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The Glimmering Light of Hope

The Glimmering Light of Hope

Dear Friends, The tour guide, ten college students and I walk as quickly as we can from the parked bus, down the Spanish Steps, breathing heavily as we hurry under the black night sky along the glittering lights of the streets in Rome, Italy. We race toward the Pantheon, desperate to get into the building before its closing time. We sprint through the doors, talking, laughing, not really paying attention to where we are, what is happening. Caught up in the rush of movement, the students laugh and call to one another. Once inside, all of us fall into a...

Listening for the Waters to Rush Free

A person wearing mittens holding snow in their hands.

“May the God of hope fill you will all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.” Romans 15:13 Dear Friends, At the staff/volunteer luncheon, Mark (our much-loved volunteer) shows me the video on his phone of a large storm drain well-outside Cranaleith’s property line. It had been fully blocked, and he tells me the story of how he filled and removed twenty-seven contractor-grade bags of trash, old tiles, broken concrete, plastic bottles. I can’t take my eyes away from the video of the water from...

A New Journey

A number 2 0 2 4 surrounded by christmas decorations.

Dear Beloved Cranaleith Community, As we stand on the threshold of a new year, all of us at Cranaleith are filled with profound gratitude and anticipation. The journey we’ve collectively traversed in the past year has been one of both challenges and triumphs, growth, and reflection. We find ourselves humbled by the resilience and love that defines our community. As we embark on the blank canvas of the coming year, please let us share a few thoughts on the significance of this moment. The turning of the calendar is more than just a change in dates; it is an invitation...

Listening Deeply: A Profoundly Powerful Act

A red bird sitting on top of a tree branch.

Dear Friends, Parked in the cell phone lot at the Philadelphia International Airport, I listen for a call. Two of the facilitators for Cranaleith’s staff/board “racial healing initiative” weekend retreat are arriving soon from California and Missouri, and I am here to give them a ride to the center. The phone should ring at any second. In the silence of the car’s closed space, I hear the muffled sounds of jet engines, buses, cars, the laughter of four men joking with one another outside my passenger door. It is quiet in here, but my mind is noisy with anticipation and...

Listen for the Language of Wholeness

A wooden table with leaves and berries on it.

All this is for your benefit, so that the grace that is reaching more and more people may cause thanksgiving to overflow to the glory of God. 2 Corinthians 4:15 Dear Friends, At last month’s Harvest Festival at Cranaleith, four women from the neighborhood stand in front of the small table where we are giving away for free a few hundred of the native trees and shrubs remaining from the 2500 trees that had already been distributed as part of our partnership with the Keystone 10 Million Tree Partnership initiative. Recent immigrants to Somerton, the women speak no English, only...

October 22nd, 2023: Walking With One Another

A group of people posing for a picture.

Hello from the airplane en route to Philadelphia. Besides feeling cramped from the long flight, I am immensely grateful for all the blessings of this week in Rome to support the Catholic Church’s Synod on Synodality 2023. First of all, I have encountered many wonderful people, each one doing good in the world – for women, for the marginalized, for a Church that is more welcoming and more faithful to the Gospel. It always heartens me to meet others who are “rowing in the same direction.” I am not alone in making the world more merciful. Many other people of...

October 19, 2023: Praying With Pope Francis

A group of people standing in front of a building.

Wow! This week is flying! On Tuesday, friends and I had a guided tour of the Gesu, the Jesuit Church of the Holy Name of Jesus, and of the rooms in which St. Ignatius Loyola lived. As you can see, the church was designed in the awesomely garish Baroque style of the sixteenth century. The vision of the Holy Name of Jesus, surrounded by angel choirs covers the ceiling and appears to spill down to us humans on the earth below. I was moved by the painting of Jesuit superior general, Pedro Arrupe at the foot of the cross –...

October 16, 2023: My First Full Day in Rome!

A woman standing in front of a projector screen.

Ciao from Roma to everyone in the Cranaleith community! My first full day here in support of the Synod on Synodality involved travelling to the headquarters of the Christian Brothers, the LaSallian Consulate, to co-facilitate a workshop for young adults studying in Rome. The aim was to give them an experience of the synodal process of deep listening to the Spirit in themselves and in others. (Sounds familiar to all us Cranaleith folks, que no?) Eleven students from Fordham, one from Notre Dame and two from St. John-St. Benedict’s, MN, attended. Cranaleith’s own Maureen O’Connell, who is currently working on...

An Interconnected and Sacred Creation

A group of people standing around in the rain.

When Cranaleith first opened our doors as a spiritual center, we had experienced very little rainfall over the Spring and Summer. The pond was nearly dry. The vegetation around the pond was dying, and the surrounding trees were languishing. One of our first visiting groups were women from a Mercy ministry in North Philadelphia who reflected on the pond in the course of their retreat day. They saw it as an image of their own spiritual thirst. They learned that the pond was fed by only one weak stream, flowing through the pond and into the nearby creek. They heard...

Listen to the Space Between

A path through the woods in autumn.

“Be still, and know that I am God.” Psalm 46:10.   Dear Friends, At Cranaleith, the crickets chirp loudly in the meadow behind the historic house, in the space we are actively turning “wild,” crisscrossed by winding pathways Fred (core volunteer) has mown into the deep, tall grass. In 1897, Amos Dolbear found that the rate of the crickets’ chirping directly correlates to the ambient temperature of the air. Cold? Slow chirps. Warm? Faster. Try it for yourself. Count the number of chirps in 14 seconds, then add 40 to find the temperature in degrees Fahrenheit. You will find that...