Been to Canaan, and I wanna go back again

I have wrote about my experience of attempting to sing beside the stream while here in Piegaro, a request from one of the women of Mary’s that I do while here on sabbatical. It was a good request, I do love to sing, especially when I find a peaceful place that is solitary, for I am self-conscience about my abilities. Here in Piegaro is a perfect place, where two lovely streams converge before merging into the trevore (river). I walk there almost every day, but have had a sort of “singer’s cramp” much like a writer’s block where I just couldn’t sing.
That is, until this week. This week, my favorite in the Holy Year – the church calendar – Holy week from Palm Sunday until Easter, when Jesus goes from the great welcome into the back gate of Jerusalem and exits out through the last supper, the passion, death and resurrection. It is the week that captures the heart of the Christian journey I found my voice at the stream. The song I sung was not the church song she suggested, but spoke to my heart in a very theological way. It was Carol King’s “Been to Canaan” a song that was brought to mind while speaking with my brother on skype while he is in Brazil working and I am here in Italy, we share the songs of Carol from our childhood.

One of the most telling lines in this song is: “I’ve been to Canaan, and I wanna go back again.” This is a very powerful line that goes back to the Israelites in exile, desiring to return to the land of Canaan, which translates into: humble, land of God’s gifts, and place of abundance. It is a song about the desire to return to home. A most fitting song for the week when Jesus would find himself at first welcomed as the Messiah, and end with the promise of eternity. The middle part of the week, where the desire would be, through the pain of friends betraying or denying, torture and suffering, and ultimately death. It is a part of life many people have experienced, particularly the type of women who pass through the doors of Mary’s Place and Church of Mary Magdalene, who have experienced abuse as children, have lived through poverty, and have continued patterns of suffering for many years, a part of life I have left in coming to Piegaro for sabbatical. I realized that just as Jesus was, through all the trials, coming closer to God, striving toward that elusive Canaan, beyond the pain, as are so many of us in this world.

As I sung this song I thought of the women at Mary’s needing that place of God’s gifts and abundance where they could humbly live within God’s loving grace. I also couldn’t help but feel like I had found my Canaan right here in Piegaro. A place where I regularly worship on a very frequent basis, where I have places like this stream to pray, where I have amazing friends who surprise me each day with the peace and love of God. Who are o.k. with me learning Italiana piano, piano (slowly, slowly). As I sang, “I’ve been to Canaan,” I realized for the first time in my life that yes, indeed I have been to Canaan, and I wanna come back again. Here in this place there are little reminders of my life where I would repeat negative patterns, and I could talk to people about the healthy patterns I needed and they provide, with hugs and kisses and support. It is a place where my friend Maria constantly surprises me with a mystical spirituality that is both sassy and so very loving.

In this place, my beloved daughter has come and told me, “Mom, you need to stay here, it is good for you.” It is my Canaan.
Do you have a place that speaks of Canaan to you, where God calls you?
How do you live in Canaan, or seeking Canaan?
What was your experience, if any, of the transition of Holy Week between the “hosannas” of Palm Sunday, the dark of Friday and the “alleluias” of Easter Sunday?