Smuggling Grace

When I think about the possibility of Spring — like actual Spring, and not the False Spring I wrote about yesterday — one of the things I’m most excited about is getting back on my e-bike. I’ve become an avid cyclist, but I have to put it away for nearly half the year.

The weather makes me do this, but for the record, I am also remarkably good at delayed gratification. I can wait. Even more than that, I can set a goal and work at it consistently over a long period of time. I would crush that marshmallow test.

I’m not sure how I became like this, but when I want to try something, I will do it for a very long stretch of time. And if a goal falls apart, I’m flexible enough to pivot — but I will try again repeatedly over time. I’ll adapt where I need to, but I know how to play the long game. I know how to delay gratification.

I was thinking about this on my way home from work. I saw a bike leaning up against a tree, and I found myself thinking about my very first bike. I really only started biking seriously in my forties, but when I was seven years old, I bought a bike that cost over $100 with my allowance money.

For a long while, I received $1 a week, and I think when I set that goal for a bike, I started getting $2 per week. That means I waited for more than a year to buy that bike.

It was hot pink. I loved it.

I remember riding around the block oodles of times in a row and imagining that one day I’d end up in the Olympics doing distance riding. Well, that’s not true.

See, I can pivot!

But I have biked more than 3,000 miles in my own town. And that’s a long-term goal, too. In fact, I set what might be the most absurd goal of all — riding to every street in my town in alphabetical order.

I’m on the Fs. I average about 2.5 alphabetical letters per year, so I doubt I’ll even live here long enough to finish. But I’m going to go as far as I can.

Maybe my seven-year-old self would be impressed.

—Renee Roederer

I’ve lived in Michigan for thirteen years — a whole teenager of time. And yet, every year, I am fooled by False Spring. You would think I would have figured this out by now.

You may or may not experience False Spring where you live, but here in the Upper Midwest, sometime in March, maybe mid or late month, it suddenly gets warm. The sun is stretching a little longer into the evening. The air softens. And you start to believe that the weather will finally align with astronomical spring on the Spring Equinox.

But no. It inevitably turns cold again. Snow is still entirely possible. April can feel like a betrayal. Wishful thinking, I know.

It’s February, so I’m not falling for it just yet. But somehow I still wasn’t expecting snow last weekend. I should know better.

And I’m thinking of everyone in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic today.

February makes sense, technically. But at this stage, we’re just… over it.

Patience, Grasshopper.

—Renee Roederer

I am publishing this post in the early morning hours, so it seems like a strange time to send a benediction. But whenever you hear it, I hope you know it’s true and that you can lean into it.

Here’s how I finished a worship service yesterday:

“This is the most matter-of-fact way to end a service, but it’s also profound: You are loved with a love you cannot lose. And since that is true, it’s yours to share.”

I say the same to you as well:

You are loved with a love you cannot lose.
And since that is true, it is really yours to share.

—Renee Roederer

–Photos by Renee Roederer

This week, news landed hat astronomers have discovered an “inside out” solar system with planets orbiting the star LHS 1903. In this system, gaseous planets are closer to the star, with rocky planets orbiting at a greater distance. This kind of system has never been observed before, and it’s raising big questions about planet formation.

You can learn more here or below.

I’m connected to many congregations and spiritual communities, but Farm Church is the one I most consider to be my church.

Farm Church is a spiritual community in Durham, North Carolina. We grow food on a plot of land inside the city and give it away to address food insecurity. We put our hands in soil. We tend and harvest. We practice care in embodied ways. Though I live in Michigan, I lead Farm Church’s weekly newsletter, which keeps me tethered to its rhythms and questions, even from afar.

Last Sunday, the community gathered and explored a simple but searching question: What do we believe?

That question can take on many postures depending on who is asking it and why. It can feel defensive. It can feel academic. It can feel charged. But it can also invite something deeper. What do we hold most dear? What sits at the center of our lives? What shapes our actions without us always realizing it?

At Farm Church, we believe that loving the earth and growing food is sacred. We believe that tending soil is prayerful. We believe that caring for one another is sacramental.

As we enter the season of Lent, another question emerges: Are there any beliefs we need to give up?

Beliefs about ourselves that are too small?
Beliefs that are cynical?
Beliefs that flatten complexity?
Beliefs that limit joy?
Beliefs that distort what is actually true?

Last Sunday, members of the community wrote down beliefs they want to release and placed them in a fire. Those ashes were then used for an Ash Wednesday gathering. The things we release can still mark us and change us. Surrender becomes part of our transformation.

I find myself wondering: What beliefs are we carrying that quietly shape us more than we realize? Is there a belief we are ready to release? What might happen if we named it — and let it go?

Lent has begun. Perhaps this is a good time.

—Renee Roederer

I think it’s rare for us to receive personal letters and cards in the mail outside of holidays, but early this week, I got two in one day! One was from a long-time friend who regularly writes like this, and she always gives me joy. The other was a kind affirmation from a colleague I appreciate and admire. It was such a wonderful surprise.

My point in sharing this is that if you have something meaningful to share with someone — a story, an affirmation, an invitation, a kind word, a joke, a vulnerability, or a memory — do it. I don’t think we ever regret that connection.

—Renee Roederer

Carl Jung, the Swiss psychiatrist who founded analytical psychology, wrote a great deal about archetypes and the symbolic life of the psyche. He was interested in sacrifice as something transformative, not merely destructive. And linguistically, “sacrifice” and “sacred” share the same Latin root, sacer.

I’m not an expert in Jung, so what follows is riffing rather than representing him directly. But I’m intrigued by the connection.

So often, we think of sacrifice as depletion. This is especially true when we think about our bodies and how much time and energy we give. If sacrifice is our aim, we might imagine it as self-negating. We give until we are exhausted.

But how different would it be, and how different would it feel, if we thought about sacrifice through the lens of offering something sacred?

Rather than living through depletion or exhaustion, we might think of our giving as an act that honors what is sacred, in ourselves and in others. We might remember that what we are offering is not the erasure of ourselves, but something that carries ultimate value. Something grounded. Something intentional. Something that also fills us.

And perhaps what is sacred flows through us rather than being manufactured entirely by us. We are not required to do it all or be it all on our own.

That feels like a different framing to me. And I appreciate that.

—Renee Roederer

“It’s better to be whole than good.”

That’s what Dwight L. Wilson, one of my mentors, recently shared in an interview about the books he has written. I highly recommend the entire interview. It’s filled with wisdom. He said this is a phrase he first heard many years ago from Elizabeth Watson, one of his own mentors.

That sentence really struck me.

We all carry places of woundedness. We have received harm from relationships and systems. And we have also wounded others. We have harmed our relationships and created pain for communities and even the environment through our participation in systems.

We can all heal. Notice that this word is both passive and active. Healing is something we can receive and something we can offer. It is an internal process and a relational one.

If we spend all our time trying to be good, we will keep our wounded histories in the shadows. We will do all we can to avoid them or suppress them. When we live this way, we miss opportunities to heal ourselves and to be reconciled with people, communities, and land. We keep places of pain in our rearview mirror, yet they remain active in ways that are not always conscious.

As Richard Rohr says,

“We either transform our pain or we transmit it.”

As Margaret Foley says,

“We reenact what we have not resolved.”

So yes, as Dwight L. Wilson and Elizabeth Watson remind us,

“It is better to be whole than to be good.”

—Renee Roederer

When one of my friends was 18 years old, he traveled to Chicago for a service trip. He and other young people stayed with host families who were receiving services from the organization they had come to serve alongside.

The family he stayed with struggled deeply with poverty, and they were regularly neglected by their housing complex. Their home often had mice and roaches. In the midst of these challenges, they were deeply hospitable to the young people who stayed with them, and over a few days, meaningful friendships began to form.

One morning, my friend noticed a particular clock in the kitchen. Underneath it, the family had written the words, “Nebraska Time.” When he asked about it, they explained that it marked the time in Nebraska. Of course, Chicago and Nebraska are both in the Central Time Zone, so this analog clock was no different from any other clock they might see that day in the city.

But it carried so much meaning.

This family had contacts in Nebraska. People they loved. A place where they believed they could get a new start. It was their dream to move there and begin again.

Every day, they saw that label, and with it in front of them, they dreamed. Did they ever get there? I don’t know. My friend doesn’t know either. But the Nebraska Time clock had a powerful effect on their lives in the present moment. It didn’t only give them hope or a vision for the future. That imagined future seemed to reach back and shape their present, as well. It helped them hold onto hope in their current circumstances and continue building partnerships and friendships that aligned with their goals.

I wonder, do you have anything like that?

An idea or vision you hold for your future — or something that represents your deepest hopes or values so clearly that it is shaping how you live right now?

Might you?

—Renee Roederer