Though my spirituality has morphed and evolved into a very broad, multi-faith practice, the mantra-prayer I use most often, especially when I am experiencing fear, is “Lord have mercy.  Christ have mercy.”

In 1995, my mother was diagnosed with uterine cancer and underwent surgery.

As I sat in her apartment, she in the hospital recovering, me waiting for the day I could bring her home, coming back and forth from the hospital, not knowing how much longer she would live or if the surgery was successful.

I came as close as I had until then to recognizing her mortality and my own.

I felt frozen.

I sat at her table, her things all around me, but not her.

I pulled out my paints, these I’d brought with me because from the beginning of my artistic journey, I knew this was how Spirit would speak to me, how I would listen.

Not anticipating any image but just allowing the paint to flow onto the paper, connecting, praying, “Lord have mercy; Christ have mercy” for my mother, for myself, this image emerged.

In that moment, I felt as close to this teacher/healer as I have ever felt, knowing the Essential Energy of his work in the world was fully present to me then, as I know it is now.

Today, I use many other equally powerful mantras and memorized prayers, some from the Christian tradition and some not, but the one element that remains steadfast as essential to my connectedness with the Whole, with Great Spirit is what I now call the christ, the essential truth of being.  Mercy.  Mercy is Lord.  Gentleness.  Care.  Compassion.  Being and living into these qualities day by day.

What prayers sustain you?  Do you use affirmation?

Let us gather here in a community of gentleness, sustaining one another as we enter this season of darkness returning to the Light.

Aho!