03/11/2023
I must say I really like this photo made of me last week in Augsburg, Germany…
I opened here the first day of 3 study days for Andante; a European alliance of organizations for Catholic women who let the women speak about their ideas about women in the church. Because of their theme they invited me to give 2 workshops, to open the days with inspiration and prayer and to join in a discussion panel. It was a bit exciting, because what I created especially for the openings was out of their comfortzone. Each time I explained what I did, what it meant, how it also came close to Catholic rituals or thought - but just different, and why I chose this. And I was wondering how they would experience this. For example, this first day I did something that is a growing tradition in the interfaith/interspiritual movement: acknowledging the land. It is a statement at the beginning of our gatherings where we acknowledge the original people of the land we are meeting on. Especially in land where the indigenous people still are present, but where their land was taken. And right now with the war between Israel and Hamas it shows the importance of this kind of awareness. I found out that 2000 years ago I’m the area where we gathered something alike happened; the Raeti tribe dissapeared due to the Romans. So I acknowledged the land as theirs. And so I did a few things more that were ‘different’ using texts and stories from different traditions and very different music. To my delight the women loved it! I got a lot of responses about how it opened doors for them to experience (their own) spirituality in new ways. One of them thanked me for her very first very overwhelming experience with a guided meditation. It made me happy and I hope that my feminine way inspres them further to hive voice and perhaps new forms to the importance of their female presence and wisdom in the catholic church. It was a joyful experience!
