NUDGINGS: a journey into the unknown

“How beautifully leaves grow old. How full of light and colour are their last days.” John Burroughs It is Fall in Canada. In mid-August I noticed the first slight change of colour in the maple trees. Since then it has accelerated as the cold weather approaches.  This year, though, I noticed something new. The leaves weren’t immediately turning red and orange. Instead there seemed to be an intermediary stage when they became a dull brown, before they burst into the glorious colours of fall. They will keep that glorious colour until after they have fallen to the ground and been raked into piles. Then they will decay and become food for the next generation of leaves that will come in with the springtime.  Some leaves don’t change colour, some change colour sooner that the rest, and some simply become part of the grand overall spectacle. Something like humans, I thought, as we pass through childhood and to adulthood with all its complexities and responsibilities....

"Our limitations and success will be based most often, on your own expectations for ourselves. What the mind dwells upon, the body acts upon." Denis Waitley CTV late-night news reported week that an elderly woman had been involved in a accident while boarding a streetcar. She was 75! When I told this story to my physiotherapist (He’s in his early to mid-twenties), the conversation went something like this: ‘It made me so angry, that if I had had a rotten tomato, I would have thrown it at the screen!’ ‘Wasn’t she elderly? ‘No, she wasn't! But my friend who just turned 94 might be. Ask me in 20 years!’  Despite the fact that we hear from health-care professional that people are living longer, healthier lives, obviously whoever wrote the script for this newscast hadn’t internalized it. Recently someone said to me, ‘Nobody ever told me what to expect as I grew older.’ And I think that is true for many of us. Because we lack the knowledge of what hap...

An email arrived in my inbox last week with the heading ‘Numbers do Matter.” It was taking about the NAFTA negotiations between Canada., Mexico and the United States, stating that it was no surprise the agreement with Mexico was sought by the United States first. No surprise, the email said, because the population of Mexico is about 132,000,000 people, compared to Canada’s 34,000,000. Hence the bigger market, and thus a more profitable market, was to be found in Mexico. Yes, numbers do matter. A lab result comes back with an extremely high reading. The patient is hospitalized. On redoing the test in hospital it is found that the lab added an extra zero to the results taking them out of the normal zone into the dangerously high. Yes, numbers do matter. Churches are being closed because the numbers in the pews are shrinking. They can no longer pay for the upkeep of the building and the stipend for the clergy person. Yes, numbers do matter.   No one can dispute that...

“But spirituality without religion is also day-old manna, incapable of sustaining our life together in community. We are after all human beings and by our very nature we are beings who require other beings in order to thrive. We are called into community with one another and we bring into our communities our spiritual practices and once we do that we are about the task of being religious.” Taken from the online sermon, ‘Spiritual AND Religious’ by Rev. Dawn Hutchings When I had finished reading the complete text of this sermon. I felt uneasy, that something was wrong. I agree that spirituality without religion would not sustain anyone’s life within a religious community. And so, yes, a religious community is made up of those who share similar religious views. However that doesn’t give them the right to denigrate the experiences of other people who have differing views, or to slight those with differing experiences as being of lesser value. There are many other communities o...