how does connecting with nature revive my spirit?

why to the woods i go

Welcome to “Transformational Love,” a Lenten reflection series to help us all prepare for Easter. 

We follow Christ through the darkest parts of his story: the agony in the garden, his betrayal and abandonment by his friends, the humiliating march up to Golgotha, and finally his lonely, degrading death. We’re invited to look up at the cross, to see love and hope and goodness hanging limp and lifeless. And we’re asked: even now, can we say that God is good?

Proclaiming God’s Goodness in Dark Times (Lent Week 1)

Dave Brisbin 3.2.25
Jesus doesn’t save anyone passively, in spite of themselves, beyond their willingness to actively engage a way of experiencing transformed life he calls Kingdom. If we’re waiting for a savior, no one is coming. If we’re waiting for anything, we’re not in Kingdom. Waiting is passive, not yet; Kingdom is always in motion, herenow. Jesus saves by empowering us to act in ways we may have thought not possible or not allowed. He shows us the process of fundamental change, challenging us to make the small choices we can make now to start dominos falling toward radical transformation not yet.

The good news of the gospels is that God is all poured out. 

Everything God is and has to offer is already herenow. Nothing withheld…Kingdom within, in our midst. Jesus’ message tells us that we are empowered to accept the everything of God any time and always, and his Way is the unavoidable process of realizing our empowerment, only and always experiential—the choice by increasingly audacious choice or trust.

Tragically, we’ve been taught a disempowering God who mirrors human leaders to whom we must appeal, who keep us waiting for what we need. If we’re waiting, we’re not empowered, not in Kingdom, and such a God is anathema to Jesus. Yet we’ve also been taught that God is disempowered himself and only half of the cosmic equation. The other half, Satan, God’s arch enemy and opponent, has the power to lead us into temptation. We imagine ourselves pawns in this cosmic battle, victims, collateral damage in a scorched earth.

That is anathema to the Jews who wrote the scriptures from which we extract such a creature as Satan. For Jews, God is unopposable, the One without opposite. No battle is possible, and ha-satan, the adversary, is God’s agent—whether a person, spiritual being, or our own inclination to evil—providing us with the alternate choices that make free will real. But the choice is always ours, and ha-satan has no power over us that we don’t give.

Jesus is telling us we are not victims. Everything we need is right here. The choice is always ours to break through any resistance that would tell us otherwise. Empowered.

Empowered

"Only" is a hauntingly poetic reflection on time, fate, and love’s endurance through life’s uncertainties. With evocative lyrics and a melancholic yet hopeful tone, this song weaves through moments of longing, resilience, and the quiet passage of time. Set against a backdrop of gentle acoustic melodies and atmospheric depth, "Only" captures the beauty and fragility of the promises we make and the roads we travel—both seen and unseen. A song for those who’ve loved, lost, and still hold on.

Only

Dave Brisbin 3.9.25
Years ago, at the lowest point in my life, a friend invited me to her church, marking a return to Christianity after fifteen years away. First thing, I booked a lunch with the pastor, and halfway through, across my untouched plate, he said he saw “divine dissatisfaction” in me. Strange phrase. I didn’t see anything divine in my dissatisfaction or speed-questions, but then, there I was. Asking a pastor.

Years later, I looked it up. I’m pretty sure he didn’t know he was quoting a dancer. He was much more a football quoter. But Martha Graham said that artists have a divine dissatisfaction, a blessed unrest, that keeps them marching and more alive than others. Pastor saw that unrest in me. Though it didn’t feel divine or blessed, it certainly was motivating. Kept me marching, desiring, seeking, doubting. I doubted everything I’d ever been taught about spiritual life, which only made me desire it more.

Remember Doubting Thomas?

When the rest of the Twelve of Jesus’ inner circle said they had seen Jesus risen and alive, Thomas says he would not believe until he literally put his hands in Jesus’ wounds. That one line has made Thomas a meme for faithlessness for two thousand years and counting. But is that fair? Every one of Jesus’ friends doubted. None of them recognized him when they first saw him again, their doubting minds filtering out the possibility of the impossible until they had a personal experience that broke them through to new reality. Thomas was the only one honest about his doubt, bold enough to state it, and we’ve punished him for it.

All Thomas said was that he was dissatisfied with a second-hand report, hearsay. That only a personal experience could break him through to trust the impossible. Thomas is our hero, showing us doubt as a gift. It stokes us with the dissatisfaction we need to admit that even the Bible is a second-hand report. It points us toward our own personal experience, but it’s not the experience itself.

This Lent, can we see our doubt and dissatisfaction not as weakness, but a gift…a divine call past hearsay to a personal experience of the new life Easter represents?

The Gift of Doubt

"One of my favorite stories of St. Ignatius of Loyola is the Cardoner River vision, in which he received a sort of enlightenment from God, illuminating his spiritual senses as though all things were new. When I place myself alongside Peter, John, and James in witnessing the transfiguration of Jesus, this is what I imagine."

Welcome to the 2nd Week of “Transformational Love,” a Lenten reflection series to help us all prepare for Easter. 

Illuminating Our Vision: How Christ Transforms Us (Lent Week 2)

Soft, gentle and nostalgic piano bed, works with advertising health, beauty & self-care. Touching, calming, soothing.

For licensing, contact
https://www.Shockwave-Sound.com
https://www.LynnePublishing.com


Relaxation & Meditation, Vol. 13

Wez Devine - Little Miracles

Skit 3

Méditation chrétienne. Conférence d'Ivan Marcil (12-03-25)

"Jésus nous appelle à le suivre et à devenir comme lui, un être d’amour envers tous et envers soi. Pour vivre cette transformation, Jésus nous propose des pratiques spirituelles. La prière est un moyen privilégié dans ce chemin. Dans notre culture du facile et de l’instantané, elle comporte cependant un effort d’attention de notre part.
Nous parlerons de ce défi de la prière qui conduit à une vie plus riche. Nous vivrons une expérience ensemble autour du Nom divin."
_______________________
*IVAN MARCIL :
pratique depuis longtemps la méditation chrétienne.
Il a vécu plusieurs années dans la communauté des carmes déchaux.
Il a aussi travaillé au sein de la Bande FM pendant plusieurs années.
Il est maintenant intervenant en soins spirituels à l'hôpital Pierre Boucher, sur la rive sud de Montréal depuis 2011.

Méditation chrétienne. Conférence d'Ivan Marcil (12-03-25)

The Office of Ignatian Spirituality (OIS), a ministry of the Jesuits on the East Coast, works to promote the ministry of the Spiritual Exercises and to create opportunities for people to experience its graces. Listen here for audio reflections that incorporate Ignatian themes into daily spirituality as well as resources for spiritual directors.

Milkdrinkers are an influential and controversial duo from Toronto consisting of @26lost and Lil Spiegel, founded in 1802. They have been described by critics as "Unlistenable" and "Sometimes almost decent". Critics recommend their sound to "nobody with ears". They are renowned for their experimental take on modern society, saying in a 1926 interview: "We would never chase a hawk to a cliff".

Lynne Publishing is a music label representing a library of high-quality, carefully developed, production music / stock music, available to license for use in your own media. We founded our company in April of 2000 and since then we have added new music to our catalog weekly. We develop our own music with contracted professional composers, both young and exciting talents and experienced film- and TV composers.

All our music is available for easy licensing and immediate download for use in media creations, such as videos, films, games, TV, online, social media, corporate use, etc. To obtain a Master Synchronization license for any of music, contact us via www.Shockwave-Sound.com

Audio podcasts delivered at theeffect church in San Clemente, CA. theeffect is a community of imperfect people working together to find the emotional recovery and spiritual transformation that is theeffect of God’s love by unlearning limiting perceptions, beliefs, and compulsions, and engaging a first century Jesus in a non-religious and transforming way. See more at theeffect.org.

True North with Dave Brisbin is a podcast about the things that can bring you back to center, whether God, spirituality, community or family or all of them. Never esoteric or abstract for its own sake; always practical and full of common sense, we’re interested in exploring the effect of what we believe on our lives and questioning what we believe in light of the deep connection we’re meant to live. Dave Brisbin is an author, speaker, coach, and songwriter. He is the teaching pastor of theeffect, a faith community and recovery ministry in San Clemente, CA and executive director of Encompass Recovery, an addiction treatment center in San Juan Capistrano. For more on finding deeper spiritual expression free from limiting beliefs and behavior, go to davebrisbin.com.

La Bande FM, c’est « l’École Foi et Mission », un groupe de jeunes adultes catholique créé depuis 1997. Elle se définit comme une forme particulière d’école de la foi, vécue en lien avec une  paroisse. La Bande FM s’adresse avant tout aux jeunes de 18 à 35 ans désireux de vivre et d’approfondir leur foi chrétienne par la formation, la prière et la vie fraternelle. À travers les activités qui rythment sa vie, la Bande FM contribue à évangéliser et à apporter des réponses à ceux qui ont une soif spirituelle, à ceux qui sont en quête de Dieu.

New tracks tagged #Contemplation