Hope

I started this blog when I wanted to follow my spiritual journey, after deciding to stop going to church for a season. I needed to step out and step back from the insulated identity I had with the Lutheran Church, like our children at some stage must step out and step back from their parents and develop their own direction for themselves and their new family, holding onto what is helpful and shedding what is not.

Stepping back, has been a kind of holiday for my soul in many ways. I have let go of a great deal of guilt and fear and self expectation. I have tasted an expansive freedom in myself and the world around me. I'm more aware of what it is that I need and also more conscious of the wide variety of ways in which people find hope in their time of need. I'm also aware I have a few questions whirling around in my head in which I would like to explore the answers to, outside of my current faith?

Is our sole purpose here on earth to praise God?
What is death all about?
What does it mean in the universal scheme of things, not to believe?
Can hope and faith be in 'anything' that helps you to get through suffering, old age and death?

I guess I didn't really think about these things on a deeper level until the death of my mother a few years ago. I often wonder where she is now? Something deep in me has changed to which I'm still resolving.

I think HOPE and DEATH are the two things in my spiritual life that are being stirred up the most. I am searching for an understanding that is new and fresh that sits well in my heart and mind.

I like this quote:

They can cut all the flowers, but they cannot stop the coming of the Spring - Pablo Neruda