A Meditation for the Longest Night

This year's longest night takes place in the northern hemisphere on Wednesday, December 21st. As we journey toward Christmas day, we are invited to dwell in the depths of nighttime's shadows. Jessica Vazquez Torres (she/her), a member of the MLP National Board of Directors, provides a meditation for this sacred night. A video recording and transcript are below. May these words inspire you to dwell in the gifts of this evening.   CLICK HERE TO VIEW JESSICA'S VIDEO RECORDING   The longest night, the shortest day with its chilly air, confronts many of us with our dependence on light, our addiction to noise and brightness, our inability to be still, our biases against the absence of light. It reveals our inability to embrace times of fallowness, creative hibernation and regeneration,[1] the beauty the cold and bleak winter reveal. This resistance to embrace the season of long darkness is not without consequence, for it hinders us from experiencing and appreciating the fullness of creation; from seeing the darkness as a gift that can only be experienced because the light has stopped centering itself. I stumbled upon Jan Richardson’s poem Blessing for the Longest Night[2] which does not portray the dark as bleakness, but as worthy of its own place in the universe. It has served as a companion to my reflection.   She begins, All throughout these months as the shadows have lengthened, this blessing has been gathering itself, making ready, preparing for this night. It has practiced walking in the dark, traveling with its eyes closed, feeling its way by memory by touch by the pull of the moon even as it wanes. I am an urban dweller. It is the environment I love most with its noise, movement, and clarity. It is almost impossible to experience darkness in the city. There are too many sources of light and noise disrupting the darkness to feel comfortable in it. I was conditioned to distrust the darkness. The setting of the sun marked the transition from safe to unsafe. Consequently, I prefer my darkness to be artificially constructed via darkening window coverings. The light is just a curtain panel away. So when I heard my friend Richard at the beginning of a night to sunrise hike say, “You do not need a flashlight. Walking in the darkness is part of the journey. And it is not as dark as you think,” I looked at him in disbelief. The idea that we were supposed to hike into the dark New Mexico desert without turning on our flashlights because the light would keep us from fully experiencing the journey was absurd, and yet Richard’s enthusiasm won me over.  So, along with the others, I turned off my flashlight. As the hike began so did my anxiety. My brain was overwhelmed by the absence of light. Could I trust my feet? Would my reflexes move my legs fast enough to catch me when I stumbled? At least twice I turned on my flashlight only to discover it hindered my ability to see fully. The light narrowed the scope of my vision. It focused me on the six feet directly in front of me and that focus turned out to be disorienting, so I turned it off. As we hiked, I noticed my fellow night travelers. Each was navigating the darkness in their own way. Some, like me, struggled. Others threw themselves into the experience as if their life depended on it. Some moved in total silence, while others covered their discomfort with incessant chatter. Noticing them, allowing my awareness to reframe the darkness through their shapes, movements, and noises, shifted something in my relationship to the dark. The presence of community, of fellow sojourners, reminded me that I did not step into the darkness alone. Our walk that morning had a purpose. We were headed to meet the light. To see it as it broke through the horizon to play with the darkness, to collaborate in atmospheric refraction, queering straight electromagnetic waves as they passed through the atmosphere creating beautiful colorful mirages. As our group sat still on the mesa, our bodies and spirits adjusted to the darkness, I could finally understand Richard’s insistent declaration that the darkness would reveal the way, that it was in fact not as dark as we feared. I understood that if I allowed myself to adjust to it, it would offer unexpected blessings. Richardson’s poem continues: So believe me when I tell you this blessing will reach you even if you have not light enough to read it; it will find you even though you cannot see it coming. You will know the moment of its arriving by your release of the breath you have held so long; a loosening of the clenching in your hands, of the clutch around your heart; a thinning of the darkness that had drawn itself around you. (Breath) An insistent and excited voice broke the quiet. “This is your pilot speaking. My apologies for interrupting your sleep. We are experiencing something special, and I cannot let you miss it. Open your window shades and take in the Northern Lights.” These words awakened me from a shallow sleep on a red-eye flight from Seattle, WA to Minneapolis, MN. I struggled to comprehend what the pilot was talking about. I grew up in the Caribbean and prior to this moment had never heard of the Northern Lights. But given his insistence, I lifted the window shade to be confronted by the most breathtaking colors; dancing lights in hues of greens, blues, yellows, and light mauve. Once on the ground I did a bit of research to learn how rare the sighting had been. While Minnesota is among eight locations in the continental United States where the lights can be seen, the environmental and atmospheric conditions must be just right and key among these is darkness. The darkness is a requirement for us to witness the magical result of disturbances in the magnetosphere caused by solar wind[3] also know as the Northern Lights. I will never forget the moment when I encountered the lights. I will never forget how it made the tiredness cause by interrupted sleep bearable, how it allowed me to move in and out of meetings the next day if only to share what it was like to experience divine magic. I will never forget how in the darkness a voice prompted a group of strangers to awaken and share in the magic; how the experience created a pathway for strangers to notice each other and connect. That moment began to shift something in me; the narratives that align the darkness with threat, sadness, and loss suddenly felt hollow. How can a space that collaborated with the sun to produce such beauty be dangerous? How can a moment that meets us day in and day out be but an opportunity to notice how the absence of light created new possibilities to experience what lay hidden? As Richardson’s Blessing states: This blessing does not mean to take the night away but it knows its hidden roads, knows the resting spots along the path, knows what it means to travel in the company of a friend.   [1] Winter Solstice and the longest night ~ A love note from your online abbess | Abbey of the Arts [2] Blessing for the Longest Night (by Jan Richardson) - Bill Johnson (billjohnsononline.com) [3] Wikipedia, Northern Lights   Make a gift to MLP! Contact Us More Light Presbyterians hello@mlp.org