Dancing Up the Sun

I have been a person of faith all my life. God has always resided in a place deep within me… sometimes closer to, at other times farther from the surface of my consciousness, engaged actively or simply present, at different times recognized or seemingly forgotten… but always there, always here. While I may have not been, God has been constant. The paths I have followed and the ways I have chosen to understand, interpret and interact with God have changed through the years – as has my spiritual self-identity, the forms my worship has taken, the words I use in prayer and meditation… the aspect or name or form I attribute to the divine, or perhaps that I come to recognize as the Divine, with or without gender – and I suspect (or hope) that while people may not have, God has perhaps found it humorous and endearing. I’m not even certain whether it’s anthropomorphizing a force beyond my ability to understand, to say so… but there it is. Such is my faith. Deep, abiding, changeable and immovable.

One thing that has not changed throughout my life is my understanding of God-as-Love. I’ve argued it, written about it, preached it… in any form and by any name, my one consistent understanding of the Divine has been Love. Christ taught it, Buddha taught it, Ramakrishna taught it, bards sang of it (and still do)… God is Love. Our worship is offered in love and to Love, as conduits for Love – in all of the many shapes, kinds and iterations that takes.

Today is May Day, Beltane – in many parts of the world and in varying traditions, it’s a day of welcoming the coming summer in the heart of spring. It is a day for new beginnings, for joy and for love both carnal and divine, depending upon one’s own inclinations and beliefs, sometimes without making too much of a difference between those points. It is a time of primal communion with the Sacred, what the Celts call a thin place and time, where we draw perhaps closer to God and God feels nearer to us, than at other times. In past years, I have enjoyed spending it with friends who are Morris dancers… their tradition is to dance up the sun, to greet and welcome the day and the season with music, bells, sticks, handkerchiefs and swords, and I must admit that this morning I am missing it. I suspect that despite the current shelter-in-place/quarantine orders due to the Covid-19 coronavirus, I could probably still find a group if I went out looking… in Tilden Park or on the streets of Berkeley, San Francisco or Oakland… and it’s tempting. But sitting in my car to maintain safe “social distancing” while watching the dance does not seem quite the same. So I am here in my home looking out a window to the north and east, enjoying videos of my favorite Morris team at Renaissance Faires past… watching with a big orange kitty next to me as the sky lightens and waiting for the sun. This is my thin place this May Day… and even in this odd fashion, I can feel the joy of it, the exuberance and Love… and I know that God is present in it. Wherever you are and whatever you are doing… I hope you can feel it too.

Photo credit: Broken Sphere on Wikimedia Commons

Pipe & Bowl Morris & Country Dancers at Norcal Ren Faire 2010-09-19