Yesterday, I had the good fortune to spend time at a monastery in Connecticut. It was a retreat for a church council who have a kind of mountain in front of them. Like many churches in New England they struggle with issues involving older buildings, shrinking towns, less young people, the stony nature of mission fields in our region. But something extraordinary happened in our time together. We told stories of times our needs were met in our faith community. They became stories of times we were met by God in community, in worship, in service. In the simple act of listening, and then sharing what we heard, the mountain became something less fearful, something more inviting, something to be curious about. And possibly something, also, that we could actually climb, even the freedom to decide, maybe we don’t want to climb this particular mountain.

What struck me was the longing in the group to spend more time in prayer and quiet, to focus on worship, and let go of the busy-ness they were feeling, spiritual hunger for time with God. By the end of the session, we were talking about what we could let go of, so that we would be freer to spend time listening to God, to each other, and to have more sabbath time. In terms of climbing mountains, it was a moment where we put down our packs, and took out the things that we didn’t need.

I spent some time this summer in the mountains, myself, on both sides of the country: the White Mountains, and the upper end of the Appalachians in Maine, driving through them, alas, not hiking; and also in California along the coastal ranges. I was astonished at how many ways human beings and animals had found to make paths up them and through them, often following river beds, but sometimes you could tell the path was made by sheer doggedness. One morning, on the top of a ridge, in California, I counted at least six different footpaths, all leading up and over, traversing ravines, hummocks, knots of woods. The same was true in the mountains here at home, many trails, many possibilities, easier climbs, harder climbs, climbs along rivers, climbs across rock faces.

The mountain is still a mountain. There are many ways through.