Death. Love. Peace.

Today is the last day of a difficult yet graced filled year bookended on both sides by death. It is a good day to prepare again for a novena of peace.

As 2018 began, my husband’s father fell ill with what seemed to be a terrible cold. By mid-January he had pneumonia followed by sepsis. My husband’s presence enabled his dad to come home on hospice care. We all spent a truly loving and graced-filled month together as my father-in-law gave up his life bit by bit.

In October, my mother finally succumbed to her long slow journey to eternity. She had spent over a year on hospice care in a nursing home. My sisters, my dad, and I surrounded her with loving presence as her spirit broke free of the shackles of the body which imprisoned it.

Love Is What Matters

These deaths are a reminder of what truly matters in life. Both my father-in-law and my mother were “patient zero” in large families infected by love. Their children and grandchildren, plus family and friends galore, gathered to tell stories, support and comfort each other, and bask in the love they’d been given.

My husband and I miss our parents terribly but we are both so grateful to have had them for so long. Longer than most. And any of us would be lucky to leave behind the legacy of love our parents left.

One way to ensure that is to be conscious of our effect on the world. We live in troubled and divisive times. But our disagreements do not condemn us to be disagreeable. We can choose love. We can choose compassion. We can choose peace. And we can do so every day.

Intentional Peace: An Invitation

Whatever your tradition or spiritual practice, I ask you to join me in a novena (nine days of prayer—or intention if the word “prayer” doesn’t’ suit you) for peace.

It is an opportunity to gather as a virtual community with the focused intention of creating the peace we seek through a spiritual discipline.

Global Peace in 10 Minutes a Day

Well, peace in you—which is a start. It is also the only way to create global peace.

Praying the novena for peace will take about ten minutes a day. And depending on when you choose to engage in it, it will prepare you for a more peaceful day or for a good night’s sleep.

I’ll post a little something for reflection each day starting January 1 or you can simply use the reflection questions posed in the post of ritual basics and the questions for reflection . Answering these questions will challenge you to notice how your thoughts or actions create or disturb peace. Feel free to adjust the prayers and questions to suit your religious tradition, need, or comfort.

So that’s it. Take what works for you, let go of the rest. Invite others.

My hope is these few moments of focused intention, quiet reflection, reading, or prayer will enable each of us to plant within us another peace-filled seed that will germinate and grow as 2019 draws us forward.

And if we plant that seed in the loam of mercy, feed it with the light of love and the water of forgiveness, then the flower of peace will bloom in us and bless the world with its fragrance.