Where are your thin places?

Be it awe of God's Presence in our lives or the awe of our own resilience, when we let ourselves experience our fear, we turn on a light that shines light into a dark place, showing us the shadows of our fear revealed as awe.

— Rabbi Karen R. Perolman

In response to my post a couple of days ago about inhabiting thin places, places of transition, I received an email explaining to me that thin places were places where we see the grandeur of God, full of examples of art and music and architecture which in the author's opinion were thin places.

And also...as a wise friend taught me to say rather than but...thin places are places where we can rest in the presence of the Divine as we stand on the precipice of changes or disruptions in our lives. Perhaps we could say, like beauty, thin places are in the eye of the beholder.

Rabbi Perolman's description above of places where the light shines into the darkness reminds me of my experience of thin places. They are the moments in time, the places in time, the feelings in time when I feel so present with the Divine that despite the darkness of my despair or pain, the Light reveals the shadow of my fear and I am in awe...a speechless paralyzing awe.

Some thin places have been well-known to seekers for centuries and have become popular places of pilgrimage, such as the isle of Iona in Scotland or Lourdes in France. Other thin places are particular to our own experience of God and serve as touchstones as we seek to encounter the Divine. For pilgrims in search of Sacred Encounter, thin places serve as direct portals to the Divine, offering particular moments and locations in which we can more readily dwell in the presence of God and cultivate the transformation we desire.

Sometimes being in thin places provokes fear, thus the prayer for Courage I offered yesterday. Sometimes the silence of thin places is deafening, thus requiring aloneness.

Where are your thin places and what protections do you need in order to dwell there as long as is necessary?

The majesty of Creation is often the portal to thin places for me, rather like the armoire was for the Pevensie children!

Look closely and savor the Creation of the Divine!