Scott Avett is a visual artist, musician, and songwriter. No amount of descriptors quite do him justice. Scott’s work was met by my ears before my eyes. His songs slip into the ear stream, reverberate off the rib cage and remind the heart it was born free. Scott’s paintings hold your gaze in absorption, jostle you awake, and drop you off a block later. In our conversation today Scott and I talk about creativity and contemplation, mysterious inputs that need to be absence of the thought of output...
Jul 19, 2023•1 hr 13 min•Season 4Ep. 3
Haleh Liza Gafori is a translator, vocalist, poet, and educator born in New York City of Iranian descent. Her latest work, is a translation of Rumi poems entitled Gold . I first heard one of her translations of Rumi sitting around a campfire on a Sunday morning in Patagonia, Arizona. I was bit by the passion and this conversation does not disappoint. Haleh and I converse about being raised in a family that celebrates poetry, how a translator’s work is never done alone, what clergy of today might...
Jul 05, 2023•59 min•Season 4Ep. 2
Belden Lane is Professor Emeritus of Theological Studies at Saint Louis University, author of numerous books including The Solace of Fierce Landscapes: Exploring Desert and Mountain Spirituality and Backpacking with the Saints: Wilderness Hiking as Spiritual Practice . Belden Lane is a true elder, and in our conversation he exhibits that when we talk about wild places, the rough play and laughter of God, grief after losing a son, what we can learn from trees, and much more. Visit contemplify.com...
Jun 20, 2023•54 min•Season 4Ep. 1
Good poetry is inherently spiritual. It is a clown car of interpretation. Once a door of perception is opened, endless and surprising “Ahas” tumble out. When you have a spiritual teacher who embodies a poem, their words become thunder and contemplation soaks you. Get a taste of Season Four of Contemplify. First full episode is out in a week. slide over to contemplify.com
Jun 13, 2023•6 min
A musing on practice, desire, and its evolutions vist contemplify.com
May 12, 2023•6 min•Season 3Ep. 14
I was overly giddy, strangely nervous, but above all grateful to be in conversation with James Finley about his breathtaking new book, The Healing Path : A Memoir and an Invitation . Each page is a thousand pages deep, that is how Jim walks about the world, drawing from the depths and teaching with winsome grace, poetics, and of course, wisdom. I have read The Healing Path twice now and I don’t see an end to rereading it, it charts the unfolding of Jim’s life; terrorizing trauma and abuse he end...
Mar 30, 2023•1 hr 29 min•Season 3Ep. 13
A musing inspired by Shawn Askinosie's story about Belgium beer brewing monks and the parables of Jesus from Feb 2023 vist contemplify.com
Feb 25, 2023•9 min•Season 3Ep. 12
A musing on Bill Holm's "Horizontal Grandeur" pulled from his book of essays, The Music of Failure.
Feb 08, 2023•5 min•Season 3Ep. 11
A musing on the present moment of awareness that holds everything.
Jan 24, 2023•7 min•Season 3Ep. 10
Father Adam Bucko has been a committed voice in the movement for the renewal of Christian Contemplative Spirituality and the growing New Monastic movement. He has taught engaged contemplative spirituality in Europe and the United States and has authored Let Your Heartbreak be Your Guide: Lessons in Engaged Contemplation , and co-authored Occupy Spirituality: A Radical Vision for a New Generation (with Matthew Fox), and T he New Monasticism: An Interspiritual Manifesto for Contemplative Living (w...
Nov 27, 2022•1 hr 1 min•Season 3Ep. 9
Musing from November 9th, 2022 inspired by by reading Chris Dombrowski's The River You Touch Visit contemplify.com
Nov 09, 2022•8 min•Season 3Ep. 8
Fr. David Denny is a lifelong seeker whose commitment to the unfolding mystery of life has brought him to explore the deserts of place and soul. In 1975 Fr Dave entered the Spiritual Life Institute, a contemplative monastic community rooted in the Carmelite tradition. And in 2005, he left that community to co-found the Desert Foundation with Tessa Bielecki. A writer, a poet, retreat master and teacher, Fr. Dave now hangs his hat in Tucson, Arizona. In our conversation, Fr. Dave and I talk about ...
Oct 21, 2022•1 hr•Season 3Ep. 7
I have been waiting years to have this conversation with author, poet, and fly-fishing guide Chris Dombrowski. There is a kinship I feel with Chris's lens on life. He is a top-shelf writer to boot. The River You Touch: Making a Life on Moving Water comes out October 11th, 2022. I have read it and pre-ordered multiple copies for friends and family. If you are a longtime listener, you know I do not ever do a hard sell. Buy this book for yourself . And another for any friend who seeks to live a min...
Oct 02, 2022•1 hr 25 min•Season 3Ep. 6
Musing from September 16, 2022 visit contemplify.com
Sep 17, 2022•6 min•Season 3Ep. 5
I asked Todd Davis if he could read some of his poems from his latest collection called Coffin Honey . And he generously said yes. Take a beath, find a comfortable seat, preferably out of doors and let the poetry of Todd Davis seep in through your pores and raise forth the best of you. **Before we get started, I want to note that in this episode of poems from Todd Davis include content about sexual assault and self mutilation. If that sounds like poetry you are not comfortable listening to, we s...
Aug 31, 2022•32 min•Season 3Ep. 4
The poems of Todd Davis sharpen a reader’s spirit and focus, on the bloodstained teeth breaking apart the day-to-day doldrums and on the mythic imagination necessary to bear witness to this daunting moment in our species, on our planet. Todd Davis and I spoke back in 2019 about his book Native Species and he has read his poems in the last two years on the Contemplify Backporch Advent Outpost series. Today we focus on Todd’s latest book of poems, Coffin Honey . We step into the rich imagery of ch...
Aug 30, 2022•54 min•Season 3Ep. 3
Paula Huston has written a book, The Hermits of the Big Sur , that charts the history of the New Camaldoli Hermitage. A history born amidst Vatican II and World War II with even deeper contemplatives roots back to the 11th century in the mountains of Italy. Paula follows the ragtag set of novices who become the elders of the community, those who wandered to follow other calls, and those hermits who it their life’s work to be enfolded by Mystery. Paula Huston is more than author, but oblate of Ne...
Aug 16, 2022•1 hr 10 min•Season 3Ep. 2
(My audio starts shaky, but gets better after 8 minutes) Bill Porter, aka Red Pine, calls the hermit life, "graduate school for the spiritually inclined." Bill Porter is a translator of Buddhist and Taoist mountain poets that uncross your third eye and waft the scent of a fine scotch. What can I say about Bill Porter that he won’t say better about himself? I first stumbled on his book Road to Heaven: Encounters with Chinese Hermits while on retreat. His adventures and chitchats with hermits beck...
Aug 02, 2022•1 hr 1 min•Season 3Ep. 1
The hermit life is cool. That is the stone that skips across this season of Contemplify. The urging, the calling, to retreat from the hustle of the red dirt economy. To wash your face with cold water. Blink away the dust. Sit still in the sun and watch the shadows kneel in prayer. This season of Contemplify highlights a few folks who touch the hermit life by study, proximity, and by craft. There will always be those who are called to live the hermit life. Then there are those of us who tend to t...
Jul 30, 2022•8 min
Musing from May 31, 2022
May 31, 2022•5 min•Season 2Ep. 8
Fenton Johnson is the author of At the Center of All Beauty: Solitude and the Creative Life. His book Geography of the Heart: A Memoir received the American Library Association and Lambda Literary Awards for best LGBT Creative Nonfiction, while his book Keeping Faith: A Skeptic’s Journey among Christian and Buddhist Monks received a Lambda Literary and Kentucky Literary Award in Creative Nonfiction. A regular contributor to Harper’s Magazine, Johnson has received fellowships from the Guggenheim ...
Feb 05, 2022•1 hr 9 min•Season 2Ep. 7
Brie Stoner is a juggernaut of creativity who channels these forces as a musician, artist, podcaster, writer, teacher, and mother. Her latest project is a podcast called Unknowing ; a conversation series with artists, spiritual teachers, authors and friends as she explores the practice of unknowing as the (beautiful, surprising, messy) spiritual path of creative possibility. As some of you know, we were co-hosts on the podcast Another Name for Every Thing with Richard Rohr . Check out Brie Stone...
Jan 21, 2022•1 hr 13 min•Season 2Ep. 6
Amy Frykholm is a writer, scholar, and journalist. Long time listener’s will recognize Amy as the second guest ever on Contemplify when we spoke about her book on Julian of Norwich. For those new to Amy's story, she has a PhD from Duke University and is a senior editor at The Christian Century . Her wry wit and adventurous spirit deserve a place in her accolades too. Today we talk about her latest work, Wild Woman: A Footnote, the Desert, and My Quest for an Elusive Saint . This cheeky quest fol...
Jan 07, 2022•1 hr 17 min•Season 2Ep. 5
Stephen Mitchell is a translator, author, and poet. I was first introduced to his work through his translation of the Tao Te Ching . Stephen was educated at Amherst, the Sorbonne, and Yale, and de-educated through intensive Zen practice. He is married to Byron Katie, founder of The Work . Today we talk about his latest work, The First Christmas: A Story of New Beginnings that tells the story of Jesus birth with imagination, humor, historical context and red-blooded gusto! As someone who has been...
Dec 17, 2021•1 hr 10 min•Season 2Ep. 4
Blessed Darkness and Blessed Light, this Advent season. Here we are again, In the midst of Season Two of Contemplify and I am sliding in another bonus episode part of the 2nd annual Backporch Advent Outpost on Contemplify. Today’s poet is Chris Dombrowski. I first read Chris’ book Ragged Anthem and then his earlier work in the book Earth Again . It wakes me to the day at hand. Dombrowski’s poetry has been a constant companion to me during this pandemic, his connection to earthbound attention, hu...
Dec 12, 2021•10 min
Blessed Darkness and Blessed Light this Advent season. Here, In the midst of Season Two of Contemplify I am sliding in a bonus episode. This is the first episode of the 2nd annual Backporch Advent Outpost on Contemplify. This year there will be one poet in each outpost, offering their poetry to gild the thin space beyond waiting or reception. Pour a tea or a finger of rye, consider this your Advent nightcap. Todd Davis, will be reading two poems from his forthcoming book of poetry Coffin Honey f...
Dec 05, 2021•8 min
Sister Joan Chittister is a member of the Benedictine Sisters, played a huge hand in developing the Charter of Compassion, was president of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious., director of Benetvision, founder of Monasteries of the Heart, passionately advocated on behalf of peace, human rights, women’s issues, and church renewal, written over 60 books, and has a bird named Lady Hildegard. The focus of our conversation today is Joan’s book, The Monastic Heart: 50 Simple Practices for a ...
Dec 03, 2021•49 min•Season 2Ep. 3
J. Drew Lanham is an Alumni Distinguished Professor of Wildlife Ecology, Master Teacher, and Certified Wildlife Biologist at Clemson University . He's the author of The Home Place: Memoirs of a Colored Man's Love Affair with Nature and the collection of poetry and meditations, Sparrow Envy: Field Guide to Birds and Lesser Beasts , which is the focus of our conversation today. And I just gotta share this self-descriptive line by Drew, “I am a wondering wander in love with nature and all the sensu...
Nov 19, 2021•58 min•Season 2Ep. 2
Gary Nabhan (aka Brother Coyote) is an Ecumenical Franciscan Brother, a first generation Lebanese-American, seed saver, agro-ecologist, ethnobotanist, agrarian activist, and author. A former MacArthur Fellow, he has been called the "father of the local food movement" by Time . He currently holds the W.K. Kellogg Chair in Food & Water Security for the Borderlands. Gary has engaged with farmers and refugee farmworkers in Lebanon, Egypt, Palestine, and Oman. Nabhan keeps orchards, gardens and g...
Nov 05, 2021•1 hr 6 min•Season 2Ep. 1
On the cusp of season 2, I was ruminating on how I might introduce the tonality of this series of conversations. The September musing jumped to mind. In this musing, I reflected one some words to live by according to Ralph Waldo Emerson And there was one Emerson line that stuck to my ribs. No matter how hard I scraped, it would not leave me alone. "Nothing great is ever accomplished without enthusiasm." Not cheerleader or car salesman enthusiasm. But enthusiasm as the fire within, the fire blazi...
Oct 30, 2021•3 min
