As a "once and future" ballet student, I understand the term "my other religion." However I think of it more as another vocation. If you're not called to it, no one can make you do it. If you are called to it, no one can keep you away.

I love it, Donald! I studied aikido seriously for several years before children but moving constantly made it *really* hard to maintain. (I'm now restarting my tai chi practice...)

I echo your thoughts--I constantly find parallels between martial arts and Christian formation (especially liturgy) in that they are both forms of ascesis, training, whose goal is to instill deep habits and ways of being.

I was also struck by the aspect of askesis in this. There's something Pauline about it, isn't there.

Yes, I think we do need to consider what discipline we might encourage. Indeed, I think that speaks to the hunger that sometimes turns folks to "the exotic" to experience spiritual disciplines and methods that have been in Christian practice for centuries.

Marshall Scott

Your comments, Donald, about joining in with familiar chants brought a question to mind: I wonder what liturgical "practice" looks like, and whether we should think of it as something "I" do or something "we" do? I worship every week in three different communities, one of which uses experimental liturgies, another basically uses Rite II, and the third uses Rite I. Each community is prayerful and lively, and because I am "at home" in all of them, I can relax into the "core forms," as you suggest, and "pay attention and find continuing surprises in doing it." But if you moved some of the folks around me at worship from one of these congregations to another, they would be thrown off a bit, unable to relax and "practice" for a while.

Community is important to practice, I think, and occasions its holiness. Your fellow Akidoists, simply by their presence and faithfulness, encourage you in your practice, as much as the regulars at church encourage one in one's practice. (In my own experience practicing yoga, I have found it well-nigh impossible to practice without regular attendance at a group class!).

Regarding liturgy, I don't think this means that we should never change anything, but rather that how we make the changes and how we invite people to work into a new practice are important. It also lifts up the importance of reflecting with a community on their practice so that they can see how they are being formed (or deformed) as they dance through a rite again and again.

Amy McCreath

Absolutely, Amy. And, in my experience, a great sensei is one who will (can!) offer explanations about precisely why a certain grip or angle is necessary--the meaning behind the movements. The same is true of liturgy... Yes, we may have always done it "that way", but there may actually be a reason why we've always done it that way--one rooted in edification, not just local preference.

Excellent piece, Donald, good read. I'm glad I get to practice your "other religion" with you.

I especially liked the point about repetition. My wife, and fellow Aikido practitioner, said something similar last night when she returned from her life-drawing class. I asked her how the class went and she said she was not too happy with her drawings that night, but that "Life-drawing is like scales. You just have to do them. They may be no fun, but if you don't do them it shows really fast."

Life is like that.

Travis Eneix

I love the way you have expressed this, Donald, and look forward to more transformative conversations!

At rowing this morning we discussed this idea of habit, which gets each of us out of bed and down to the boathouse even when it is dark and rainy as it was today. This is the same habit which gets us to church even when we would rather stay snuggled warm in bed. It is habit which we generally choose not to question, but simply obey. This unspoken, yet clear sense of obedience and stability to the habit carries us through the hard times, the dry times, even the busiest times. And, every so often, we raise our heads and ask “is this working?” It is important for this occasional check-in. Just not too often, or the questioning becomes the new habit!

I am currently trying to pay attention to how various kinds of church people approach this idea of habit. A parishioner who struggles says “I know I don’t HAVE to kneel; I just don’t want to let it beat me.” It being the opposite of the mystery which propels us forward through each day, the Spirit of God infused in every cell of our (sometimes old and aching and deteriorating) bodies. We have much to learn from this embodied habit which carries us past momentary hurts and infirmities, and into joy.

Thank you for you post, Donald.

I'm struck by (as Amy is, I think) by the sense of a practice that's based in community. We have a practice that we engage in every Sunday in community, but how many of us have a church-based practice that we engage in every single day? It seems important that we have daily rituals that structure and frame our lives -- rituals that challenge us to extend beyond ourselves or our small families and participate in community every single day.

I long for a place to go each morning to pray, sing, and touch base with friends. How might that type of interaction be facilitated in busy city or suburban lives?

friends,

Thank you for rich, fascinating response. I'm glad for the breadth of practices that identified with what Stacey and I found in rowing and Aikido - ballet, tai chi, singing and with Marshall's reference to St. Paul, running. I've often wondered at Paul's intimate sounding experience of athletic training and competitive running. Are we hearing from a Roman citizen who first grasped askesis in one of the mania gymnasiums around the Roman Empire?

I'm intrigued at the threads of habit and of community that almost demand further exploration. Thank you all for a rich exploration!

Amy's description of worshipping in three different communities reminds me of visiting Aikido dojos when I travel and a couple of years when I was practicing at two different dojos in San Francisco before I finally settled at Suginami Aikikai where I finally settled. There is a shared language, a habituated discourse, and, as a guest or visitor, a process of discovery in visiting. Sometimes it seems like different styles of Aikido (and maybe different styles of liturgy) are like Spanish, Italian, and Portuguese - different langauges that can be comprehensible or mostly comprehensible to someone who speaks one of the other languages. But fluency? It sounds like Amy's found her way to a quality of being at home that's multi-dojo'ed or maybe tri-lingual.

I'm also glad for Derek's observation of the specifics and 'why' of a good sensei's instruction. What I recognize immediately is the sheer practicality of the specifics I hear and value. I do feel there's something mystical and holy lurking around the edges, but what holds my attention is something as simple and challenging as offering a firm grip and a flexible arm and shoulder or an accurate, energetic strike to the partner's head or belly. And again. And again. Clearer, more complete, more sincere.

Again, friends, thank you.

donald

I, too, am a rower and priest, and have even competed against Stacey's crew! The regular practice of this sport is for me an integral part of my spiritual discipline. I am vicar at a church in Seattle, and would simply go crazy if I didn't have this physical and profoundly humbling sport as part of my prayer life. And that I have an outlet for my competitive spirit keeps the congregation safe and sane as well.

Crew rowing requires extraordinary team commitment. Rowers who row in boats with two or more people must work together to make the boat move effectively. When rowers synchronize the swing of their bodies, match the movement of their bodies on the seat slides, and drop their oars into the water at the same time, the better the row. Rowing is literally all about working together. One cannot harbor anger at one's boatmates and be an effective rower. A boat that requires two or more rowers cannot be rowed if one those people doesn't show up. There are great analogies to be made between rowing and being in community and about living our baptismal promises. To be effective in spreading the Gospel, we have to show up for each other and work together.

I shamelessly use rowing analogies in preaching, I take Sundays off in order to compete, and I share with my community why I do this. Even though I find an intense personal satisfaction and spirituality in my chosen sport, it isn't all about me. Those people whose most natural prayer style is physical most readily understand why I commit so much time and work to rowing. Those who understand the necessity of being and working together in community are also beginning to understand. As I talk about my spiritual discipline of rowing, it opens up in others the possibility that perhaps their most natural activities are themselves a prayer.

Cynthia,

Thanks for rowing words from further north. Do you row on Lake Washington? Lake Union? Puget Sound? If both fresh and salt water, does it make a difference to the experience?

The words that struck me in your piece were "profoundly humbling" and "the possibility that perhaps their most natural activities are themselves a prayer."

I imagine it could sound contradictory, or at least paradoxical to someone who hasn't spent some good time in a physical/spiritual practice but something comes together in humility and rigorous competition (in Aikido the competition is supposed to be internal, and unattached to judging and striving). And we work so hard to be/do what's not only effective, but actually natural (I get this in your description of the moving together in rowing).

This morning at Aikido practice, my sensei was talking about natural, easy and relaxed posture, what we see in children's unconscious movement and what disappears as we 'try' to 'do something' or 'get it right.' My experience of physical practice of spirituality is that nature and grace also converge amazingly (or at least I sense that possibility when I get out of my own way and quit getting hooked on my own effort). Today was our weekly weapons practice (another wonderful irony that Aikido finds the way to effortless self-defense and a spirit of protecting others from moves we learn from sword and stick work). I watch Jimmy (my sensei) at work and I wonder how long it will take me to move my spine and shoulders beyond the lingering 'I can save the world' stance to this kind of openness.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OqCqkZfxfxo

Donald -

Thanks for this. Two parts leap out at me, one personal, one churchy (which is, of course, also personal).

My own fear of conflict comes to mind as I hear you talk about your practice: I'm afraid of argument and yelling - not of discussion and disagreement. I can handle the intellectual discussion for or against something very well, but when people start to yell, gang up, rant, I turn off (first) and then run away - disengage. Your practice offers a way in which I can imagine engaging that energy without running - but without strongly reacting either. (Which is my problem of course - I can also yell, scream and rant with the best of them.)

And so I wonder what Aikido practice would say as conservatives and liberals in our various denominations run to their respective corners and say "I'm not talking to you" or "agree or get out" or any one of any possible runnings away. Or what would an Aikido practitioner do when the reverse is true, when the parties are attacking each other, calling each other names, deposing, schisming.

The "church" level that speaks to me is in your line about "A mark of practice is regular discipline and open attention to oft repeated core forms. The point isn’t to figure something out, but to learn it well enough to pay attention and find continuing surprises in doing it."

So much of what we fear in liturgical reform is a tearing away of these "oft repeated core forms". I find great comfort in rote recitation and little comfort in constantly new and "exciting" liturgical entertainment. To be clear "new" is not the problem. It's "constantly new". Even a radically different liturgy going through slow evolution is conforting (a la SGN) - but not new every Sunday or every Month, even, or every season.

So much of your other religion seems at odds not with Anglicanism but with what we are currently experiencing *in* Anglicanism. I'm envious.

Huw

Yes, I was glad someone mentioned yoga. I don't practice yoga everyday but a few times a week. While it isn't community in the same sense, yet there is a sense of the class as a whole and a shared energy especially since in most classes you start out by breathing together. And it strikes me that is essential to liturgy as well, breathing together, singing together. It requires an awareness a basic bodily functions, like breathing, that are usually done as individuals, and then bringing that into a communion, a shared experience.

I also like the reference to childlike ease and naturalness. Many poses in yoga are named for children: happy baby pose, child's pose. These tend to be poses of surrender or abandon that are self effacing in a way that helps remove us from that fraught state of painful self-consciousness. Yes, I like what Donald says about not trying too hard like children don't try to do something they just embody it.

And also I relate to what several have said about reluctance and fear of injury. I don't get afraid of yoga in that way and yet there is a stripping away of protective layers. And so sometimes in a pose I feel a vulnerability, I may feel exposed. And the teacher may sense that and say something like "open to grace" or "open your heart" or she may touch a tensed shoulder and then - boom - there is a physical relaxation into the pose and - boom - opening happens on many levels, physical, spiritual, mental, emotional. Sometimes this goes so deep I cry, not because of pain but because of that stripping away.

And I do relate this to liturgy because liturgy is also about a stripping away of layers and being in states of vulnerability and opening to grace. And that is also why I loved the children gathered around the table because they reminded us about the true naturalness of our souls.

My "other religion" is probably not yoga although yoga is close. But singing because again, if you try too hard in singing it doesn't sound good and it is based on the breath and using the body in an intentional yet not self conscious way. As in most art it is really best to "get out of the way" and yet how to do that, how to apply that to an aria, a difficult passage of music.

It is about being a vessel, allowing the song to come through you and yet be part of your expression. Again this brings me back to liturgy and the Eucharist. Being a vessel, being instrumental in sharing the
expression of Christ's body.

I love how Donald has described Aikido in the past - something about transforming the aggressive energy into love. The aggressors energy is transformed and given back to him or her - this results in a physical triumph for both the attached and attacher as well.

So much of yoga and artistic endeavours also hold this transformative mix and I think this is why these activities are rich with spiritual meaning for me.

Thanks and Happy New Year, Cheryl