Sketching Prayer

Last Friday I took a quiet day from my full schedule and spent the day at Holy Cross Monastery, where there are quiet spaces, comfortable chairs, good lunches, and wonderful river views, all wrapped up in an atmosphere of prayer and contemplation. Last year I took one day at the monastery each week of Advent, and I’m hoping to do likewise this year. When I am there my phone is on airplane mode and I spend my day in silence, reading Scripture, praying, musing, and sketching.

I consider all of these sketches from last week to be a form of “sketching as prayer,” whether or not I have Scripture or my own thoughts and prayers written on them, because I did them with an attentiveness to God. I often find that when I start to sketch, a part of me becomes more inclined to worship, more open to God’s still, small voice, and also drawn into prayer for other people.