Vox Veniae Podcast

Gina Bastone reflects on how we might need to reconsider what it means to invite God to bear witness and consider the evidence of love around us [1 John 5:9-13].

 

Reflection

Where have you seen the evidence of love recently, especially in our community?

Where in your life (past wounds or experiences, current anxieties or fears) do you need God to bear witness? Where do you need validation?

Where is God calling you to take responsibility for harm you may have caused? How can God’s witness help you grow and heal from that harm?

 

Practice

Notice the spots in your life where you need God's validation. Start with something small, and invite God to bear witness to your pain and anxieties.  Also notice where you have caused harm (intentionally or unintentionally), and investigate how you can begin to take accountability for that harm. God is with you in this process!

Reflect on where you’ve seen the evidence of love in our community.  Where have we shown up for each other in the last few months? Where have you born witness for others in our community?

 

Resources

Podcast: You’re Wrong About

https://yourewrongabout.com

Book: Undrowned (Alexis Pauline Gumbs)

https://www.amazon.com/Undrowned-Feminist-Lessons-Emergent-Strategy-ebook/dp/B084T5S2DQ

Weylin Lee reflects on our practice of love in light of what is happening around us and how we’re invited to reflect the love Christ modeled for us [John 15:9-17].

Reflection

How do you imagine God's loving gaze toward you?

What would it look like to lay down your ego and practice non-transactional love?

How are we creating a more loving community and becoming more loving people?

Practice

Image of the Towel and Water Basin.  Reflect on the ways you've been loved.  Meditate on the image of the towel and water basin and imagine Jesus washing your feet.  Receive the loving gaze of God.

Non-transactional Love.  Reflect on where our love and relationships are transactional.  What would it look like to lay down our ego, our selfish motives, our narcissistic tendencies?

Resources

Book: Love is the Way (Bishop Michael Curry)

Virginia Cumberbatch reflects on God’s invitation for us to experience both individual and collective freedom in the midst of our fears [1 John 4:17-21].

Reflection

After a year of quarantine, how will you seek freedom and rest for yourself this spring?

As we witness the hate and injustice of the world, how will you support the liberation of others?

How will you allow God’s love to “fully form” in you this week?

Practice

How will you abide in God’s love to navigate you through the fog (fear) of our current conditions?  Inhale: God, meet me in this fear.  Exhale: Bring rest to my restless mind.

How will you allow God’s love for us to model and direct our pursuit of collective freedom and community justice?  Inhale: We were meant for freedom.  Exhale: I will not settle for less.

Resources

Instagram: @BlackLiturgies

Podcast: gen/activist

Weylin Lee, Kristy Robinson and Joe Arenella reflect together on how they are receiving and integrating Psalm 23 in the context of how this past year has invited them into the green pastures and dark valleys [Psalm 23].

Reflection

What are the green pastures you're invited to remember from this past year?

How have you seen glimpses of God's grace and hope in the midst of the valley?

Naomi Jackson reflects on how Jesus' interaction with his disciples after resurrection invites us to our own experience of restoration [Luke 24:36-48].

Reflection

How do we see the marks of death we see in ourselves? And how have they been transformed?

How do you need to reintroduce yourself to your community?

Where do you need to experience restoration?

Rebecca Wheeler-Waltson invites us to locate ourselves in the story of Nehemiah and how it plays out in ways that’s familiar with what’s currently happening in our country [Nehemiah 2:1-8].

Reflection

Where would you place yourself in this account? As the exiled? The emperor? Or an eyewitness?

As you ponder what's happening in this country today (anti Asian hate, Darin Chauvin trial), can you see the exiled, the emperor, the eyewitnesses?  What response is the Spirit stirring in you?

On Easter Sunday, Weylin Lee reflects on how the unexpected nature of Jesus’ resurrection invites us towards groundedness and good news [John 20:1-18].

 

Reflection

How have we been accompanied in the losses we have experienced?

How are we invited to a path of healing and restoration that Jesus offers?

What restorative work are we being invited to participate in?

 

Practice

Reflect on losses and accompaniment.  Hold space for both the unexpected losses and the ways you were accompanied. Write out all the unexpected losses this past year has brought. List the names of those who have accompanied you in them.

Observe the gardens around us.  Notice and observe the gardens and natural landscape around us.  Sit with and reflect on the restoration that is happening through our plants.  How are we invited to a path of healing and restoration that Jesus offers us?

 

Resources

Film: Feels Good Man

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZEiqZWw5vYs

Rachael Clinton Chen reflects on the groaning work of God as we enter Holy Week and how we’re invited to look for Jesus in our story of ache [Mark 15:25-39].

 

Reflection

Will you let Jesus, the Messiah, enter your ache this Holy Week? 

Where hope feels weary or foolish, will you let God (and others) groan with you and for you?

Resources

Instagram: @aapi.liturgy

https://www.instagram.com/aapi.liturgy/

Sarah Berson reflects on what a new Covenant means for us and how the love of God is available for all of us even in the midst of the challenging year we have been collectively navigating [Jeremiah 31:31-34].

 

Reflection

What grounds you?

What are you moving from? What are you moving toward?

Practice

Think about the mile markers from this last year.  Think of a safe person you can share your year with. Offer to listen to another person's story of what this year has been.

Title: Poison and Its Remedy

James Alison reflects on how Jesus’ death undoes the world of sacrifice from within [John 3:14-21].

Reflection

Is Jesus’ death really a sacrifice?

How did Jesus’ death undo our whole world of judgment and condemnation built on sacrifice?

The little word “so” in the most famous verse in the Bible has two possible meanings. “For God loved the world so much that he gave his only Son”. Or “For God loved the world in this way: that he gave his only Son”. Which do you think John meant, and why?