I’ve been thinking today is Rogation Day, planning all week for *today* to be the day, thinking about what I want to write in this vein. And just now I sat down, about to start writing about today being the 25th of April, when I noticed it’s the 26th. I suppose that sums up how things feel like they’re going these days.
Last Friday I took our dog Trotter to the vet, where they informed me he wasn’t on the schedule. “Is Wicket on the schedule? Did I bring the wrong dog?” No. Neither of our dogs were on the schedule for the day. I pulled up my confirmation email and said, “Is it the 18th?” The nice woman at the desk said, “No, that was yesterday.” Oh. Thankfully, they could take him back for quick vaccines and it was no problem. Except that it set of a tiny alarm in my brain — I’m not doing as well as I think I’m doing.
I had plans that evening on my calendar, too, that I’d been looking forward to all week. But the plans involved others and I hadn’t heard any details, so I reached out to a friend. “Do we have a plan for tonight?” Her reply was quick, “Are you thinking of LaBoheme? Or am I forgetting something?… LaBoheme is next week.” Twice in one day I had plans written in the wrong place on my calendar. How does this happen??
So here I am a week later, thinking it’s the 25th and discovering it is the 26th. I’m beginning to question my sanity as well as my calendar and, like Bilbo, “I feel thin, sort of stretched, like butter scraped over too much bread.” I’m finding it challenging in this season of life to stay temporally grounded, with one foot in today and the other already in next week, next month, and next year. Daily I am having conversations and making decisions about what needs to be done today, Graduation next month, Italy in June, collaborative summer projects for work, Eliana to college in August, and a conference in November. I’m trying to wrap my mind around plans in Italy, Idaho, Oregon, Texas, and online, while having already said “no” to plans in Belfast and Stockholm. We may be eternal beings living in a global community, but I think we are also made for a time and a place, and our finitude calls us to them.
So what do we do when we feel spread so thin, when there are always more things to do than time to do them, when the whole world is theoretically within reach, but our proverbial arms are not long or strong enough to lay hands on all that’s offered? I think at least part of the answer for me lies in living locally.
There are local and liturgical rhythms that ground me in time and space, and I think leaning into these matters more than I realize. Each year the convergence of Earth Day (April 22) and Rogation Day (April 25) draw my attention to the place I live in a way that I often overlook. Earth Day invites me to attend to the soil beneath my feet, planting seeds and tending to the garden, connecting with local producers at the Farmer’s Market, and noticing the ways in which the earth is awakening as the days grow longer and warmer. Rogation Day invites me to attend to the soil around me in the form of my neighbors, the dust we are before we return to the dust we were. Rogation Day offers a chance to pay attention to my local boundaries, the places I inhabit, my local parish as it were. For me, that includes the places I frequent and especially those places within my walking radius.
Rogation Day strips away the fable that I can live anywhere and everywhere and reminds me that I live here. In Bozeman, Montana. In the Valley West subdivision. I live in a particular neighborhood, work in a particular school, attend a particular church, shop at a particular grocery store (now within walking distance!), and have coffee at a particular coffee shop on Friday mornings. It reminds me that I belong to a particular place, and am called to grow in this particular patch of earth. I cannot know every place well, but I can know this place, these people. And my regular rhythms, my temporal habits, help me know this place better. In the process, I find that I am better known as well.
This morning I went the gym, close enough to walk to even though I drive. These are my people, this is my place. This morning Eliana and I went for Friday morning coffee, where Greg knows what we order and we chatted with him about the day ahead. We saw our neighbors there and said hi, and I ran into a former student. These are our people, this is our place. I will walk over to the school today, where we will end our week with singing before we gather as staff at a local restaurant, also within walking distance, to spend time getting to know one another more deeply. These are my people, this is my place. Tonight I will gather with friends to go to the opera, where I will see friends on stage and enjoy this richly beautiful community event. These are our people, this is our place.
Earth Day grounds me in the universal, Rogation Day the particular. Both are where I live. The earth is the Lord’s and everything in it. And this little patch of earth is where I’ve been invited to tend and be tended, to know and be known. To be present here I have to slow down, move at the speed of growth, not progress. And growth is slow. In my garden this week I noticed that the leaves and brush from last summer didn’t break down over the winter as much as I’d hoped. So I raked up what was left and added it to a mulch pile. In the process, I startled (and was startled by) a duck who flew from the sticks and leaves that had not “progressed” as much as I had wished. And there, in my yard, was slow growth — a duck nest with seven beautiful eggs. The leaves can wait; knowing my neighborhood duck has found a safe place to nest settles a patience within me. There is no hurrying new life.
But that’s what we want to do so often, isn’t it? Hurry along new life? We want to flip the switch between night and day, making a sudden shift between Lent and Easter. Sections of my garden have been planted, but you’d never know it by looking. Growth takes time. And no amount of rushing will change that. I think my own growth is the same. Maybe the answer when I’m not “keeping up” isn’t to hurry more, it’s to slow down. Maybe it’s to live at the speed of growth, to know my place and be known in it.
Living Liturgically: Rogationtide
Rogationtide is a season-within-a-season in the liturgical year, beginning with Rogation Day on April 25, and ending with the minor rogations on the three days before Ascension Thursday. George Herbert, 17th century poet and Anglican priest, offers the following about the advantages of Rogationtide:
Particularly, he [the priest] loves Procession, and maintains it, because there are contained therein 4 manifest advantages. First, a blessing of God for the fruits of the field: Secondly, justice in the Preservation of bounds: Thirdly, Charity in loving walking, and neighborly accompanying one another, with reconciling of differences at that time, if there be any: Fourthly, Mercy in relieving the poor by a liberal distribution and largesse, which at that time is, or ought to be used. (Chapter 35, A Priest to the Temple)
Though separated by time and place, I love the reasons he gives for a continued observance of Rogationtide. Rogation comes from the Latin rogare, which means “to ask, to invite, to introduce.” It is an intercessory season, not for the world at large, but for a particular people and place. The intercession practiced during Rogationtide manifests itself in four ways:
Seeking God’s blessing over fruitful fields.
Seeking justice within the boundaries of a place.
Seeking to walk in love with one another and reconcile differences.
Seeking to practice God’s mercy by caring generously for the poor.
In George Herbert’s words I am reminded of what Joan Chittister says about the purpose of work: “Work is not to enable me to get ahead; the purpose of work is to enable me to get more human and to make my world more just.” It seems to me that Rogationtide is exactly a season of becoming more human and making the world more just. It’s the sort of invitation that changes not just the way my mind thinks about the place I live, but how my hands and feet move within it.
While Rogationtide isn’t as popular on this side of the pond as Earth Day, I think it is worth looking into and exploring. I’ve found a couple resources helpful in shaping my own thoughts and practices, and invite you to dig deeper with them if you’re interested.
A Book: Sacred Seasons: A Family Guide to Center Your Year Around Jesus by Danielle Hitchen
A Podcast: Risking Enchantment - Entering the Anglo-Saxon Seasons: Poetry, Liturgy, and Festivity with Eleanor Parker
Another Book: Winters in the World: A Journey Through the Anglo-Saxon Year by Eleanor Parker
A Poem: The Kingdom at Hand
Repent, for the kingdom of God is at hand. ~ Matthew 3:2
To repent
is to wish that I could go back in time
and do things differently
And seeing that I cannot,
to change course with the steps
that lie before me
instead of behind.
It is to wish I had never
wielded the weapons of the world
But knowing that I have,
tossing them afar
and reaching for what is near,
always near at hand:
the tools of the kingdom.
The kingdom is a garden shed
not an armory, full
of tools for building,
growing, sowing,
and not for tearing down.
So let me repent
of my anger
by forging forgiveness,
tempering my temper
in the heat of conflict
and inhabiting a stronger relationship
on the other side.
Blessed are the weak
for His power is made perfect
in weakness
and theirs is the kingdom.
So let me repent
of my selfishness
by releasing resources
into the kingdom coffers
where they will build good
instead of war.
Blessed are the poor
for they are building
what moth and rust cannot destroy
and theirs is the kingdom.
So let me repent
of my gluttony
by making meals
a place for others,
breaking, blessing, giving
into their emptiness
your fullness.
Blessed are the hungry
for the kingdom is manna,
a blessing broken if hoarded,
multiplied when shared,
and theirs is the kingdom.
So let me repent
of my hands that are full
of more than they can hold.
For Thine is the kingdom
and you give it away
as if there were enough for everyone
and too much for anyone
who might try to keep it
just for themselves.