Easter Sabbath

Almost every Sunday since mid-May 2020 with a few exceptions, I have been taking my own personal Sabbath, where I tune out of the news and social media and turn off my ringer and all notifications on my phone on Sundays or Saturday and Sunday. In the interest of full disclosure, I do use my phone to listen to music and podcasts, and check out e-books from the library. Before, during, or after my Sabbath, I share what I am reading, listening to, or watching for that day or days.

I’m starting right where I am, watching and listening to the the Easter Day service at Washington National Cathedral:

I realize most of you will skip clicking on the video, but I highly encourage you to skip to the musical parts with the singer Imani-Grace Cooper. During the last couple of years, her voice has been a balm to the souls of me and my wife. No matter your faith or no faith, I believe you might find this a respite for your spirit and/or mind.

In addition to this service, I also plan on watching and listening to one more video from Washington National Cathedral, probably with my wife who will be awake later this afternoon (she worked midnight shift last night):

At the start of this Lenten season, which for me as an Episcopalian began on Ash Wednesday and lasted until Holy Saturday (last night), I planned to use two devotionals from Forward Movement, a ministry of the Episcopal Church and read some but not all from a selection of seven books. While I finished the two devotionals, I only finished one of the seven books, Liturgy of the Ordinary: Sacred Practices in Ordinary Life by Tisha Harrison Warren, and am almost finished with one other, Fear: Essential Wisdom for Getting through The Storm by Thich Nhat Hanh. I will have to read the other five another time. I’ll be honest that I can’t remember a thing about Warren’s book and will have to return to it another time too.

My mind has been, and is, scattered, thanks/no thanks to a “big thing” I mentioned cryptically last week and that I won’t shed any further light on here other than to say again my wife and I and our families are all fine. It’s just too complex, personal to explain and, in the light of other events in the world, trivial.

All that said (or not said, actually), Kim and I have a scheduled vacation next week, during which we’ll spend three days on Seneca Lake, one of the Finger Lakes in upper New York State. That vacation actually begins Friday for both of us: Friday morning for my wife when she is off work at 8 a.m. and Friday night for me when I am off at 5 p.m. As it gets closer, and maybe Thursday night or Friday night, I will share more of what I (and we) have planned for our days off. It will be a time of celebrating her birthday, which was earlier this month, and the memories of her mother and best friend, both of whom passed away last year at the end of April.

So how is your weekend going? Reading, watching, listening to anything good? Please share in the comments.

Oh, forgot to mention: I woke up to snow this morning…and now, of all things, as I add this comment, we’re wishing a rebroadcast of Billie Eillish at Coachella last night.