Welcome to Sacred Correspondence
Sacred Correspondence is an online offering of spiritual direction, the time-honored practice of accompanying persons on a spiritual journey. Sacred Correspondence blossoms from the same deep roots as Sacred Listening, a traditional face to face practice of spiritual direction, which I tend in my home office in south central Pennsylvania. (if you prefer in-person spiritual direction and my location is convenient for you, please contact me to schedule an introductory session.)
Sacred Correspondence substitutes the long-established soulful practices of journaling and letter-writing for the usual one-on-one verbal sharing, deep attentiveness, prayerful response, and deepening exploration of the more conventional conversation associated with spiritual direction.
Rather than inviting you into my home, entering into the stillness of the depths, and honoring what is present there-- through sacred correspondence, I will invite you to enter into your own depths, bring forth what is present there and to find in me one who will receive with an ear for the sacred and respond with love to your offerings. The door to my heart and inward to my spirit will open to embrace you as a sacred friend the same as if you, as a weary traveler, came knocking on the door to my house.
The metaphor of the traveler on his or her way home...perhaps wounded, lost, weary or simply in need of respite, nurture, comfort and a friendly ear to listen as he or she sorts, heals, rests and regains his or her own inner strength...is a fitting one for this relationship. As your hostess, I can help you to regain your bearings by looking inward with you for the landmarks of the Spirit that are guiding you back home to your true Self. I can offer shelter, nurture and warmth as you heal and rediscover your soul. For many weary travelers, especially the war-torn, it is the letters to and from home that keep their spirit focused and alive.
Sacred Correspondence -a definition
The word Correspondence is an interesting one. Etymologically, it means 'with promise' or 'with answer'. The promise of response is an important one. In our oft isolated, disconnected world, we find ourselves frequently feeling unheard. And while there are innumerable opportunities on the web to post one's thoughts to an unresponsive and uncaring community, the promise of truly being heard and responded to is rare. Too often the internet atmosphere is one of being deluged by information and by others who are also seeking to be heard, such that receiving and listening are rare. Connection and response is even rarer. If there is response at all, it is typically to the surface of the issue being discussed, not through to the yearnings of the heart or soul of the one sharing. There is no relationship to the human spirit beneath the words, behind the computer screen. That can leave one feeling vulnerable and even more isolated and alone.
Playing with the word correspondence, one can take it apart to read Core Respondence. This is my hope--that I might respond from my own core to the the sacred core that is behind your own sharing and deep within your words. In fact, this is the essence of spiritual direction, one soul sharing from its depths, the other receiving from its own. This touch, this communion of souls, is where the Sacred is encountered. More importantly, my hope is that you will learn to listen to and respond from your own core. The ensuing hope is that the outward movement in your life afterward will be one that lives and gives more fully from this deeper sense of Self. Curiously, the word correspondence also has to do with harmony.
What is the Sacred we will be sharing? If the whole of life is a Sacred Journey, which I believe it to be, then each moment, each experience, each thought, feeling, yearning, each expression and each word is Spirit-filled, Spirit-inspired and Spirit-guided. Some persons call this sacred aspect of life God. Others call it the Goddess, Divine, Love, Inner Wisdom, Christ-presence, Buddha, Allah, Tao, Higher Power, Source, the Absolute, the One, Eternal Being, Holiness, Energy, or Spirit. Whatever your name for the unseen mystery that is beneath and behind Life, it lends to your existence purpose, meaning, and creativity and fills it with the something-more-than-this that we all yearn for. We will look together for this unseen flowing through your life as your story is attended to with an ear for the Holy.
13th century mystic, Meister Eckhart, using God-language, saw the sacred within the whole of Life. "..all beings are words of God and books about God. My mouth expresses and reveals God, but the existence of a stone does the same....All creatures are doing the best they can to express God, and God is constantly speaking only one thing". For me that 'one thing' is Love. Though often wounded or hidden, it is present, the Source of all of life's manifestations and incarnations. To look for and to see the Divine in all things is to begin to be awake and aware, and is to begin to Live more fully. To look for and to see the Divine within oneself is to begin to Love.
"Love all of creation, the whole and every grain of sand.
Love every leaf and every ray of light.
Love the plants, love the animals, love everything.
If you love everything, you will perceive Divine Mystery in all things.
Once you perceive it you will comprehend it better every day.
And you will come, at last, to love the whole world with an all embracing Love."
--Dostoyevsky, Brothers Karamazov
Again Eckhart, " God is nowhere as much as God is in the soul. There, where time never enters, where no image shines in, in the innermost and deepest aspect of the soul, God creates the entire cosmos. Everything created millions of years ago, and everything which will be created after millions of years, God is creating within the innermost and deepest realms of the soul."
What is being created within and by you? What Divine Mystery do you incarnate and manifest here in this place? Why has your soul chosen this particular journey? How is Love (and how is your own soul) growing through your experience of Life? Who are you? What is the meaning of this, your precious Life?
Let's talk.
all is well, vicki