Betty Ann Rutledge
By Betty Ann Rutledge
As part of our graduation from the Shalom Retreat Leadership Training, we were each asked to “present ourselves” to the community in the fullness of who we know ourselves to be as a leader: our strengths and growing edges and what we have learned about ourselves as leaders over the course of the training. Sunday, February 21, 2010
I began by holding up two stones: one a rose quartz heart-shaped crystal and the other a piece of hematite and asked people to pass them around the circle as I spoke. They represent the two parts of myself – the whole and the broken – that I move from in the world and that I intend to lead from.
Kahlil Gibran said:
Your joy is your sorrow unmasked.
And the selfsame well from which your laughter rises, was oftentimes filled with tears.
And how else can it be?
The deeper that sorrow carves into your being,
The more joy you can contain.
These words have been a beacon of hope for me over almost two decades. For those of you who don’t know my story, I spent 11 years working in HIV/AIDS communities, followed by 8 years working in grief and bereavement before coming to Shalom. Long before I knew that Shalom Mountain even existed, I learned and believed that the flip side of:
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- Anger is Passion
- Fear is Excitement
- Pain is Joy
I learned these lessons in hospital rooms and funeral homes and in the great parties we threw to celebrate the dead and remember that we were still alive.
I also grew up knowing, down to my core, that in midst of the pain and trauma of my childhood, that I was a beloved child of god.
And though I had to spend a few years in the desert after coming out as a lesbian and losing my connection to the Catholic Church which had been so formative for me – I finally did find my way back to a new spiritual home. And during all that time, my faith in the presence of that abiding, divine love never wavered.
So I would say that as a Shalom Leader, I AM THE EMBODIMENT OF VIA TRANSFORMATIVA…and I offer myself to you, to this community and to the world as a prayer for our collective healing so that we may all live more conscious, loving and fully alive.
At this point I offered the body prayer that many of you may be familiar with
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- Via Positiva (stretch arms out) delight, awe, wonder, revelry
- Via Negativa (dip down and let arms hang) darkness, silence, suffering, letting go
- Via Creativa (scoop up and lift above heart) birthing, creativity
- Via Transformativa (offer up to god) compassion, justice, healing, celebration
My growing edge as a leader is to embrace Positiva – to really claim pleasure as a holy birthright – and to learn to walk in the world from this new paradigm.
I started this training as a MASTER OF GRIEF –
And I’m leaving as a PRIESTESS OF LOVE.
…which really are just 2 sides of the same coin.
