New Year's Eve Labyrinth Walk

Happy New Year!
Tonight (new year's eve), CtK hosts the Gallatin Valley Interfaith Association Labyrinth Walk. It provides a wonderful opportunity to reflect on the year now over and prepare for the new year.
Labyrinths are used in a wide variety of faith traditions. One of the most famous labyrinths is in the floor of the Chartres Cathedral.
Read about the event here, in a Bozeman Daily Chronicle article from last week.

From the website of Grace Cathedral in San Francisco, which houses a replica of the Chartres Labyrinth:
General Information and Instructions
The labyrinth is an archetype, a divine imprint, found in all religious traditions in various forms around the world. By walking a replica of the Chartres labyrinth, laid in the floor of Chartres Cathedral in France around 1220, we are rediscovering a long-forgotten mystical tradition.

The labyrinth has only one path so there are no tricks to it and no dead ends. The path winds throughout and becomes a mirror for where we are in our lives. It touches our sorrows and releases our joys. Walk it with an open mind and an open heart.

Three stages of the walk
Purgation (Releasing) ~ A releasing, a letting go of the details of your life. This is the act of shedding thoughts and distractions. A time to open the heart and quiet the mind.

Illumination (Receiving) ~ When you reach the center, stay there as long as you like. It is a place of meditation and prayer. Receive what is there for you to receive.

Union (Returning) ~ As you leave, following the same path out of the center as you came in, you enter the third stage, which is joining God, your Higher Power, or the healing forces at work in the world. Each time you walk the labyrinth you become more empowered to find and do the work for which you feel your soul is reaching.

Guidelines for the walk Quiet your mind and become aware of your breath. Allow yourself to find the pace your body wants to go. The path is two ways. Those going in will meet those coming out. You may "pass" people or let others step around you. Do what feels natural.

CtK hosts New Year's Eve Labyrinth Walk

Once again we have the privilege of hosting the Gallatin Valley Interfaith Association New Year's Eve Labyrinth Walk. Families with young children are invited to walk tonight from 7:00-8:00pm, recognizing that it could be a little noisy. Adults and older children/youth are invited to walk the labyrinth any time between 8:00pm and midnight.
Labyrinths have been used as tools for meditation and prayer for hundreds of years, in a variety of cultures. There's a famous labyrinth mosaic in the floor of the Chartres Cathedral (upon which the labyrinth at CtK tonight is patterned), which in the middle ages people walked as a symbolic pilgrimage to Jerusalem.
There is only one path in the labyrinth, so you can't get lost. Come and check it out as we let go of 2013 and greet 2014 with faith and hope.

Happy 5th Day of Christmas!

While I was out running a few errands yesterday, the woman ahead of me in the checkout line commented to the checker, "I'm sure glad Christmas is over." I said, "It's not over. Christmas lasts until the 5th of January. Today's just the fourth day of Christmas." Oh how she glared at me...

I hope your celebrations of Christmas continue, even if you're back to work, back on the road, or "back to reality." The incarnation of God is something to celebrate ALL the time. And probably even more necessary when all the glitz of the season is gone. (Yes, they're putting out Valentines at Target).

Just a couple of reminders for this week: We host the Gallatin Valley Interfaith Association Labyrinth Walk on Thursday night, New Year's Eve. An hour for children and families is scheduled from 7-8pm, and then for adults from 8pm-1am. Walking a labyrinth is a great tool for prayer and meditation, particularly as we embark on the journey of a new year and decade.

Also, we're back to our regular worship and Sunday School schedule on Sunday, with services at 8:30 and 11am and Sunday School at 9:45am. Invite your friends and family to join you!