Spirit

Spirit of God, Present in the North, the place where water is snow and ice, we greet you.  You are the Spirit of the cold and biting wind that blows across our land, that strips the Earth of all that is dead and decayed, that robs us of the false securities so easily blown away.  Teach us to plant our feet securely on the Earth and to see creation as it really is, that your coming may find us standing firm in integrity.

Your winds bring the snows of winter with their fury and their solitude.  It is you who blanket the Earth for sleep.

Strengthen us for whatever is cold and uncertain in our lives.  Help us to be faithful when the struggles are hard.  Teach us, Spirit of the North, in the silence of winter, to wait in darkness with the sleeping Earth, believing that we, like the Earth, already hold within ourselves the seeds of new life.

Sprit of God, present in the East, where the sun comes up over our Atlantic Ocean, we greet you.  You usher in the dawn with diamonds of light sparkling on the waving surf.

You promise new birth – birth of babies, birth of puppies, birth of ideas, birth of friendship.  You bring us the hope of a new day, hope that we can live in harmony with one another and with the whole community of life.

Spirit of the East, fill our bodies with your breath, bring us light, invigorate us that we might reach out boldly to grasp the miracles that come to birth with each new dawn.

Spirit of God, present in the South, with its warm, tropical waters and currents, we greet you.  You warm our oceans and nurture our land.  Your mighty rain forests breathe life into our Earth.

You are the Spirit of all that is soothing, gentle and refreshing.  We ask you to give us this spirit of growth, of fertility, of gentleness.  Caress us with a cool breeze when the days are hot.  Give us seeds and rain that the flowers, trees and fruits of the Earth may grow.  Give us the warmth of happy families and good friendships.

Oh Spirit of the South, thaw and soften our coldness and hardness that we may, like children, rejoice in the simple signs of life.

Oh Spirit of God present in the West, where water finds its home in both sparse desert plants and in the wild surf of rugged, jagged coastlines, we greet you.

We turn to you in praise of sunsets and in thanksgiving for changes.  It is by your power that the sun hangs suspended for endless moments before you catch it with your breath and carry it off into the night.

You are the great colored sunset of the red west which illuminates us.  You are the powerful cycle which pulls us to transformation.

O Spirit of the West, keep us open to life’s changes.  And guide us at the end of each day that, filled with your peace, we might rest securely in your great mystery of night until morning calls us forth again.

We greet you, Great Spirit of the Earth.  It is from you we came and from a mother; you nourish us still and give us shelter.

Teach us to walk softly on your lands, to use with care your gifts, to love with tenderness all our brothers and sisters, humans and non-human, who have been born of your goodness.

And when the day comes when you call us back to yourself, help us to return to you as a friend, to find ourselves embraced, encircled, enfolded in your arms.  Amen.