You know that “overflowing head and heart” feeling after being immersed in an enormous pool of literary wisdom and honesty and lament and hope, and speakers so articulate that the beauty rises so fully that your eyes leak a little?
That’s where I’ve been.
The Festival of Faith and Writing
Three days in Grand Rapids, MI on the campus of Calvin University where the students and staff and guests opened themselves with immeasurable generosity and hospitality - y’all, it was magic. (and ok, yes, we’ve been reminded a thousand times to avoid cliches like “it was magic”, but I’m here to testify: It. Was. Magic.)
For decades, I’ve been envious of my friends and colleagues who’ve attended this legendary event. So when the stars aligned this year, I signed up, knowing I’d be in way over my head, among brilliant theologians and authors, preachers and poets, editors and publishers. I expected to be inspired and intimidated (in that good inspiring way that intimidation can catalyze our commitment to learning and improving), and I expected to be star-struck. Robin Wall Kimmerer and Ross Gay and Ariel Lawton and Amanda Opelt and J.S. Park and Barbara Brown Taylor. Y’all. An absolute tsunami of blinding brilliant goodness, words washing over us and into us. Full immersion.
I took notes occasionally, but mostly I sat and soaked it up, as much as I could; steeped and saturated in so much talent, so much wisdom, so much kindness and goodness. So much light, so much hope. I hadn’t acknowledged my thirst for this abundance of hope.
And this wasn’t hope as optimism, or hope as “positive thinking”; this was and is the hope born of attention, of seeing and naming the wholeness, the connectedness of all creation. Robin Wall Kimmerer’s gentle powerhouse heartful of indigenous wisdom reminding us that nature is our teacher, all of nature, that we must pay attention, and that the word “pay” is so appropos - attention is currency. She cited a study that found that middle school students can correctly identify more than 100 corporate logos, but cannot identify more than 20 species of plants.
Attention, she says, generates wonder, begetting gratitude and awe even in the presence of pain and woundedness. Attention, she says, - deep slow reflective attention - can become our initiation into the fullness of life, a recovery of valuing belonging over belongings. She invited us to choose new (to us modern-western-way-of-thinkers) ways of naming, honoring, cherishing all of creation - things that grow and swim and fly and flow and give us steadfast bedrock.
Poet Todd Davis reminded us, in his packed-to-capacity talk, that the word from Genesis that we’ve called “dominion” is more accurately “stewardship”, more accurately “parenting”, more wholly and holy “care-taking and care-giving”. We have work to do and it’s sacred reparation, restoration, re-membering.
Reading Ross Gay’s “Book of Delights” is delightful, and hearing him read his work is extra delightful and does indeed incite joy, and hearing/watching him read his own footnotes - hearing him get as tickled as we are by those long delicious detours of footnotes - creates waves of joy and laughter even as he reminds us, with the same contagious energy, that our work in the world matters, and we can make it greener and brighter and kinder, and that is ours to do as well.
J.S. Park named our collective lack of grief literacy, and the practical grace of learning to “unpastor”, learning it doesn’t help - we don’t help - when we try to resolve the unresolvable, to wrap grief and faith and tie it up with a bow. Make space, he reminds us, for all the ways the body and the heart and the community express grief and loss and pain and “the fractures of mortality.”
Barbara Brown Taylor’s concluding plenary address named the inadequacy of words to express the reality for which the word stand, but she named that inability with an unmatched elegance and accuracy. She named the sacred power of “divine diversity”, inviting and reminding us to learn from one another, quoting Father Richard Rohr: “Religions should be understood as only the fingers that point to the moon, not the moon itself, ” noting the hubris and humor of arguing over who has the best finger.
She invited and reminded us to embody the love in which we’re created, for which we’re created, saying “Incarnation is proof that matter matters to God.” Her hour of luminous, tender, courageous encouragement passed in a finger-snap, too soon.
Something in the neighborhood of 1500 people attended this Festival, making it extra festive. I only met a handful, of course, over coffee and in book-signing lines and on the shuttle across campus in the rain. Locals from the Grand Rapids area, readers and writers from across the country, like all the way across - from Alaska and California and Texas, and some dear Canadians. I’m so glad to say I have a new friend from Prince Edward Island (looking at you, Lindsey Gallant); we met over pizza and I plan to follow her writing for a long long time. I met editors from well-known publishing houses and journals, and many from new-to-me presses. Shuttle drivers and Uber drivers - Claudia and Jadir and Patrick who got us to and fro.
So. Many. Good. People.
I’ve not posted here in awhile, as I’ve been working on a project that asks and deserves lots of my time and attention, and I want to honor it by giving it everything I’ve got, maybe by giving life to words and in turn, words to life.
These past years have been a long season of listening, healing, learning, hurting, more listening and watching and healing. Many of you have accompanied and companioned me and tolerated me and pointed, again and again, toward the light. I’ve watched the tides and fed the birds and sat still beneath sunsets and stars; I’ve walked beaches and bridges, explored new places with old friends, and embraced old friends in new moments of loss and love. I’ve been taking notes, and I hope to share more of them soon.
For now, though, for the time being (because what else do we really have?) please know I’m grateful for the ways you share life with one another and with me, for the ways you shine your own gorgeous light into dark spaces, for the ways you help us laugh and listen and love, heal and hope.
Thank you for companioning one another and for making this journey beautiful.
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