Follow-up to WATERmeditation
Mary Hunt
Follow-up to WATERmeditation
Monday, March 9, 2026, 7:30 PM ET
“Hallowing Time” with Lillian Lewis
Warm thanks to Lillian Lewis for helping us to “Hallow Time” at such a time as this. Happy International Women’s Day. The video and notes can be found at https://www.waterwomensalliance.org/march-2026-hallowing-time-with-lillian-lewis/ .
Last month, Rosemary B. Ganley helped us to deal with the end-of-life issues and the planning we all put off. She convinced me, at least, to do the documents and then put it on the shelf and enjoy life. It was spiritually brilliant and very practical, if I do say so. Thanks, RBG.
You can find the audio and the notes at https://www.waterwomensalliance.org/february-2026-the-grace-of-endings-with-rosemary-ganley/.
We began with our customary land acknowledgment. We took a moment to focus on war, the utter and complete absurdity of choosing violence as a way to solve global and regional problems. May the Divine forgive the folly of our fellows who lead the way down this destructive path. May we renew our commitment to non-violence.
Mary E. Hunt’s Introduction of Lillian Lewis
I have never met Lillian Lewis in person as far as I know, but you are an amazing person to me, Lillian. As a writer and spiritual guide, the transparency and uniqueness of your contributions make you very trustworthy.
You preceded me at Marquette University where you were among the pioneer women who got master’s degrees in theology when women were few and far between in those circles. You remarked that that experience “set her (your) course for a life-long journey seeking Wisdom and the Divine Face.” Surely you have taught and ministered in ways some of those Marquette professors never imagined.
You are an ordained priest, part of the Roman Catholic Women Priests crowd in Michigan. You have defied convention by being ordained validly if not licitly according to Vatican lights; you have been excommunicated because of it. You have gone on your merry way to offer your time and talent in ministry to those who need you. I admire that and I rejoice that we are those people tonight.
Those of us who have benefited from your leadership in earlier sessions remember the first meditation on straightening our antlers and moving forward. We recall “Roadkill, the Blessing,” with a story of your grandson. Most recently, we were challenged by your reflections on the wardrobe, a la C.S. Lewis. These meditations are on our website under Programs/ WATERmeditations. I highly recommend them.
Thanks in advance for leading us on “Hallowing Time.” Welcome back, Lillian Lewis.
Lillian Lewis’ Input“ Hallowing Time”
It is best to watch the video to get every nuance of Lillian’s presentation.https://www.waterwomensalliance.org/march-2026-hallowing-time-with-lillian-lewis/. These notes are compiled from Lillian’s outline and the video.
From The Christian Century, Feb. 2025, Article by Aaron Rosen, “Lesia Sochor’s Ritual,”https://www.christiancentury.org/art/lesia-sochor-s-ritual-left-and-icon-right.
Lillian began: The picture is an icon. We will see time through the eyes of the woman. To hallow the Easter time it is necessary to hallow Lent first. The renewal of Easter has drifted away from Lillian’s and many other people’s lives. The effort now is to hallow Lent and then to get to Easter. Easter is the greatest mystery of Christianity. Mystery can’t be defined; it can just be approached as it sifts through your fingers. Mystery is solid as a rock and fragile as an egg.
Two approaches to hallowing the time:
A. The Old-fashioned way: Fasting, Almsgiving, Sacrifice, but take it up a notch.
1. Fasting from food, alcohol etc. is obvious. But be radical with yourself on fasting.
2. Give alms every day, every day. Pray for those to whom you give.
3. Sacrifice time to figure out how to give and to whom.
Stop pussyfooting around and figure out the meaning for this time for us.
B. The Old/New approach comes from the book and movie “Hamnet.”
Hamnet’s mother, Anne Hathaway, wife of Shakespeare, spoke of her son, “He was the lynchpin and when he died, we lost our footing, we became scrambled.”
On Holy Week—be with the Apostles, feel Jesus, the lynchpin being pulled out, and weep.
Let the old ideas scatter and fall down. We are old enough to know how this works.
These two approaches to Easter get us close to where the woman in the picture is. Hints of meaning are available in the face of mystery even if it can’t be known. The woman in the picture is holding a fragile egg which she is decorating. She is interacting with the resurrected part of ourselves.
Meditation
Divest yourself and take the place of the woman. Sit before the flame of the Holy Spirit. Put on the clothes of your ancestors—a beret tam or a hat, perhaps a babushka.
The point of the egg is to have what God wants us to have in newness.
Choose words you need to say to the Holy Spirit: “Let me know what I am meant to know/give. What wild, wise wisdom am I meant to know in power of the Resurrection?”
This was followed by communal silence for meditation.
Comments from Participants
Lillian’s leadership evoked a lot of responses from our group. Among the many good insights:
1. One person pulled out her many strands of family pearls. Another put on an apron as the painters of eggs do to keep splashes of paint off their clothes. Pysanky, the dying of the eggs in the Polish tradition, is passed from generation to generation. They were embracing their ancestors as Lillian suggested.
2. Another person remarked on the notion of giving every day. What a challenge.
3. Lillian’s humility struck another person as important. Swept up by news and the rest, she found that Lillian opened hearts and imaginations to more fundamental spiritual habits.
4. Lillian drew on Hamnet (book and now movie) to realize just how important Christ is to her life. Having the egg makes her feel as if she has Christ. She didn’t want Christ to leave, so knowing that he has returned (the essence of Easter) is helpful.
5. One participant recalled her trip to Ukraine and how deeply she grieves the suffering that the war is causing people there. This is no time to “roll over and play dead.”
6. An artist among us showed what she drew during the meditation time: the larger candle is Christ, the smaller candle received light from the larger candle. It a conveys hope to her.
7. Another person said that Lillian “redeemed” Lent for her. The gaze of the woman in the picture, her glow struck this person as important: What is the new light that is trying to emerge this Lent?
WATER thanks Lillian Lewis for another profound meditation. We look forward to the next one, Lillian.
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Next WATERmeditation will be Mon. April 13, 2026 at 7:30 PM ET with Jeanne Christensen who will reflect on the theme “Rest in the Time of Chaos” which is entirely fitting for our moment.
Co-director
Women's Alliance for Theology, Ethics and Ritual (WATER)
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