait in the company of Christ, learning from the cloud of witnesses what it is to be loved by God and to love God. And in that Love to understand more what it meant for them to be called to be part of God's mission to redeem and renew, to reconcile and restore a fallen but God-loved creation!
Grace and peace,
Anita Sorenson
Pastor for Spiritual Formation