Howling at the Moon
breaking the rules, living freely, and taking life less seriously
It was a magical night. I was in New Mexico at a retreat center, in one of my favorite places with some of my favorite people. The night sky was clear above us, and I had spent the night having deep conversations with new and old friends while others danced the night away. After the party was over, several of us stayed up to watch the moonrise.
I was exhausted, and even though it was nearly 1:00 a.m., I stayed awake. A friend’s phone told him that the moonrise was imminent and so we headed out to the large field and crawled into the bed of an old truck that was there more for looks than for function, and we pushed back the hay to make room for our bodies. While the five others climbed in, I stayed outside the truck, afraid to break some unwritten rule. Another friend’s phone played music for us as we settled in for the slow show: Gregory Alan Isakov’s acoustic, mellow tunes provided the background as we waited for the moon to rise, realizing that we had a while yet to go until it came over the mountain on the horizon. Eventually, I did crawl into the truck bed to join my friends, and while I loved Isakov’s melodic voice, I also grew anxious we weren’t supposed to be in this truck, and we were making too much noise. My constant worries kept drowning out the magic of the moment.
But my friends were as care-free and happy as could be. Their plan was set: once the moon is fully visible above the skyline, they would howl. “What if we wake up the people sleeping in cabins nearby?!” I asked, to which I was reassured that it was fine, not a big deal. “Maybe we should howl quietly…” I suggested, struggling to be anything except anxious about the whole situation.
Finally, the moment came and we hushed as we watched the moon inch up over the mesa. Once the moon was fully visible, all five friends belted out their full moon howl. Faces to the sky, full throated in their wild cry, shoulders open to the horizon. But my body, not even consciously, had the opposite response. I literally curled into a ball. I turned inward toward the ground and got as quiet as possible. I totally missed the beauty of the moment—this joyful noise that broke into our evening—this primal howl that connected us to our natural environment.
While I’m not proud of it, I understand where my response was coming from, and my friends knew me well enough to know, too. I was afraid of breaking the rules, of waking someone up, of getting in trouble. Normally, this anxious following of the rules helps me to keep moving through life smoothly and causing as little friction as possible. But in that moment, my attachment to following the rules at all costs was actually costing me a great deal. I could feel it in my body as my friends howled. I could feel how small my fear made me. Meanwhile, I could see how free and joyfully my friends were able to live.
I wanted to live like them. I wanted to move from a place of inner-freedom, rather than from a place of fear.
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Within days after I returned home from that trip to New Mexico, a sister in the community died. I didn’t know Sister Paula personally very well, but I had gotten to know her stories over the last few years through those who loved her and cared for her. This memory service would be a good one, I thought, because I rarely heard a story about Sister Paula that didn’t make me laugh or think about life more deeply.
One of my favorite details shared throughout the memory service was about Sister Paula’s love of the monastery clown troupe, “Fools on the Hill.” Her own gift was as a mime, and several sisters and friends spoke to the power of her expressions. In white face paint and dressed in black, Paula brought the scriptures to life in their monastery liturgies through the freedom of her physicality. Using no words at all, one sister said Sister Paula’s miming brought the gospel alive in a whole new way.
Later, after the memory service, a few of us found a write-up in the L.A. Times about their monastery clown troupe written in 1987, “Merry Benedictine Nuns Celebrate Gospel by Being Clowns for Christ.” In it, the sisters said they tried to break the Christian message out of the box it gets stuck in. The gospel, they believed, should be a source of connection and joy as well as a call for justice and peace. In the article, Sister Anne McCarthy was quoted to say: “You can easily get stuck in a position where you’re saying ‘no’ all the time. ‘No, we shouldn’t bomb Libya. No, we shouldn’t fund the contras. No, we shouldn’t be involved in Central America. No, we shouldn’t be building this weapon system.’” The clown troupe, offered a “yes”—yes to a life of happiness and hope in the Christian message. It brought it all together: laughter as well as lamentation. Sister Paula was quoted in the article, too. She said that she heard from people as they traveled with their troupe: “Boy, you’re the happiest bunch of nuns I’ve ever seen.”
From being a “clown for Christ” to her faithful daily practice of picking up litter on the monastery road to the way she lived in her elder years, the word people kept using to describe her was “free.” Sister Paula lived freely, and she didn’t seem to get caught up in what others thought. Her freedom came from a place deep within, yet it showed up in all the small things of daily life. She never lost her child-like joy—from laughing at herself and with others, to making friends with squirrels outside her window. Her freedom and joy led to a deeper connection and communion with all living things. She didn’t seem ashamed or afraid. She lived freely and fully.
In one of her journals, the sisters found a letter that Sister Paula had written over a decade earlier as an exercise in conscious dying, meant to be read after she died. It ended this way: “Remember me laughing at all the crazy stuff I did with all of you.”
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When I was helping edit the book Everyday Sacred, Everywhere Beauty, there was a line that jumped out at me every time I read it. Appearing in the brief chapter, “A Healthy Path,” Mary Lou Kownacki wrote about the signs of a healthy spiritual life, and she emphasized one especially: lightness of being. She asked, “Am I able to laugh at myself and the endless games I play like ‘how to measure progress on the spiritual path’? There’s nothing worse than a seeker who takes herself too seriously.”
There’s nothing worse than a seeker who takes herself too seriously? Eek... I feel called out every time I read that sentence. I tend toward the self-serious, especially about my spirituality. I like big theological ideas that keep me in my head. I resist things like improv games, or anything where I can’t plan and control the outcome. I prefer the concrete nature of pen-to-paper journaling, rather than the open-endedness of silent meditation.
This isn’t bad, of course, to take things seriously. But what I appreciate about Mary Lou’s spirituality was that she took things seriously, and then knew when to let go. She worked hard promoting justice and an inclusive spirituality every day, but she also would regularly take a half-day to go golfing, her favorite activity. She lived simply, but also embraced her love of food and art with trips to restaurants or museums with friends.
For Mary Lou, the monastic life was not one of deprivation and denial, but a life of abundance and beauty. The last words she wrote on her beloved Monasteries of the Heart blog, Old Monk’s Journal, remain her lasting lesson to me and countless others:
“Maybe I still need to realize that purpose is illusive, that too much of life is preoccupied with ‘working for a purpose,’ and that at the end purpose can’t be grasped. Maybe my purposeless wild cosmos and canaries get it: We’re here for play, for wonder, for awe and mystery.”
We’re here for play, for wonder, for awe and mystery.
I won’t say I have figured this out yet in my own life in the slightest. Howling at the moon put this into focus for me: living from a place of inner freedom is a muscle that I have hardly paid attention to, and so it has become atrophied. Sister Paula’s memory service showed me how beautiful a life can be when it is lived from that place of inner freedom, and how one person’s freedom inspires another’s. Mary Lou’s words remind me not to take myself too seriously, and that it’s okay to let go of purpose, and to instead simply play.
I suppose I’m writing all of this to tell myself: it’s okay to howl at the moon. Even, maybe especially, if it breaks the rules.
a few images of summer play
While I am still working on embracing play, summer does make it a little bit easier. Here are a few photos from the last month. I hope sharing these moments might spark your reflection on where / how / with whom you are able to live freely and embrace play in your life!
Sunset on Lake Michigan - I love how each night during the summer in beach towns like my hometown of Muskegon, Michigan, dozens of strangers gather together to witness this nightly miracle. Some play and run on the beach, others take family photos, some sit silently to take it in, others swim in the water. There are so many ways to welcome in the sacred.
Friday Morning Beach Club - In Erie for the third year and running, a bunch of people gather at the beach at 7am on Fridays to run into the water together. This has become a favorite ritual for my friends and I; there is no better way to end the week and start the weekend. Plus there’s free coffee.
Summer Night Bonfire - A few weeks ago, the Pax Christi Young Adult Caucus took their annual retreat at the Erie Benedictine monastery and we had a bonfire with them on the first night. It was so fun to spend time with young people who identify as Catholic and live into the counter-cultural, nonviolent roots of the faith.
As always, thank you for reading! If you like, please share any reflections this sparks in you below.
So beautifully expressed, Katie. Age will help you take life less seriously and become a rule breaker as I do now, but I used to feel as you do. Life is so short and must be enjoyed whenever you can, as long as you are always true to yourself. I know that Mary Lou and Paula are telling you this as well!
Really empathize with the desire to lighten up — it’s so easy to get so serious! Thank you for the reminder