Student Choice #3

Throughout this class, we have discussed the importance of long-distance hiking through the wilderness as a form of pilgrimage and I wonder if running as a similar effect but on a more short-term scale. This semester I have started running on trails as a form of spiritual discipline. While I run, I will have a conversation with God about the things that are weighing on my mind. I ask God what he thinks about the things I am struggling with and what he thinks about the way I have been living my life. I interact God but in doing so I also include the environment I am in. I will stop at a beautiful tree or gaze at the water as I am running over a bridge. In doing so, I am not simply engaged with myself but also my surroundings. Furthermore, running makes sacred communication not simply a mental or emotional exercise, but completely encompassing, body, mind, spirit. My legs are pounding out my prayers with each prayer, my arms praising God, my lungs breathing in his Spirit and breathing out the world's. Thus, running seems to demonstrate the extent to which the entire body can be involved in process of sacred communication.

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