April 04th, 2020

​Two Wings of Awareness

The reflection that you are about to read came to me in a group email. It is a beautiful reflection for our
time.

Two wings of awareness, from John Philip Newell
From John Philip Newell’s blog on the Heartbeat website:
24th March, 2020:
Hildegard of Bingen, the 12th-century Christian mystic, said that we need to fly with two wings of
awareness. The one wing is an awareness of life’s glory and beauty. The other is an awareness of life’s
pain and suffering. If we try to fly with only one of these, she said, we will be like an eagle trying to fly
with only one wing. In other words, we will not truly see.
We are living through a moment in time that invites a new strength of awareness. We are hearing
stories from around the world today of terrible suffering and loss. And, at the same time, we are hearing
accounts of great beauty of spirit and love.
I pray for all of us these days that we may be strong in our seeing and in our loving of another. As one of
the prayers in Sounds of the Eternal puts it:
Let us serve love with our strength this day, let us serve love with our strength.
In heart and mind and body this day let us serve love.
Heartbeat
​
John Philip Newell is a former Warden of Iona Abbey, a teacher and an author.