Wondering Presbyterian

            I love reading. I was the kid who used to get in trouble in school for reading under the desk instead of paying attention in class. I even tried to set my room up as a library once. I organized my desk and made my dad come in and check one of my books out. Luckily, he returned it before I had to issue him a late fine.             I read for many reasons. Sometimes it’s to relax. Sometimes it’s to learn. Sometimes it’s because I’m a glutton for emotional punishment (seriously, some plots just make me anxious and I read the book anyway because I need to know how it ends!). Very, very rarely do I leave a book unfinished and I usually have three or four books going at once (I’m not advocating this…I think it probably contributes to my memory issues).             In a recent issue of a magazine I love to read, Flow , they talked about reading retreats. People go on retreats and read together. I imagined the quiet of this room with only the sound of pages turning and the oc

The adult coloring book craze seems to be winding down a bit, but I jumped on that bandwagon when it first started a few years ago. I have about seven adult coloring books in my house, some of which I’ve started and others that are completely blank. Sitting down to color does bring a little relaxation and calmness to me when I’m feeling anxious. Using artwork for meditation wasn’t that big of a leap, but it was a unique experience to sit in a circle in the sanctuary and pray through scripture and artwork with other people. I actually really enjoyed it. For Lent this year, we used an art-based devotional resource from a group called A Sanctified Art (https://sanctifiedart.org/). Each week, we offered a meditative service. We spent half the time in Lecto Divina , reading and meditating on the Gospel story of the week, and the other half of the time in Visio Divina , using the weekly artwork for meditation, and always closed with the weekly poem. We also had coloring sheets so we coul