Close Encounters of the Spiritual Kind
Sr. Miriam Brown (center) talks with a group of retreatants.
Recently I had a chance to see again Steven Spielberg’s 1977 movie Close Encounters of the Third Kind. It opens with signs around the planet of mysterious visitations that leave an imprint of longing on those who experience these strange nighttime presences passing over the land. These stirrings draw people together and culminate in a moving ceremony of welcome to a people from outer space. It is a mystical story (though humorous in many parts) of invitation to the More, of transformation.
I am a staff member of the Racine Dominican Retreat Program at the Sisters’ motherhouse, Siena Center, on the shores of Lake Michigan. It is a holy place for close encounters. The retreat center offers welcome and holy space for transformative processes—recognition of inner resonances and stirrings, deep attention to the vibrations of Presence and call, and brave steppings-forward into the Spirit’s movement of change. Ours is a God who troubles the waters and makes all things new.
In the movie, an investigating official could make no sense of the response that an African nomad made to his questions about what he had seen. The officer was too embarrassed to write this in a report: “The man said the sun came out last night. He says it sang to him.” Ah . . . Simultaneously, the same haunting notes were being chanted by praying people in Asia and studied secretly by linguists from a number of nations. All were in the grip of some great anticipation, a new moment, a meeting about to happen.
Spiritual encounter is what we in retreat ministry hold reverently and give space to grow. The movie’s main character (Richard Dreyfuss), who was oddly but poignantly obsessive in his search for what it was all about, said desperately, “I just want to know that it’s really happening.” Today’s seekers also ask, “How can I learn to trust this innerness, this unsettlement, this desire in my heart for communion?” They listen to the tune planted mysteriously in their hearts. Coming together, many say this: Despite these worrisome times, we are celebrating and nurturing the new stirrings in our consciousness and spirituality. Something is “really happening!” We take responsibility. We are changing!
I love the ministry here. I am glad that it is Dominican, attuned and evolving, collaborative, interfaith, and working for a holy and just society. We are privileged to be “in the midst” of transformation of mind and spirit in people’s personal lives and our world today. The Spirit’s winds are circling our globe. We are hoisting our center’s sails through retreats, spiritual guidance, and communal nudging. We join in the global invitation to hear a new tune. We are part of the processes of transformation. We are taken up into the Spirit’s whirlwind and the “close encounters” of God’s ever newness.
Sister Miriam Brown, OP (Clarina)
