Kinship with all things

I am returning to a blog written over three years ago, knowing that my aging cat Tabitha has passed on and the people of Syria continue to suffer. It is a difficult time for many around the world and in this country.

There is so much that fills me: plants, animals, clouds, day and night, and the eternal in man. The more uncertain I have felt about myself, the more there has grown up in me a feeling of kinship with all things. ~Carl Jung; Memories Dreams, pg.359

I have found in prayer a kinship with humanity and with animals. I love the liturgical prayers, but I also find myself quietly praying in a more conversational style at bedtime with my cat Tabitha. Animals reflect God’s grace and unconditional love for us. Jung was a believer in the power of animals to signal change and nudge us to live and trust in a new way.

• I pray for animals in the midst of war, animals outside in the extreme cold and extreme heat.
• I pray for animals who are in their hour of need.
• I recall how Temple Grandin wrote how animals need to feel calm when they are afraid.
• And then more specifically, I pray for my cat Tabitha, who has given me so much love.

This is from the Book of Common Prayer: “This we know: every living thing is yours and returns to you. Gentle God: fragile is your world, delicate are your creatures, and costly is your love which bears and redeems us all.”

• From animals I move to people.  I move around the world naming countries one by one, not knowing what will happen, but hoping for something good to spring up to replace religious wars, bigotry and nationalism.
• For many months I have been fixated on Syria and specifically Aleppo. The images of devastation linger with me long after my prayers have ended. While I rejoice that many families are leaving Aleppo at this moment; I also know that it is the beginning of a long journey to find “home” again.
• I feel a bond with the world in a strange way, because of this nightly “naming,” even though I speak a different language and have a different faith.

Let us all practice respect and understanding for one another as some of us journey through lent, while others practice their faith or religion in another way.  May we be nudged to live and trust in a new way.