Every few months, we enter into the spirituality of one of the saints or holy people who understood, interacted with, and manifested God in a particular way in their lives, through a focused celebration of the Holy Eucharist in honor of their lives. This coming Contemplative Eucharist (just meaning one that involves more silence, time for reflection, and language expressive of the mystery the saint or mystic evokes) is centered upon Hildegard of Bingen. She has been canonized by the Catholic Church as a saint in 2012. She is a self-described female prophet, as one of only four women set apart as a Doctor of the Roman Catholic Church. Faithful to the church, the first Rhineland mystic nevertheless challenged the Church she loved to live up to the values of Jesus. Her words still challenge us to remember the apostle Paul’s counsel characteristic of the mystic’s experience, “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds”.
From her early life, Hildegard was sensitive to God’s illuminating presence. Before she turned 5 years old, she began to experience God’s presence enlivening and enlightening her. She experienced diving energy permeating her mind, body, and spirit, and revelations coming to her through spirit, sound, smell, touch and taste.
Hildegard held a profound sense of the goodness of creation and original wholeness of humankind that implicitly challenged literalistic interpretations of the reigning sin-redemption theology of the Western culture.
Hildegard wrote poetry, plays, songs, an opera, and medical and scientific treatises as well as texts in theology and spirituality.
Come and join us in a special worship experience, when we come together in community to settle into the goodness of God which Hildegard experienced and shared in so many ways.