Sacred Sauntering

During a short, silent retreat this summer, I unwrapped an unexpected gift - the gift of sacred sauntering.

On a typical day at home, my schedule is blessedly full and I walk with great purpose to get wherever I am going. However, while on silent retreat, I had no schedule other than to meet once a day with my spiritual director and simply hang out with God - to set aside the demands of daily life for a brief moment in time and just be. 

While walking the beautiful, wooded paths of the Jesuit Retreat Center, I slowed down. I didn't walk to get somewhere... I walked to be somewhere. I walked slowly enough to look up and around rather than down at my feet on the path before me. I sauntered.  

I was so stunned by the sacredness of the simple act of sauntering that I mentioned it to my spiritual director. She shared with me that the word "saunter" may have come from a French term used to refer to folks who were on a pilgrimage to the Holy Land or "Sainte Terre." Sainte-terre became saunter. When we saunter, we slow down enough to remember that we are indeed walking on holy ground... sainte-terre.

Perhaps, sacred sauntering isn't only about our pace, but also about our attentiveness to the holy ground upon which we walk.  

Therefore, we can saunter no matter what our level of mobility, as long as we turn our attention to the holy ground beneath our feet. One can saunter while moving in a wheelchair or while driving on the highway. One can saunter in the city or in the woods. One can saunter at home or in a church. Sacred sauntering simply slows us down so that we might have eyes to see and ears to hear.

Since my summer retreat, I have begun a new sacred practice. I saunter slowly around my block in the mornings - not every morning, but as often as I am able. As I saunter, I pray for the people in the houses I pass. I pray about the events of the day before and the day to come. Often I saunter on one side of the sidewalk, allowing space for Jesus to saunter around the block next to me...sometimes imagining a conversation between the two of us and sometimes simply walking in amiable silence. My morning saunters have become one of my very favorite spiritual practices.  

What might your own practice of sacred sauntering look like? How might you slow down enough to remember the sacred ground upon which you walk?  

I invite you to explore the gift of sacred sauntering. May it bring you peace, hope, joy and an ever-deepening awareness of God's presence with you - today and every day. 

"And what does the Lord require of you

But to do justice, to love kindness,

And to walk humbly with your God?" Micah 6:8

"Now these mountains are our Holy Land, and we ought to saunter through them reverently." John Muir

"I have met with but one or two persons in the course of my life who understood the art of Walking, that tis, of taking walks... [of] sauntering." Henry David Thoreau