Your body is spiritual. There are not two halves of you: soul versus body. You are one whole, made in the image of a God who is integrated and indivisible. Your relationship to your body cannot be separated from the health of your soul, for the two are intertwined to make up all that it means to be you. Your flesh and bones are sacred; they connect you to your soul’s experience of the divine. Science indicates that your body is composed partly of stardust. Faith tells us this was no accident. The presence of your body on this earth today is a miracle—a massive statistical improbability. And yet here you are, held fast in the divine generosity of this body you were given. Here you are, your flesh and bones a product of a perfect, generative, mysterious Love; a Love that holds all things together.
The contemplative tradition centers on an awareness of the reality that all things are interconnected; all things find oneness within one another, and thereby within God. With this contemplative posture in mind, think about the miracle of your body’s existence on the planet, here against all odds. Let yourself be amazed and humbled. As you come to honor your place in the universal life of God, see if you can notice and physically feel the gratitude in your body.
—from Luminous: A 30-Day Journal for Accepting Your Body, Honoring Your Soul, and Finding Your Joy,
by Shannon K. Evans
//Franciscan Media//