We at Mercy by the Sea have so much we want to share with you:
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Resources and thoughts on contemplative prayer, spiritual direction, the second half of life, emerging leadership, creativity, our relationship with nature and much more!
You'll find seasonal photos of the grounds — vegetation, trees and winged and four-legged creatures that make their homes here. We'll capture changes in the light and colors as the seasons change. So bookmark this page and come back regularly. or subscribe to our weekly eNewsletter where these posts will be sent to your email inbox.
I don’t recall when I first began sitting in my prayer chair early each morning. With the demands of four young children, most likely my practice was born out of necessity. I needed quiet and peace before the many tasks of motherhood took precedence.
The chair is just an ordinary chair that over the years acquired meaning beyond just a piece of furniture. I don’t remember which child first named it the “prayer chair” or which one called the living room the “loving room” but somehow we all sensed the subtle field of grace that permeated the room.
One of the joys of working at Mercy by the Sea is the staff’s appreciation of the creatures with whom we share the grounds. There’s "Ralphie," the woodchuck, who birthed two little ones this summer; a lean fox that makes frequent appearances; chipmunks; and rabbits, who graze in the courtyard outside our offices.
Let’s not forget the seagull who likes to sit on our assistant cook Adam's car; Harriet, the hawk; the bald-headed cardinal who turned up this year; and a host of crows, gulls, ospreys, sparrows, mourning doves and robins. One of our volunteer gardeners, Bob Bartusiak, recently put up bird feeders which are attracting imperial red cardinals, stunning gold finches, chickadees and squirrels, whose antics mesmerize us. Daily we’re entertained by two tenacious squirrels – one male, the other female – who hang upside by their claws while munching on black sunflower seeds.
I was totally focused on harvesting the tomatoes, sorting through the crop, deciding which vegetation to remove. It was stifling hot. The air was so thick that I felt as if I was moving in a dense liquid. Suddenly, the heavy silence was interrupted by the voice of my fellow gardener. “Look up!” Thinking I could ignore the directive, I lowered my head closer to the earth. “Look up!” came the persistent call. Obeying the command, despite my desire to quickly finish my task so I could escape the heat, I looked up and there above my head was the most glorious sunflower I had ever seen.
“The second half of my life will be ice breaking up on the river, rain soaking the fields, a hand held out, a fire, and smoke going upward, always up.”
I begin this reflection on second half of life spirituality with an excerpt from Joyce Sutpen’s poem “Crossroads.” With so many poems on the topic from which to choose, I picked Sutpen’s for its evocative imagery and its outright acknowledgement that we can choose to thrive in the second half of our lives. In just a few lines, the poet describes some of the beautiful gifts we can anticipate.
