This week we started up another round of LEX, which is my oh-so-clever name of our small-group Lectio Divina gatherings at the parish. This time around I've marketed it to young adults, which makes it a group I technically shouldn't be allowed to attend, given my advanced age.
(oooh by the way I came up with a theme for my next year... no, no I already have a Word Of The Year for my calendar year, remember? It's ASK. So far so good! This one's for my birthday-starting-year. Starting mid-august it'll be the year of "Forty-2ne-up*"! I'll be tuning up my...self. Get it?)
We an easy-breezy version of Lectio, which has a list of steps that varies depending on where you google it. We do a quick intro, then have one volunteer read Sunday's gospel.
(I am growing aware of how many commas I use when I write. I write like I talk, and apparently I speak in long, long sentences. If you are like me, you will be out of breath by the time you finish reading one of my sentences. What, you don't breathe differently according to what you read?)
Then we invite people to share their word or phrase or image that has "spoken" to them in the reading. (We have already, in the intro, invited them to listen prayerfully for such a thing.)
Then another volunteer reads the Gospel, and then we share our thoughts and whatnots.(Ooh wouldn't that be a great blog title? Thoughts and Whatnots!)
(I have been resisting taking part in Conversion Diary Jen's Seven Quick Takes, but maybe I'm actually doing it here. I am in super random mode, or what my friend Nancy used to call "random search")
I do a little bit of research on the reading so that I can fill in the contextual and exegetical details, which is nice because that directs our discussion and gives it some weight. It means we aren't just sitting around talking about our opinions on the text, or saying things like "huh, I wonder why it says that?"
I love LEX because always always always, someone says something that makes me think about the reading in a new way. This Sunday's Martha/Mary story is one I've heard a million times, and heard parsed a thousand times. It's always "are you a Martha? Or are you a Mary?" But this time we hotly debated the use of "distracted" vs. "burdened" in different translations, for instance.
In this new year of focusing on the liturgical Calendar at the parish, I think LEX-ing is going to be a great practice to...practice... with my fellow parishioners. Fun stuff!
*If I could get a job giving things nifty names, I would be a rich rich girl. Need something named? Let me know.
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This word has captivated me so much I am going to try to incorporate it into my every day conversation.
Margo I heart you, you always give me some small task for myself.
Interestingly enough if you look at the Latin for the "Martha and Mary" passage you will also find that the part where Jesus says she has chosen the better part can really be translated to she has chosen the "one thing necessary"...I talked about that this weekend. Just a thought for you.
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