In which I explore the Spiritual Life | Anita Mathias: Dreaming Beneath the Spires

On Checking In Before you Fly

Anita Mathias — Wed, 16 Oct 2019 18:20:52 +0000

Thingvellir National Park, Iceland I am (slowly!) learning to slow down, and say, “So, what should I do, God?” or “What should I do, Spirit?” or “What should do I do, Jesus?” And often enough, clarity comes, out of the box. I do not send the email I was about to. I change the time […]

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Gratitude: A Secret to Happiness

Anita Mathias — Sun, 07 Jan 2018 13:57:03 +0000

Georgia O’Keefe All of us have a negativity bias which makes us more apt to remember one mean comment about our writing, our children, our appearance, or our characters, than dozens of positive ones. It’s true, isn’t it? More disquietingly, I’ve read, in Andrew Solomon’s brilliant The Noonday Demon that the myelin sheath around […]

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The Things Worth Doing Badly

Anita Mathias — Mon, 01 Jan 2018 00:08:57 +0000

A tyrannical statement we’ve heard as children, and said as exasperated parents: If a thing is worth doing, it’s worth doing well. Which means we might never learn or do new things, for who has margin for one additional thing? In fact, the opposite is true…anything worth doing is worth doing badly. * * * […]

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Is “ending those Muslims,” as Falwell advises, the way of Jesus? Aren’t there other ways?

Anita Mathias — Sun, 06 Dec 2015 22:28:52 +0000

So the President of Liberty University, Jerry Falwell Jr., patting the gun in his back pocket, has called on the 14,500 students of Liberty University, the world’s largest Christian University, to carry concealed guns, and “end those Muslims,” thereby (somewhat belatedly!) “teaching them a lesson.” Everything about that statement is so alien to the values […]

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The Best Thing You Can Do with your Life: Sign it Over. (Inspired by Bill Bright.)

Anita Mathias — Sat, 24 Oct 2015 22:02:22 +0000

I read an arresting blog about Bill Bright, founder of Campus Crusade for Christ, and one of the post-War generation of entrepreneurial American Christian giants—like Billy Graham, Bob Pierce of World Vision, Francis Schaeffer of L’Abri, or George Verwer of Operation Mobilization. As newly-wed Christians, Bill and Vonette Bright were disappointed with each other. After a quarrel, Bill […]

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Honesty Is the Narrow Gate to the Spiritual Life: Learning from My Daughter, Irene

Anita Mathias — Thu, 03 Sep 2015 11:30:57 +0000

So I signed my daughter Irene up for a ministry called “LieBusters” at the David’s Tent worship festival. Five minutes in, her “LieBuster” asks her, “What is God saying to you?” Irene sits there, taken aback, and then tears stream down her face. “Nothing. I can’t hear a thing. I didn’t know it was going […]

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On Liturgy (which I Dislike)

Anita Mathias — Wed, 18 Mar 2015 11:20:11 +0000

I was interested to hear the leader on my silent retreat say that different approaches to prayer or the spiritual life are like food. Different people like different things. Such a simple way of expressing a new thought for me. (I had a mental gradation of superior and less-evolved spiritual practices.) * * * I intensely […]

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Grazie Signore! “Thank you, Lord, for those who have greater gifts.”

Anita Mathias — Thu, 12 Mar 2015 11:14:18 +0000

In his excellent The Ragamuffin Gospel, Brennan Manning mentions the limited Antonio Salieri, court composer to the Holy Roman Emperor, who was conscientious, devout, and wildly jealous of the wildly gifted Mozart who–neither conscientious, nor devout–tossed off sublime music in the interludes of a life of “wine, women and song, and he didn’t sing much.” […]

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Wriggling towards Shalom

Anita Mathias — Tue, 10 Mar 2015 20:39:53 +0000

When I find I am stressed, or distressed, I like to pause there and then instead of going through the day with undefined, subterranean unease. I take the question to which I do not know the answer–how to be more productive perhaps. How to read more. How to help someone. How to get our business […]

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On Choosing Happiness Today

Anita Mathias — Wed, 25 Feb 2015 19:04:24 +0000

The three legged runner is the symbol of the beautiful Isle of Man which I loved exploring. Ah, that’s me. One foot in the past—well, naturally, I am writing a memoir. One foot in the present, trying to live each day well. One restless foot leaping into the future, planning, dreaming. But perhaps the most […]

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