O Birther!

Welcome to the first of a series of reflections on The Lord's Prayer, as translated from the Aramaic by Neil Douglas-Klotz. If you missed my introduction to this prayer last week, you can read that here.

Oh my goodness, I LOVE this first line SO MUCH. When I cry out —or sigh out, or cheer out— these words I feel immediate connection. I am turning toward the One from whom I came. I am turning toward my Source. I carry the Birther's divine DNA. This is the One in whom I first lived, and moved, and had my being. This is the one in whom I still live and move and have my being. This is the one in whom I will always live and move and have my being. I am forever connected to this One, and any illusion of separation is just that: illusion. This One carries me, anticipates me, nourishes me, contracts and expands for the sake of birthing me again and again into a larger existence. This one couldn't be more delighted to meet me after each harrowing birth and hold me to Her breast for comfort and assurance that She is still holding me, even though how I experience that may shift radically, as it does for an infant upon her birth.

This Birther is both Father and Mother. In this One both my own masculine and feminine divine inheritance is mirrored to me. This Father-Mother says, "You are made in my image, masculine and feminine." And this Father-Mother leads the way to guide my cultivation of both of those energies. While our world —our families of origin, our religious communities, our pop culture—often so narrowly defines and prescribes how we may or may not embody these energies, our Birther is invested in healing the masculine and feminine within us which has become wounded. None of us escape this wounding and perhaps you wonder, What is the difference between a healthy and unhealthy masculine or feminine energy? You may find this compare/contrast image defining healthy/unhealthy masculine and feminine energies to be as helpful as I have.

I wonder, when you greet God in this way, what is the Mothering or Fathering you most desire? What do you notice the Birther is up to in healing your inner masculine and feminine these days?

Finally, the last three words —of the Cosmos— ground me in the paradoxical presence of a God who is both intimate and imminent —at hand, in the beauty of a single bloom or my own embodied birthing contractions and expansions—and at the same time is completely beyond and transcendent, much greater than any particular distillation of Godself. Miraculously, made in God's image, I both contain the cosmos and am contained within it.

Some days I never pray past the resounding echo of this first line.

Soul friend, I treasure your shared experience and would welcome any of your reflections of how this prayer lands and grows in the soil of your soul.